St. Louis Jimmy Oden (June 26, 1903 – December 30, 1977) was an American blues musician and songwriter with a dry, laconic vocal style and is remembered now more for his songwriting talents than for his records.
James Burke "St. Louis Jimmy" Oden was born in Nashville, Tennessee, United States. His parents were Henry Oden, a dancer, and Leana West, although both had died before their son reached the age of eight. He sang and taught himself to play the piano in childhood. In his teens, he left home for St. Louis, where piano-based blues was prominent, to make his fortune with his fingers.
He developed his vocal talents and began performing with the pianist Roosevelt Sykes. After more than ten years playing in and around St. Louis, in 1933 he and Sykes moved to Chicago. In the 20s, on the busy circuit of speak-easies, clubs and parties in that ‘wide-open’ city, he met another pianist Roosevelt Sykes, and Jimmy began to focus on singing and songwriting in their work together. For more than ten years, Jimmy and Roosevelt were at the centre of the scene in St.Louis where the Blues piano of Peetie Wheatstraw, Walter Davis and Speckled Red made the city almost synonymous with tinkling ivories.
In Chicago, he was nicknamed St. Louis Jimmy and had a solid performing and recording career for the next four decades. Chicago became his home, but Oden traveled with blues players throughout the United States. He recorded many records, his best-known being the 1941 Bluebird release "Goin' Down Slow". It was a great song, delivered in Jimmy’s typical downhearted style, and a regional hit, but when America joined WWII his recording career, like so many others, hit the buffers.
After the War, Jimmy cut some tracks for the Bullet label, and in 1948 he cut ‘Florida Hurricane’ for Aristocrat Records, which was about to become Chess. His side-men on those sessions included pianist Sunnyland Slim and Muddy Waters on slide-guitar, and Muddy later recorded several of Jimmy’s compositions including ‘Soon Forgotten’ and ‘Take the Bitter with the Sweet’. In 1949 Jimmy and his partner Joe Brown set up their own JOB label, but within a year Jimmy had pulled out. His own records appeared throughout the 50s on the Savoy and Parrot labels, and with Roosevelt on Duke Records.
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| Muddy Waters, Jimmy Oden, Chris Barber, Ottilee Patterson |
He spent less time performing after being in a car crash in 1957. Songs written later in his career include "What a Woman!" Oden released the album Goin' Down Slow on Prestige-Bluesville in 1960. It had ten of his own compositions, including the title track. That same year he performed as a vocalist on three songs recorded for an Otis Spann session in 1960.
Jimmy continued to record sporadically for several labels in the 60s, but failing health was catching up with him. Jimmy had retired from performing by the end of the decade, and passed away in Chicago on December 30, 1977 from bronchopneumonia at the age of 74. He was interred in Restvale Cemetery, in Alsip, Illinois, near Chicago.
(Edited from Wikipedia & All About Blues Music)
