SparkNotes: Bessie Smith: *** UNKNOWN SN::Tools::SNC::LitGuide::ContentPage ***

1. Where was Bessie Smith born?

(A) Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

(B) Clarksdale, Mississippi

(C) Chattanooga, Tennessee

(D) Chicago, Illinois

2. What was Smith's eldest sister's name?

(A) Viola

(B) Lulu

(C) Tinnie

(D) Ethel

3. When did Smith join Moses Stokes' Traveling Show?

(A) 1912

(B) 1894

(D) 1937

4. What accessory was Ma Rainey best known for?

(A) A charm bracelet

(B) A necklace made out of gold coins

(C) A sapphire ring

(D) A silver cross on a chain

5. What was the title of Bessie Smith's first hit record?

(A) "Need a Little Sugar in My Bowl"

(B) "St. Louis Blues"

(C) "Downhearted Blues"

(D) "Gulf Coast Blues"

6. What famous musician did Smith team up with for the recording of her famous song "St. Louis Blues"?

(A) Mamie Smith

(B) Jack Teagarden

(C) W.C. Handy

(D) Louis Armstrong

7. When did women win the right to vote?

(A) 1920

(B) 1923

(C) 1894

(D) 1929

8. What was Smith's first husband's name?

(A) Earl Love

(B) Clarence Williams

(C) Jack Gee

(D) Louis Armstrong

9. What year did Smith and Jack Gee marry?

(A) 1918

(B) 1927

(D) 1929

10. Which record companies turned Smith down because her voice was "too rough"?

(A) Columbia and Sony

(B) Okeh and Black Swan

(C) Chess and A & M

(D) Atlantic and EMI

11. At her peak, how much was Smith making a week?

(A) $2,000

(B) $1,000

(C) $100

(D) $10,000

12. Who was one of Smith's chorines and also her lover?

(A) Lillian Simpson

(B) Ma Rainey

(C) Ruby Walker

(D) Alberta Hunter

13. Who was the head of Columbia's "Race Records"?

(A) Fletcher Henderson

(B) Frank Walker

(C) Jack Teagarden

(D) W.C. Handy

14. How many records did Smith record for Columbia?

(A) 160

(B) thirty-seven

(C) ten

(D) 200

15. What was the title of the musical Smith appeared in with Sidney Bechet in 1923?

(A) Hell's Bells

(B) How Come

(C) Rhapsody in Black

(D) 42nd Street

16. On what day and year did the Stock Market crash?

(A) October 29, 1929

(B) April 15, 1894

(C) December 7, 1941

(D) June 7, 1923

17. What happened on Jack Gee and Smith's first date?

(A) Smith got into a fistfight

(B) Smith recorded her first record with Columbia

(C) Jack Gee was shot

(D) Jack pawned his watch to buy Smith a new dress

18. What was Smith's nickname for her adopted son?

(A) Toots

(B) Little Man

(C) Blue

(D) Snooks

19. Which song, outside of "St. Louis Blues," is most widely identified with Bessie Smith, and which was recorded in 1929?

(A) "Put a Little Sugar in My Bowl"

(B) "Nobody Knows You When You're Down and Out"

(C) "T'aint Nobody's Bizness If I Do"

(D) "Gimme a Pigfoot"

20. What is the term used to describe the mass relocation of African-Americans to the North in the decades following the Civil War?

(A) Southern Immigration

(B) The Blue Period

(C) Northern Migration

(D) Emancipation Proclamation

21. What was the name of the traveling minstrel show where Smith first met Ma Rainey?

(A) Liberty Belles Revue

(B) Pete Werley's Florida Cotton Blossoms

(C) Moses Stokes Traveling Show

(D) Rabbit Foot Minstrels

22. Who was Carl Van Vechten?

(A) Smith's producer at Columbia

(B) A great jazz trombonist who played with Smith on her late records for Okeh

(C) Smith's first husband

(D) A music critic and photographer who was a great admirer of Smith's

23. Who was Richard Morgan?

(A) A Chicago bootlegger with whom Smith had a six-year-long relationship

(B) A bandleader who rejected Smith from his chorus line for being too dark

(C) The founder of Black Swan Records

(D) Ma Rainey's husband

24. To what genre of music did American tastes shift after the Stock Market crash?

(A) Jazz and Swing

(B) Ragtime

(C) Rock-n-Roll

(D) Country Blues

25. Who wrote Smith's famous hit "St. Louis Blues"?

(A) Louis Armstrong

(B) W.C. Handy

(C) Mamie Smith

(D) Benny Goodman

26. What year did Prohibition go into effect?

(A) 1919

(B) 1932

(D) 1937

27. What does the term "Harlem Renaissance" refer to?

(A) A street fair

(B) An African-American writer's conference that convened in the 1920's

(C) The proliferation of African-American art, music and writing in Harlem during the 1920's

(D) An underground civil rights movement

28. Which man in Smith's life suffered a series of nervous breakdowns?

(A) Jack Gee

(B) Richard Morgan

(C) Jack Gee, Jr.

(D) Clarence Williams

29. What year did Smith start in the short film "St. Louis Blues"?

(A) 1918

(B) 1894

(D) 1929

30. What year did Columbia release Bessie Smith from her contract?

(A) 1928

(B) 1921

(D) 1937

31. Whom did Smith replace at the last minute for her performance at the Apollo Theater?

(A) Louis Armstrong

(B) Billie Holiday

(C) Ethel Waters

(D) Sarah Vaughan

32. What new nickname did Smith go by when she started singing jazz standards in the thirties?

(A) The Sultana of Swing

(B) Lady Day

(C) The Queen of All Torch Singers

(D) Sweet Mama Stringbean

33. What was the date of Bessie Smith's death?

(A) October 29, 1929

(B) April 15, 1894

(C) September 26, 1937

(D) October 21, 1969

34. Where did Bessie Smith die?

(A) Memphis, Tennessee

(B) Chattanooga, Tennessee

(C) Clarksdale, Mississippi

(D) Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

35. What famous playwright wrote a play about the controversies surrounding Smith's death?

(A) Edward Albee

(B) Arthur Miller

(C) Samuel Beckett

(D) Wendy Wasserstein

36. In what city was Smith's funeral held?

(A) Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

(B) Clarksdale, Mississippi

(C) Chattanooga, Tennessee

(D) New York, New York

37. Rumors about Smith's death stemmed from a magazine article by which music writer?

(A) Carl Van Vechten

(B) John Hammond

(C) Ralph Ellison

(D) Albert Murray

38. For how many years did Smith's grave go without a headstone?

(A) thirty-three years

(B) ten years

(C) fifty years

(D) two years

39. Which famous 1960s rock star paid for a headstone for Bessie Smith's grave in 1970?

(A) Jim Morrison

(B) Jimi Hendrix

(C) Janis Joplin

(D) Grace Slick

40. How many Grammy Awards did Columbia's re-issue of Smith's 160 songs win?

(A) one

(B) two

(C) five

(D) zero

41. When was Smith inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame?

(A) 1937

(B) 1989

(D) 1997