Valaida Snow
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Snow in a 1945 advertisement
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| Background information | |
| Born | (1904-06-02)June 2, 1904 Chattanooga, Tennessee, U.S. |
| Died | May 30, 1956(1956-05-30) (aged 51) New York City, U.S. |
| Genres | Jazz |
| Occupation(s) | Musician, entertainer |
| Instrument(s) | Trumpet |
Valaida Snow (June 2, 1904[1] – May 30, 1956)[2] was an American jazz musician and entertainer who performed internationally. She was also known as "Little Louis" and "Queen of the Trumpet," a nickname given to her by W. C. Handy.[3]
Snow was born in Chattanooga, Tennessee. Her mother, Etta, was a Howard University-educated music teacher and her father, John, was a minister who was the leader of the Pickaninny Troubadours, a group mainly consisting of child performers. Raised on the road in a show-business family, where starting from the age of five, she began performing with her father's group. By the time she was 15, she learned to play cello, bass, banjo, violin, mandolin, harp, accordion, clarinet, trumpet, and saxophone. She also sang and danced.
Her solo career began when she joined a popular revue called Holiday in Dixieland, after exiting an abusive marriage. She then held a residency at a Harlem cabaret, which helped lead her to be cast alongside Josephine Baker in the musical In Bamville, a follow-up to the enduring hit musical Shuffle Along. While the musical was itself not a hit, Baker and Snow both received positive reviews.
In the year 1922, when she was 18 years old she gained national recognition, leading her to travel all over the U.S. to perform as a dancer, musician (Trumpet player), and singer. The following year, Valaida appeared in the black musical Ramblin Round. In the year 1923, she also appeared in Will Mastin’s Follow Me revue. By 1924 she became a key figure in The Chocolate Dandies a broadway musical along with Elizabeth Welch and Josephine Baker.[4]
After focusing on the trumpet, Snow quickly became so famous at the instrument that she was nicknamed "Little Louis" after Louis Armstrong, who called her the world's second-best jazz trumpet player, besides himself. W. C. Handy, who is known as the Father of the Blues, gave her the nickname "Queen of the Trumpet." Contemporary critics Krin Gabbard and Will Friedwald have commented on her approach to playing like Armstrong. Gabbard said she developed a "distinctly Armstrongian style" and Friedwald said she "mimicked" Armstrong.[5] In a 1928 performance in Chicago at the Sunset Café, Snow played the trumpet, sang. Then seven pairs of shoes were placed in a row at the front of the stage, and she danced in each pair for one chorus. The dances and shoes to match were: soft-shoe, adagio shoes, tap shoes, Dutch clogs, Chinese straw sandals, Turkish slippers, and the last pair, Russian boots. "When Louis Armstrong saw the show one night, he continued clapping after others had stopped and remarked, 'Boy I never saw anything that great'."[6][7] Despite her talent, she had fewer opportunities to hold residencies as a bandleader at clubs in New York or Chicago, like many of her male peers. Instead, she predominantly toured, playing concerts throughout the US, Europe, and China. In 1926, she toured London and Paris with Lew Leslie's Blackbirds revue and then from 1926 to 1929, she toured with Jack Carter's Serenaders in Shanghai, Singapore, Calcutta, and Jakarta.
Her most successful period was in the 1930s when she became the toast of London and Paris. Around this time she recorded her hit song "High Hat, Trumpet, and Rhythm". She performed in the Ethel Waters show Rhapsody in Black, in New York. In the mid-1930s, Snow made films with her husband, Ananias Berry, of the Berry Brothers dancing troupe. After playing the Apollo Theater in New York City, she revisited Europe and the Far East for more shows and films. She was imprisoned in a Copenhagen jail during WWII when Nazi soldiers took over Denmark, where she was touring.[3]
According to a jazz radio show that aired on October 28, 2017, Snow said she was arrested in Europe, apparently going to jail for theft and illegal drugs. While later touring Denmark in 1941, she said she was arrested by Nazis and most likely kept at Vestre Fængsel,[8] a Danish prison in Copenhagen that was run by the Nazis, before being released on a prisoner exchange in May 1942.[9] It was rumored that her friendship with a Belgian police official helped her to board a ship carrying foreign diplomats.[10] According to jazz historian Scott Yanow, "she never emotionally recovered from the experience".[11] She married Earl Edwards. In the 1950s, she was unable to regain her former success.
Valaida Snow died aged 51 of a brain hemorrhage on May 30, 1956, in New York City, backstage during a performance at the Palace Theater.[12] Her death came three days before her 52nd birthday.
According to an article posted in the Pittsburgh Courier in 1933, Snow was arrested and later acquitted of bigamy after eloping with her fiancé Ananias John W. Berry, Jr.[13] Snow had 3 sisters Lavaida, Alvaida, and Hattie all of who were professional singers. She also had a brother named Arthur Bush.[14] In the year 1934 Valaida married Ananias Berry who was a member of the Berry Brothers. In 1943 Valaida married Earle Edwards who later became her manager.[14]
Many recordings of Snow performances still exist, including audio recordings and audiovisual recordings of her on stage or in films. According to musicology professor Tammy L. Kernodle, "The unfortunate thing about her legacy is that she wasn't recorded as much as many of her peers, but she was a greatly respected musician on the vaudeville circuit, and even amongst male jazz musicians themselves." This quote was from a phone interview by Giovanni Russonello, who on February 22, 2020, published her belated obituary in The New York Times,[15] as part of the "Overlooked No More" series. There are no commercial recordings of Snow as trumpeter made in the United States, all were recorded in Europe. Before her obituary was published, The New York Times wrote about her only once in a paragraph-long review about a 1949 Song Recital at New York's Town Hall.[16]
Dr. Kernodle also said that Snow's legacy is important as she helped "shift the context of jazz away from the early Dixieland style" and "she [was] important in terms of helping us gain an understanding of the spread of jazz to Europe, particularly after World War I."[15]
In interviews after returning from Europe during World War II, Snow claimed she had been in a Nazi concentration camp.[17]
Historian Jayna Brown studied the controversy over Snow's alleged rumor regarding being detained in a Nazi concentration camp, and concluded that she had not been in a concentration camp. According to Brown, on September 15, 1939, Snow's manager Earl Sutcliff was advised to leave the country to escape the violence that was taking place in Europe.[17] It is unclear why or what exactly took place but both Sutcliff and Snow remained in Copenhagen. According to Brown, Snow had another chance to leave Europe, but again refused. Instead, her manager was forced to leave due to drug-related charges; upon arriving in New York he was the first one to state that Snow was allegedly being held in a Nazi concentration camp, where he had nearly escaped.
To add to the confusion and controversy, many have been unable to place Snow's whereabouts between February and October 1941. In October of 1941, Snow was living under some sort of surveillance in Copenhagen until she was detained with no criminal charges on March 12, 1942, and sent to Vestre Faengsel. Brown indicates that this period was used to treat Snow's alleged drug addiction, and as a way to ensure that she would be able to return to the U.S.[17]
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