Tommy Sands

He was divorced from Sinatra in 1965 and has a daughter, model Jessica Sands, born in 1977 from another relationship. She appeared in further films, including Mystery in Swing, Sunday Sinners (1940), Stolen Paradise, Murder on Lenox Avenue (1941), and Because I Love You (1943). Sands performed in several films including Babes in Toyland in 1961 and The Longest Day in 1962 but both his singing and film career had faded by the 1970s. She returned to performing in 1939 to appear in the motion picture Paradise in Harlem. In 1960, he married Nancy Sinatra and for a time they were the toast of Hollywood. She retired from recording and performing in 1931. Sands' sudden fame brought an offer to sing at the Academy Awards show and his teen idol looks landed him a motion-picture contract to star in a 1958 musical drama called Sing, Boy, Sing. Mamie Smith appeared in an early soundie, Jail House Blues, in 1929.

On the show, his song presentation of a tune called "Teenage Crush" went over big with the young audience and, released as a 45 rpm single by Capitol Records, it went to No.3 on the Billboard Hot 100 music charts. (Shortly later, this billing of Mamie Smith was one-upped by Bessie Smith, who called herself "The Empress of the Blues".). His initial recordings garnered little in the way of sales but in early 1957 he was given the opportunity to star in an episode of "Kraft Television Theatre". She was billed as "The Queen of the Blues". He was only fifteen when Colonel Tom Parker heard about him and signed him to RCA Records. She toured the United States and Europe with her band "Mamie Smith & Her Jazz Hounds" as part of "Mamie Smith's Struttin' Along Review". Sands began playing the guitar at age seven and within a year had a job performing twice weekly on a local radio station. She also made some records for Victor.

While still young, he moved with his family to Shreveport, Louisiana. Mamie Smith continued to make a series of popular recordings for Okeh throughout the 1920s. Born Thomas Adrian Sands into a musical family in Chicago, Illinois, his father was a pianist and his mother a big-band singer. It also opened up the record industry to recordings by and for African Americans in other genres. Tommy Sands (born August 27, 1937 ) is an American pop music singer and actor. The success of Smith's record prompted record companies to seek to record other female blues singers and started the era of what is now known as classic female blues. Johnson in the 1890s), they were all black artists who had a substantial following with white audiences.

Although other African Americans had been recorded earlier (going back to George W. "Crazy Blues" in particular was noted as a distinctively "colored" number performed by a "colored" performer. To the surprise of record companies, large numbers of the record were purchased by African-Americans, a market the record industry had hitherto neglected. These were the first recordings of vocal blues by an African American singer, and the record became an explosive best seller, selling a million copies in one year.

On August 10 of 1920, Smith recorded the Bradford-penned "Crazy Blues" and "It's Right Here For You, If You Don't Get It, 'Tain't No Fault of Mine". Smith's record sold moderately well, so she and Bradford were invited back to make additional recordings. Smith recorded two sides ("That Thing Called Love" and "You Can't Keep A Good Man Down") on February 14, 1920, backed by a white studio band. Tucker was ill and could not make it to the session; Bradford persuaded Okeh to allow Mamie Smith to record in Tucker's place.

In early 1920, Okeh Records planned to record popular singer Sophie Tucker performing a pair of songs by Perry Bradford. She appeared in songwriter Perry Bradford's musical "Made in Harlem" in 1918. Smith was born as Mamie Robinson in Cincinnati, Ohio. She toured with African-American vaudeville and minstrel shows until settling in New York City in 1913, where she worked as a cabaret singer. She entered blues history by being the first African American to make vocal blues recordings in 1920.

As a vaudeville singer she performed a number of styles including jazz and blues. Mamie Smith (May 26, 1883 - September 16, 1946) was a vaudeville singer, dancer, pianist and actress, and appeared in several motion pictures late in her career.