a sexy growl that gradually rose to a series of wild honks and screams

 

pdf, with thanks to the original sharer

blues queens celebrated freedoms in no uncertain terms: “No time to marry, no time to settle down,” Bessie Smith sang, “I’m a young woman, and ain’t done running ’round.” And if their current lives still involved trials and troubles, blues provided a way to speak out: Smith threatened that if her man interfered with her affairs, “I’m like the butcher right down the street, I can cut you all to pieces like I would a piece of meat.” Ma Rainey sang of the harsh realities of domestic violence, describing a man who would “take all my money, blacken both of my eyes, give it to another woman, come home and tell me lies.” But she also sang about finding happiness in lesbian culture, dressing up in “a collar and a tie” to go out with “a crowd of my friends / They must have been women, ’cause I don’t like no men.”