Valaida Snow

Happy Birthday, Valaida Snow 1904-1956....Louis Armstrong called her the world's second best jazz trumpet player besides himself  but today she is one of the Lost Ladies of Jazz. Born in Chattanooga, Tenn. to a vaudeville family, Snow's mother taught her to play a variety of musical instruments so well that by the time she was 15 she was playing the cello, bass, bango, violin, mandolin, harp, accordion, saxophone and, her favorite, the trumpet, on a professional level. She was also an accomplished singer and dancer. At the age of 5 she was playing violin and dancing as "Valaida the Great", the star attraction of the "Picaninny Troubadours", a children's troupe that traveled the south under her parent's direction.

In 1924 she made her New York debut in Sissle and Noble's "Chocolate Dandies" where she would meet her lifelong friend Josephine Baker. 1926 would find her in Chicago, singing and dancing at the Sunset Cafe where Carroll Dickerson's orchestra included her greatest influence, Louis Armstrong, and one of her many lovers, Earl "Fatha" Hines. Snow later said that she would play with Armstrong in the trumpet section of the orchestra on occasion and that he dubbed her "Little Louis", a nickname she would go on to use for promotional purposes.

She joined Jack Carter's group as a trumpeter later in 1926 and began her career of international travel with a two year stint in Shanghai, moving on to Hong Kong, Singapore, Jakarta, Calcutta and other cities in the Far East. She made her debut in Paris in 1929 with Sam Wooding's orchestra finally finding her way back to New York. In 1931 and 1932 she starred with Ethel Waters in Lew Leslie's "Rhapsody in Black" conducting the orchestra in a rendition of Gershwin's "Rhapsody in Blue". In 1934 she appeared in a London production of "Blackbirds" and became the toast of both London and Paris. Her popularity put her in contact with both European nobility and the upper classes where she was welcomed and celebrated. She also recorded for the first time under her own name during that year.

In 1939 she caused a scandal in the U.S. by marrying 19 year on Ananais Berry of the Berry Brothers. She was 35 at the time and the pressure from both Berry's father and the American public sent them both back to Europe after making several films together in Hollywood. The couple performed together in Europe but eventually parted ways.

As WW2 loomed in Europe, Snow was invited to perform in Denmark for the royal family. While visiting she was arrested for possession of drugs for her morphine habit and thrown in a Nazi concentration camp for 18 months. She was released as an exchange prisoner but her experiences had caused her both physical and psychological damage. When she returned to America she weighed just 65 pounds.

She tried to revive her career but the spark and vitality that had made her one of the outstanding performers of the 1930's had gone. Her long absences in Europe and the Far East had also failed to garner her much of an audience in the U.S.  She married producer Earl Edwards and continued to play on occasion. She died of a cerebral hemorrhage after a performance at the Palace Theater in New York just short of her 52nd birthday.

Snow was a phenomenal musician and performer  but because she was a woman in the jazz world of the 30's and 40's she was seen as a curiosity. She had perfect pitch, was skilled at transcribing and arranging and could play trumpet and sing in a wide variety of styles including jump swing, blues, calypso and popular music. She is largely forgotten today but her recording legacy proves her to be at least the equal of many of her male contemporaries.