Boogie Woogie Piano Greats

Albert Ammons * Meade Lux Lewis * Caroline Dahl * Art Tatum * Jimmy Yancey * Dorothy Donegan * Johan Blohm * Martha Davis * Silvan Zingg * Axel Zwingenberger

Martha Davis

Martha Davis (1917 - 1960) was an African American singer and pianist whose musical comedy act, "Martha Davis & Spouse", was popular in the late 1940s and 1950s. Davis was born in Wichita, Kansas, and raised in Chicago, Illinois. By the mid 1930s she had met and been influenced by Fats Waller, and performed regularly as a singer and pianist in Chicago clubs. In 1939 she met, and later married, bass player Calvin Ponder (1917 - 1970), who went on to play in Earl Hines' band. In 1948, Davis and Ponder moved to California, and Davis developed her recording career on Jewel Records in Hollywood with a trio including Ponder, Ralph Williams (guitar) and Lee Young (drums). Their cover of Dick Haymes' pop hit "Little White Lies" reached # 11 on the Billboard R&B chart, followed by a duet with Louis Jordan, "Daddy-O", from the movie A Song Is Born, which reached the R&B top ten later that year. Davis and Ponder also began performing together on stage, developing a musical and comedy routine as "Martha Davis & Spouse" which played on their physical characteristics (she was large, he was much smaller).

The act became hugely popular, touring and having a residency at the Blue Angel in New York. They appeared together in movies including Smart Politics (with Gene Krupa), and in the mid 1950s variety films Rhythm & Blues Revue, Rock 'n' Roll Revue and Basin Street Revue. Several of their performances were filmed by Snader Telescriptions for video jukeboxes, and they also broadcast on network TV, particularly Garry Moore's CBS show. In 1957, after a break of several years, they resumed recording for the ABC Paramount label, with whom they cut two LPs. Davis died from cancer in New York in 1960, aged only 42, and Ponder died ten years later, aged only 53.