Edythe Baker

Edythe Baker (August 25, 1899 – August 15, 1971) was an American pianist, dancer, and Broadway performer born in Girard, Kansas. Following her parents' divorce around 1905, she relocated to Kansas City, Missouri, with her mother. Between the ages of 8 and 14, Baker received her formal education at St. Mary's Convent in Independence, Missouri, where she studied piano and voice.

Accounts of her early musical development vary. One places her working at Nowlin Music Co. in Kansas City as both a musician and saleswoman. Another credits composer-performer Ernie Burnett, who wrote "My Melancholy Baby," as an early teacher. A third describes her frequenting the Orpheum Theatre in Kansas City to absorb different piano styles. Some accounts suggest she was earning enough to support her mother and brother by age 15, playing ragtime piano in small cabarets. Yet another version has her leaving school for Leavenworth, Missouri, where she played piano in a moving picture house for two years before returning to Kansas City as a popular café performer. It was there that vaudeville performer Harry Fox encountered her act and offered her a position with his company.

By September 1919, Baker was billed alongside Willie Smith in a vaudeville act in Fall River, Massachusetts. The following year, she was described as a pianist featured in Fox's vaudeville offering who had arrived in New York from Kansas City seeking a career as a concert pianist. A "blues" performance drew enough attention that she signed a contract with Fox, and within a month she had also signed a two-year recording agreement with Aeolian Records to produce player piano rolls. Aeolian promoted her as "the foremost ragtime pianist of vaudeville," citing her distinctive approach to blues playing. Contemporaries noted that Baker practiced five or six hours daily and developed what observers called a "heartbreak rhythm," playing against time in a style considered entirely her own.

In 1920, Baker auditioned for Florenz Ziegfeld Jr. at the New Amsterdam Theatre. Ziegfeld, reportedly struck by the power of her playing, cast her in the Ziegfeld Midnight Frolic, an after-show cabaret held on the rooftop of the New Amsterdam, where she performed as both dancer and musician. She also appeared with the Ziegfeld 9 O'Clock Revue during 1920 and 1921, a credit that carried over into her verified Broadway record as Ziegfeld 9 O'Clock Frolic. Her stage act during this period was billed as "Ten Fingers of Syncopation."

Baker's Broadway career extended from 1921 to 1926 and included roles in the musicals Big Boy, The Blushing Bride, Hello Lola, and Innocent, in addition to her Ziegfeld appearances. She continued recording jazz music alongside her stage work throughout this period.

In 1926, Baker left the United States for London, where she established herself as a prominent theatrical star. She appeared in One Damn Thing After Another, a production by Charles B. Cochran with music by Richard Rodgers. Rodgers held Baker in high regard and acknowledged her in his autobiography, noting her distinctive performance style. John Durnford-Slater, in his memoir Commando: Memoirs of a Fighting Commando in World War Two, recalled hearing Baker perform "My Heart Stood Still" and "The Birth of the Blues" in London in 1927, describing it as among the most memorable experiences of his life.

In 1928, Baker married wealthy aristocrat Gerard d'Erlanger and became a recognized figure in London society. She was said to have taught the Prince of Wales the Black Bottom dance. She and d'Erlanger divorced in 1934. Baker continued to record music, with her final recording session taking place in 1933. Her recordings are accessible through the Smithsonian Folkways Recordings site.

Baker returned to the United States in August 1945. On December 2, 1961, she married Girard S. Brewer in Orange, California, where the couple lived until her death on August 15, 1971.