Born in Memphis, she left home while still in her early teens and settled in Chicago, Illinois. There, she peeled potatoes by day and hounded club owners by night, determined to land a singing job. Her persistence paid off, and Hunter began a climb through some of the city's lowest dives to a headlining job at its most prestigious venue for black entertainers, the Dreamland ballroom. She had a five-year association with the Dreamland, beginning in 1917, and her salary rose to $35 a week.
She first toured Europe in 1917, performing in Paris and London. The Europeans treated her as an artist, showing her respect and even reverence, which made a great impression on her.
Her career as singer and songwriter flourished in the 1920s and 1930s, and she appeared in clubs and on stage in musicals in both New York and London. The songs she wrote include the critically acclaimed "Downhearted Blues" (1922). She recorded several records with Perry Bradford from 1922 to 1927.
Hunter recorded prolifically during the 1920s, starting with sessions for Black Swan in 1921, Paramount in 1922–1924, Gennett in 1924, OKeh in 1925–1926, Victor in 1927 and Columbia in 1929.
Hunter wrote "Downhearted Blues" while recording for Ink Williams at Paramount Records, but she received only $368 in royalties. Williams secretly sold the recording rights to Columbia Records, in a deal giving the royalties to Williams. The song became a big hit for Columbia, with Bessie Smith as the vocalist. Hunter learned what Williams had done and stopped recording for him.
In 1928, Hunter played "Queenie" opposite Paul Robeson in the first London production of Show Boat at Drury Lane. She subsequently performed in nightclubs throughout Europe and appeared for the 1934 winter season with Jack Jackson's society orchestra at London's Dorchester Hotel. One of her recordings with Jackson is Miss Otis Regrets (she is unable to Lunch Today). While at the Dorchester, she made several HMV recordings with the orchestra and appeared in Radio Parade of 1935 (1934), the first British theatrical film to feature the short-lived Dufaycolor, but only Hunter's segment was in color. She spent the late 1930s fulfilling engagements on both sides of the Atlantic and the early 1940s performing at home. In 1944, she took a U.S.O. troupe to Casablanca and continued entertaining troops in both theatres of war for the duration of World War II and into the early postwar period. In the 1950s, she led U.S.O. troupes in Korea, but her mother's death in 1954 led her to her seek a radical career change. She prudently reduced her age, "invented" a high school diploma, and enrolled in nursing school, embarking on what was apparently a fulfilling career in healthcare.
Hunter was working at New York's Goldwater Memorial Hospital in 1961 when record producer Chris Albertson asked her to break an 11-year absence from the recording studio. The result was her participation (four songs) on a Prestige Bluesville Records album, entitled Songs We Taught Your Mother. The following month, Albertson recorded her again, this time for the Riverside Records label, reuniting her with Lil Armstrong and Lovie Austin, both of whom she had performed with in the 1920s. Hunter enjoyed these outings, but had no plans to return to singing. She was prepared to devote the rest of her life to nursing, but the hospital retired her in 1977, when they believed her to have reached retirement age (she was aged over 80).
Bored by inactivity, Hunter decided to resume her singing career, because she "never felt better." In 1978, at the suggestion of Charles Bourgeois, restaurateur Barney Josephson offered Hunter a limited engagement at his Greenwich Village club, The Cookery. She accepted and a two-week gig proved a smash when the comeback garnered generous media attention and people started flocking into The Cookery.
Impressed with the attention paid her by the press, John Hammond signed Hunter to Columbia Records. He had not previously shown interest in Hunter, but he had been a close associate of Barney Josephson decades earlier, when the latter ran the Café Society Uptown and Downtown clubs. Her Columbia albums, The Glory of Alberta Hunter, Amtrak Blues, (where she sang the jazz classic "The Darktown Strutters' Ball"), and Look For the Silver Lining, did not do as well as expected, but sales were nevertheless healthy. There were also numerous television appearances, including on To Tell The Truth (in which panelist Kitty Carlisle had to recuse herself, the two having known each other in Hunter's heyday). There was also a walk-on role in Remember My Name, a film produced by film director Robert Altman, for which he commissioned her to write and to perform the soundtrack music. As capacity audiences continued to fill The Cookery nightly, concert offers came from Brazil to Berlin, and there was an invitation for her to sing at the White House. At first, she turned it down, because, she explained, "they wanted me there on my day off," but the White House amended its schedule to suit the veteran artist. During that time, there was also a visit from former First Lady turned book editor Jackie Onassis, who wanted to sign her up for an autobiography but was unhappy with the co-author assigned to the project. The book was eventually done for another publisher, with the help of writer Frank Taylor.
The comeback lasted six years, and Hunter toured in Europe and South America, made more television appearances, and enjoyed her renewed recording career as well as the fact that record catalogs now once again contained her old recordings, going back to her 1921 debut on the Black Swan label.
Hunter's life was documented in Alberta Hunter: My Castle's Rockin' (1998), a documentary written by Chris Albertson and narrated by pianist Billy Taylor, and in Cookin' at the Cookery, a biographical musical by Marion J. Caffey that has toured the United States in recent years with Ernestine Jackson as Hunter.
Hunter came from a difficult background. Her father left when she was a child and to support the family Hunter’s mother worked as a servant to a whorehouse in Memphis. Although she married again in 1906, Hunter was not happy with her new family. Hunter left for Chicago around the age of eleven, in the hopes of becoming a paid singer; she had heard that it paid ten dollars an hour. Instead of finding a job as a singer she had to earn money by working at a boardinghouse that paid six dollars a week as well as room and board. Hunter's mother left Memphis and moved in with her soon afterwards.
Hunter was a lesbian, though she kept her sexuality relatively private. Her 1919 marriage to Willard Saxby Townsend was short-lived. In August of 1927, she sailed for France, accompanied by Lottie Tyler, a New York lady whom she had met in Chicago a few years earlier. Their relationship lasted until Ms. Tyler's death, many years later.
Hunter eventually moved to New York City. She performed with Bricktop and recorded with Louis Armstrong and Sidney Bechet. She continued to perform on both sides of the Atlantic, and as the head of the USO's first black show, until her mother's death, 1954. That year, she gave up show business and became a registered nurse. When Roosevelt Island's Goldwater Memorial Hospital retired her, believing her to have reached that age, Alberts (who was actually several years older) decided to return to singing. She had already made a brief return by appearing on two record albums, but now she too had a regular engagement at a Greenwich Village club, becoming a huge attraction there until her death in October 1984. She is buried in the Ferncliff Cemetery and Mausoleum, Hartsdale, Westchester County, New York (Elmwood section; plot 1411).
Hunter was inducted to the Blues Hall of Fame in 2011, while her album Amtrak Blues had been previously honored in 2009.
Downhearted Blues
Alberta Hunter Lyrics
Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴
Lord he mistreated me, and he drove me from his door
But the Good Book says you've got to reap just what you sow
I got the world in a jug, got the supper? right here in my hand
I got the world in a jug, got the supper? right here in my hand
And if you want me sweet papa you gotta come under my command
Lord I ain't never loved but three men in my life
It was my father and my brother and a man that wretched my life
Lord it may be a week and it may be a month or two
I said it may be a week and it may be a month or two
All the dirt you're doin' to me sho' comin' home to you
Lord I walked the floor, hang my head and cried
Lord I walked the floor, hang my head and cried
Had the down hearted blues, and I couldn't be satisfied
In Alberta Hunter's "Downhearted Blues," the singer expresses her feelings of despair and heartache after being mistreated by her man. She laments that he drove her from his door despite her love and devotion to him. Drawing from the Good Book, Hunter reminds him that he will ultimately reap what he sows. She then boasts about her independence by declaring that she has the world in a jug and the supper in her hands, emphasizing that any man who wants to be with her must be under her command.
Hunter reveals that she has only truly loved three men in her life: her father, her brother, and a man who caused her immense pain. She then warns her ex-lover that the harm he has done to her will come back to haunt him. In the final stanza, the singer describes the depths of her sadness and despair, walking the floor and crying from the downhearted blues.
The song captures a universal experience of love and loss, particularly during the era in which it was written, where women were expected to be submissive to their husbands and relationships were seen as conventional and traditional. "Downhearted Blues" became a classic featuring the sounds of the time and the soulful voice of Alberta Hunter.
Line by Line Meaning
My man mistreated me, and he drove me from his door
My partner mistreated me terribly and drove me out of his life
Lord he mistreated me, and he drove me from his door
Oh, how awful it was when my lover felt the need to treat me so badly that he expelled me from his life
But the Good Book says you've got to reap just what you sow
As the holy book states, we must take responsibility for our actions and accept the consequences that come with them
I got the world in a jug, got the supper? right here in my hand
I feel empowered and in control, as if I could hold the entire world in my hands and have everything I need to sustain myself right here and now
And if you want me sweet papa you gotta come under my command
If you desire my company, dear sir, you must accept to be submissive to me
Say I ain't never loved but three men in my life
I have only loved three men throughout my entire lifetime
Lord I ain't never loved but three men in my life
Oh, how true it is that I have only ever loved three men throughout my entire lifetime
It was my father and my brother and a man that wretched my life
The three men I have loved are my father, my brother, and an individual who caused me considerable pain and turmoil
Lord it may be a week and it may be a month or two
It may take a week or even a couple of months, but the negative treatment I am receiving from you will eventually come back to you in some way
I said it may be a week and it may be a month or two
I repeat that it may take some time, but the repercussions of your ill actions towards me will not be avoided
All the dirt you're doin' to me sho' comin' home to you
The harmful actions you are directing at me will definitely affect you in return
Lord I walked the floor, hang my head and cried
I suffered greatly, pacing around the room with tears streaming down my face
Had the down hearted blues, and I couldn't be satisfied
I was engulfed with feelings of deep sadness, and I just could not find any solace or happiness
Lyrics © BMG Rights Management, Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC
Written by: LOVIE AUSTIN, ALBERTA HUNTER
Lyrics Licensed & Provided by LyricFind