[Last Name] 1 Julianna Kern Dr. Brown Music Appreciation 10/31/2021 Ethel Waters Ethel Waters was an American blues and jazz singer who is known for her wide range and slow vibrato. She was bornOctober 31, 1896, inChester, Pennsylvania. She died September 1, 1977, in Chatsworth, California.She grew up extremely poor. Ethel Waters was the daughter of a teenage rape victim, raised among the slums of Philadelphia and the surrounding cities, rarely staying in one place for more than a few weeks at a time. She excelled not only at taking care of herself, but also at singing and dancing; she began performing at church functions as a child and was known locally for her "hip shimmy sway" as a teenager. At the age of 12, she was married for the first time. She worked as a chambermaid in a Philadelphia hotel at age 13 and sang in public for the first time that year in a local nightclub. When she was 17, she began to sing professionally in Baltimore, Maryland, under the name Sweet Mama Stringbean.It was there that she became the first woman to sing theW.C. Handyclassic“St. Louis Blues” on the stage. Her professional rise was rapid, and she moved to
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