Fats Waller
Even as he teased, "Your feet's too big," he always hid tears behind the laughter — recollections of his contemporaries
At a glance 🔭💭
Some coordinates adapted from GeoNames (CC BY 4.0) · Pleiades (CC BY 3.0)
The people beside him ⏳🌊
- FamilyEdward Martin Waller
His father, a Baptist preacher, who hoped his son would become a church musician.
- TeacherJames P. Johnson
The father of stride piano, he took the young Waller on as a pupil after the boy lost his mother and passed on his technique.
- ColleagueAndy Razaf
As lyricist, he wrote hundreds of songs with Waller, including "Ain't Misbehavin'."
- FamilyAnita Rutherford Waller
His second wife, with whom he had two sons, Maurice and Ronald.
- FriendshipLouis Armstrong
Loved singing the songs Waller wrote and helped make them widely known; the two cherished each other.
- ColleagueDuke Ellington
Often placed Waller's songs in the orchestra's repertoire and thought highly of his gifts.
I. The preacher's son · 1904–1920 (age 0–16)
(New York) He was born in May 1904 in New York City. His given name was Thomas Wright Waller; he was born in Greenwich Village, but the family soon moved to Harlem, and it was there that he grew up. (Father) His father, Edward Martin Waller, was a Baptist lay preacher. Hymns filled the house, and his father hoped the boy would become a church musician or a minister. He looked with disapproval on young Thomas's attraction to the worldly sound of the piano. (Mother) His mother, Adeline Lockett Waller, was the first to teach him the piano. Under the care of this tender, music-loving woman, he is said to have been touching the keys by the age of six. In 1920, when he was sixteen, his mother died. He later recalled that this loss was what finally drove him into the piano bars of the night.
II. Apprentice of stride · 1920–1927 (age 16–23)
(James P. Johnson) After losing his mother, he sought out the Harlem pianist James P. Johnson. Johnson was regarded as the father of a style in which the left hand leaps widely between bass notes and chords (stride piano), and he took the young Waller on as a pupil and passed his craft along to him. The bond between teacher and student lasted a lifetime. (Organ) In his late teens he worked as an organist at Harlem's Lincoln Theatre. The job was to improvise accompaniment to the scenes of silent films as they played, and the experience planted in his fingertips the organ's broad resonance and its humor. (Marriage) Around this time he married Edith Hatchett, and they had a son, Thomas Jr. But marriage at so young an age and an unsteady income meant the couple did not last long. (Recording) In 1922 he began cutting piano rolls, and soon afterward he signed his first contract with Victor and began to see his name on records.
A solo piano piece in which he gives free rein to the stride technique he learned from James P. Johnson.
- The left hand leaps widely between low bass notes and midrange chords, creating a striding, walking rhythm (stride), while the right hand sings freely above it.
- The passage midway through, where the right-hand phrases quicken and race toward a climax, is famous.
- As a solo piece it has no interplay, yet the two hands create the illusion of two players trading lines.
- The ease of his wrists, unshaken even at fast tempos, defines his stride style.
III. Razaf and Broadway · 1927–1932 (age 23–28)
(Razaf) Meeting the poet and lyricist Andy Razaf was one of the most important encounters of his musical life. Waller would hum a melody and Razaf would set words to it, and in this way the two wrote hundreds of songs together. (Hot Chocolates) Among the songs written in 1929 for the Broadway revue 「Hot Chocolates」 was 「Ain't Misbehavin'」. Sung as if by someone teasingly assuring an absent lover of their good behavior, the song became an instant hit, and Louis Armstrong took it into his own repertoire and spread it further still. (Copyright) Yet Waller himself earned little from these songs. Whenever he needed money for the rent, he would sell the rights to the songs he had written to publishers for a pittance. Many great songs bear his name, but most of the royalties went to others. (Remarriage) During this period he married Anita Rutherford, and they had two sons, Maurice and Ronald. Anita remained his companion from then on.
Written with Andy Razaf for 「Hot Chocolates」, it went on to become his signature song and a jazz standard.
- Its 32-bar song form (AABA) is clear, so you can hear the same melody wear a slightly different expression each time it returns.
- The asides and laughter he slips in between the lines slyly sidestep the earnestness of the lyrics.
- The piano accompaniment never shows off; it concentrates on supporting the song.
- A relaxed push and pull of the beat (swing) gives the whole piece an easy air.
Written with Razaf for the same show, it gave voice to the grief of being judged by the color of one's skin, confronting the subject head-on as few songs of its time did.
- The slow tempo and low register cast a heavy mood over the whole song.
- Louis Armstrong's version is especially well known; his husky voice deepens the song's sorrow.
- Rather than dazzling improvisation, restrained phrasing holds the emotion in check.
- Among the stage songs of the day, most of them light comedy, it is regarded as unusually serious in its subject.
IV. A birthday party in Chicago · 1932–1934 (age 28–30)
(Depression) As the Great Depression deepened, his income shrank. With Broadway shows and recording sessions growing scarce, he went back to making a living in clubs and on the radio. (Capone) The story goes that in 1926, before the Depression, he was seized in Chicago by men with guns and pushed into a car, only to arrive at Al Capone's birthday party. He was supposedly kept there playing for three days and released with a thick wad of cash in hand, but there is little record to support it, and the anecdote may not be true. (Rhythm) In 1934 he formed his combo 'Fats Waller and His Rhythm' and signed a new contract with Victor. This small group became the backbone of his recording life from then on.
V. Laughter as a weapon · 1934–1938 (age 30–34)
(Victor) With 'His Rhythm', he became a prolific recording star, turning out several sides a month for Victor. He usually chose trite popular songs of the moment, but he turned those tired tunes inside out in his own way. (Persona) He would break off mid-song to roar with laughter, toss a quip into the middle of a lyric, or roll his eyes wide to quietly mock a song's earnestness. Later critics read this clowning not as mere antics but as a way for a Black performer before white audiences to protect himself while dissolving tension with laughter. (Radio and film) Radio broadcasts and appearances in short films made him a national star. Yet on tour he still had to steer clear of hotels and restaurants that barred Black musicians. (Armstrong) Louis Armstrong loved to sing his songs, and the two cherished each other. Duke Ellington, too, thought highly of his gifts and often put his songs into the repertoire of his own orchestra.
Recorded just after the founding of 'His Rhythm,' it became a standard that countless players went on to use as an étude for improvisation.
- It is often cited as a textbook example of playing freely over a set chord progression (jazz standard improvisation).
- The passages where the rhythm section and the piano trade short exchanges (call and response) are a delight.
- Waller's signature rolling vocal tone slips humor in between the lines of the lyric.
- Its harmonic structure became so widely used that jazz students later made a practice of laying their own new melodies over its chord progression.
One of the songs that best reveals his comic persona, it borrows the frame of an earnest love song and fills it entirely with jokes.
- Brief wisecracks and laughter, breaking in mid-song, take up half the track.
- The piano accompaniment punctuates the song's comic timing with short, sharp accents.
- A relaxed swing rhythm keeps the whole piece light and easy.
- It is counted among the signature numbers that drew roars of laughter from his radio and club audiences at the time.
VI. Across the Atlantic · 1938–1942 (age 34–38)
(Europe) In 1938 and the following year he set out on a tour of Britain and Scandinavia. In London he was invited by a broadcaster to give an organ performance, and he distilled his impressions of the period into a suite titled "London Suite." (War) When the Second World War broke out in 1939, the European tour was hastily brought to a close and he returned to America. The shadow of the war would fall heavily over his later tours at home as well. (Film) In 1943 he appeared in "Stormy Weather," a Hollywood musical featuring a large cast of Black actors and musicians. Having earlier appeared in "Hooray for Love" (1935) and "King of Burlesque" (1936), he found this film to be his last feature-length role. (Health) Long tours, all-night recording sessions, and heavy drinking wore his body down quickly. Colleagues recalled that while he was as vibrant as ever onstage, he would often fall asleep exhausted on the road.
A piano suite capturing his impressions of touring Britain, it is a rare instrumental work that reveals him as a composer.
- It takes the form of a suite, a succession of short pieces for piano alone, without voice.
- Each piece tries out a different mood and harmonic color, showing that his gifts as a composer reached beyond accompanying songs.
- Traces of stride technique remain, but more lyrical, impressionistic harmonies surface than before.
- It is regarded as an unusual undertaking for its time: an instrumental suite written by a Black jazz musician for European audiences.
An experimental piece that lays a swing feel over a triple-meter waltz rhythm, it shows that even late in life he never stopped trying new things.
- It is a rare attempt to bring out a swing feel over a triple-meter waltz rhythm, something uncommon in jazz.
- The melody flows gently, then the harmony darkens slightly toward the end, adding depth.
- Unlike his earlier comic repertoire, the piano tone here is reflective and calm.
- Many players later reinterpreted the piece's distinctive rhythmic structure in arrangements of their own.
VII. Last night on the train · 1942–1943 (age 38–39)
(Tour) In late 1943, even after the release of "Stormy Weather," he kept up a relentless touring schedule. After his final performance in Los Angeles, he boarded a train back to New York. (Train) On December 15, aboard the train as it passed near Kansas City, Missouri, he died. The cause was reported as heart failure brought on by pneumonia; he was thirty-nine. By the time the car attendant found him, it was already too late. (Funeral) His funeral was held in Harlem, and thousands of mourners crowded in. Fellow musicians, James P. Johnson among them, saw him off. The vast body of recordings he left behind, and the songs that had become standards, lived on in the repertoire of countless players ever after.
Lesser-known stories
While working as an organist accompanying silent films, he trained for years at improvising music to match the screen. That this experience later underlay his ability to produce polished accompaniments on the spot, in very little studio time, is a point raised often, but mostly among scholars who study his recording methods. That many of the songs he sold off for a pittance later grew more famous under the names of other composers or publishers was long a story known only inside the industry. That he died without receiving his fair share for songs he himself had written came to light belatedly, only as his copyrights were sorted out after his death. The reading that the clownish gestures and jokes he showed on radio and in clubs were not mere showmanship, but a way for a Black performer to protect himself before white audiences in an era of open racism, took hold not in his lifetime but through the reappraisals of later critics.
Glossary notes 📚🔎
Stride piano
(In jazz) A piano technique in which the left hand leaps widely between low bass notes and mid-range chords, creating a walking rhythm, while the right hand plays freely with the melody above. Because it resembles taking long, striding steps across a playground, it was given the name 'stride.' Just as your feet strike the ground at regular intervals when you jump rope, the left hand marks the rhythm's reference points at steady intervals. (Elsewhere) In everyday use, stride often simply means 'a long step' or 'progress.'
Rent party
(In jazz) A small party held in Harlem in the 1920s and '30s, to which neighbors and friends were invited for an admission fee in order to raise the rent. A pianist was hired to play, food and liquor were sold, and the money went toward the rent. Much like classmates pooling their money to buy school supplies, it was a way for neighbors to chip in together to cover living expenses. (Elsewhere) The term is bound to a particular time and place, so it is rarely used in other fields.
Copyright and royalties
(In jazz) The share a songwriter is owed each time a song is sold or performed is called copyright and royalties. In those days it was common for composers in desperate straits to sign these rights over to publishers wholesale, for a pittance. Much like doing a friend's homework and spending the favor they owe you in advance, it meant trading the share that would come later for cash right now. (Elsewhere) Copyright is a concept that applies equally to creative works of every kind, from books and films to software.
Cabaret card
(In jazz) In mid-20th-century New York, performing at a club or cabaret that sold liquor required an identification card issued by the police. Without this card, no matter how skilled you were, you could not take the stage, and since a card could be revoked over the slightest dispute, it was a matter of livelihood for performers. (Elsewhere) The term is confined to the history of jazz clubs and is not used in other fields.
Broadway revue
(In jazz) A musical stage show made by stringing together songs, dances, and sketches without a single plot. Much like a school talent show where different classes take turns showing off different acts, a revue strings together a different song and spectacle in every scene. (Elsewhere) The word revue (review) is itself also widely used in the sense of criticism or examination.
32-bar AABA form
(In jazz) A song structure common in popular songs and jazz standards, in which one melody (A) is repeated twice, a different melody (B, often called the bridge) appears once, and the opening melody (A) returns: four blocks of eight bars each, thirty-two bars in all. It is like singing a round, slipping in a different refrain partway through, and then returning to the original tune. (Elsewhere) The notation AABA is used in a similar way to mark rhyme schemes in poetry and verse.