The man and his style were rooted in the Mississippi Delta blues. A pianist, singer, trumpet player, and songwriter who fused jazz and blues with profound lyrics, Mose Allison was a major influence on musicians for five decades, combining a voice as smooth as good sipping whiskey with taut piano rhythm and blues.
He was a disciplined professional who wrote about the ups and downs of life and music. As he put it in his song “The Night,” “Some nights you just get through it, and other nights it just comes through you.”
But after the last encore, away from the lights and crowds of nightclubs and concert halls, he was just another suburbanite who made his home and raised his children in Smithtown on Long Island. When not on the road touring in nightclubs and concert halls, he enjoyed cooking and reading cookbooks. He swam in Long Island Sound just a few miles away from home, practiced yoga, walked in the woods, and read voraciously.
How did the keyboard-thumping pianist who was named a National Endowment for the Arts Jazz Master go from a childhood in the Delta cotton fields to packed-venue audiences and high praise from his fellow musicians?
![Blues master Mose Allison lived in Smithtown.]()
Blues master Mose Allison lived in Smithtown.[/caption]
Allison wrote more than 200 songs and recorded some 60 vinyl albums; many of the compositions he penned have been performed by Elvis Costello, Diana Krall, the Who, and other musicians. Allison was nominated for a Grammy Award three times and was inducted into the Long Island Music Hall of Fame in 2006. Much of his work fits Time Out’s description: [He had a] “gift for writing a song with a sting in the tail.”
In an interview by Kevin Redding in TBRNewsMedia, John described his father’s life on Long Island. “When he wasn’t on tour, which was quite often, he would be back in the area and playing shows at the Staller Center at Stony Brook University or jazz clubs in Port Jefferson.”
John also said that his father kept a low profile. “There he was, living in Smithtown, so unassuming that even our neighbors, for 15 years, didn’t know what he did until they saw him on TV with Bonnie Raitt for a PBS concert at Wolf Trap.”… “He just wanted to do his thing.” Sometimes John would come home from school to see his father listening to weird music, laughing, and loving it. And sometimes the jazz master did tai chi in the living room.
He was 89 in 2016 when he died.
FROM THE DELTA TO THE DUNES
It was a long way from his grandfather’s Delta farm near Tippo, where Mose Allison Jr. was born in 1927. The farm had no electricity and no radio until he turned 13, so he listened to music on a wind-up Victrola record player. He showed his talent early, when he was a child, first at the piano then on trumpet. He wrote his first song when he was 14. His inclination to play blues and boogie-woogie came from hearing Black musicians playing in local juke joints, road houses, jam sessions, country music on the jukebox in his family’s general store, and after joining the U.S. Army, he played with their band. He graduated from Louisiana State University in 1952 with a bachelor’s degree in English and a minor in philosophy, and moved to New York City in 1956. He played backup piano with Zoot Sims, Gerry Mulligan and other major jazz artists, honed his improvising skills, and in 1957 recorded his first album. A few years later, he and his wife Audre Mae moved to Long Island. He told the Northport Journal, “In '63 I was living in a garden apartment in Queens. I didn't like the idea of my kids — four of 'em — growing up there.” He lived on Long Island for 45 years and raised four children there.BOOGIE-WOOGIE, BEBOP, SWING, AND THE BLUES
One of his most-requested songs was the Bukka White classic “Parchman Farm.” Allison’s rendition was typical Allison — an up-tempo, steady-pumping lament about doing time in the maximum-security prison. Another was his own composition, the contemplative “Everybody’s Cryin’ Mercy,” an exploration of politics and the Vietnam War which was covered by Bonnie Raitt and is still relevant today:"Well you know the people running round in circles
Don't know what they're headed for
Everybody's crying peace on earth
Just as soon as we win this war."
Allison was firm about his views on advertising. At one point during his career, Burger King wanted to pay him a huge sum for one day’s work. His response? According to New MusicUSA, he told his son John, “I ain’t singing about no hamburger.” [caption id="attachment_297292" align="alignleft" width="150"]
Blues master Mose Allison lived in Smithtown.[/caption]
Allison wrote more than 200 songs and recorded some 60 vinyl albums; many of the compositions he penned have been performed by Elvis Costello, Diana Krall, the Who, and other musicians. Allison was nominated for a Grammy Award three times and was inducted into the Long Island Music Hall of Fame in 2006. Much of his work fits Time Out’s description: [He had a] “gift for writing a song with a sting in the tail.”
In an interview by Kevin Redding in TBRNewsMedia, John described his father’s life on Long Island. “When he wasn’t on tour, which was quite often, he would be back in the area and playing shows at the Staller Center at Stony Brook University or jazz clubs in Port Jefferson.”
John also said that his father kept a low profile. “There he was, living in Smithtown, so unassuming that even our neighbors, for 15 years, didn’t know what he did until they saw him on TV with Bonnie Raitt for a PBS concert at Wolf Trap.”… “He just wanted to do his thing.” Sometimes John would come home from school to see his father listening to weird music, laughing, and loving it. And sometimes the jazz master did tai chi in the living room.
He was 89 in 2016 when he died.