Eva Taylor

Eva Taylor, born Irene Joy Gibbons on January 22, 1895, in St. Louis, Missouri, was an American blues singer and stage actress who performed on Broadway between 1922 and 1927. One of twelve children, she began appearing on stage at the age of three. Before reaching her teens, she had already toured New Zealand, Australia, and Europe, and she also traveled extensively as part of Josephine Gassman and Her Pickaninnies, a vaudeville act.

By 1920, Taylor had settled in New York City, where she built a reputation performing at Harlem nightspots. Within a year of her arrival, she married Clarence Williams, a pianist, publisher, and producer who worked with Okeh Records. The two collaborated on radio broadcasts and recordings throughout the following decades. Among their most notable recorded work were sessions released under the name Blue Five in the mid-1920s, which featured musicians including jazz clarinetist and saxophonist Sidney Bechet, trumpeter Louis Armstrong, and singers Sippie Wallace and Bessie Smith. Taylor and Williams continued recording together into the 1930s. Taylor was also part of the Charleston Chasers, a series of all-star studio ensembles that recorded between 1925 and 1930.

In 1922, Taylor made her first record for Black Swan Records, an African-American-owned label that billed her as "The Dixie Nightingale." She went on to record blues, jazz, and popular material for Okeh and Columbia throughout the 1920s and 1930s. Although she adopted the stage name Eva Taylor professionally, she also performed under her birth name, Irene Gibbons, as the leader of Irene Gibbons and her Jazz Band.

Taylor's Broadway career spanned 1922 to 1927 and included appearances in the musicals Queen O' Hearts and Bottomland. Bottomland, written and produced by her husband Clarence Williams, ran for twenty-one performances in 1927. In 1929, she hosted her own radio program on NBC's Cavalcade, and she subsequently worked for a number of years at New York radio station WOR, including a guest appearance on Paul Whiteman's radio show in 1932. Taylor stepped away from performing during the 1940s.

Following the death of her husband, Taylor returned to performing in the mid-1960s and undertook tours of Europe. Her final European engagement took place in 1976 in Stockholm, Sweden, where she performed at the Pawnshop alongside local musicians, drawing primarily from the repertoire she had recorded with Clarence Williams Blue Five. At least one recording of those performances was released on Kenneth Records and Opus3 Records.

Taylor and Clarence Williams had two children. Their son, Clarence Williams, Jr. (1923–1976), was the father of actor Clarence Williams III. Their daughter, Joy Williams (1931–1970), was a singer and actress who performed under the stage name Irene Williams. Eva Taylor died of cancer on October 31, 1977, in Mineola, New York. She was interred under the name Irene Joy Williams beside her husband at Saint Charles Cemetery in Farmingdale, New York.