Product Dimensions: 8”x10” photo in 11”x14” matte
Author/Artist: Center for Southern Folklore Archives

Piano legends Phineas Newborn, Jr. and Peter "Memphis Slim" Chatman celebrate Memphis Slim's birthday at The Peabody Hotel's Mallard's Bar in 1985. Newborn first played in an r&b band led by his father, a drummer, bassist Tuff Green and his brother Calvin, a guitarist, before moving on to work with Lionel Hampton, Charles Mingus, Big Walter Horton and others. Many of his records, such as The Great Jazz Piano of Phineas Newborn, Jr., remain highly regarded. Before his health necessitated his return to Memphis he played in New York, Stockholm and Los Angeles. Leonard Feather said of Newborn: In his prime, he was one of the three greatest jazz pianists of all time. Memphis Slim ranks with the great blues piano players. He took his name from Memphis, Tennessee, where he was born and raised. Memphis Slim got his start playing the blues at the Midway Caf�, at 357 Beale Street, in 1931. A tour of Europe, in partnership with bassist Willie Dixon a couple of years earlier, had so intrigued the pianist that he moved permanently to Paris in 1962 until his death in 1988. During his lifetime, he cut over 500 recordings and influenced future blues piano players for decades.