Willie “The Lion” Smith

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Happy birthday, Willie “The Lion” Smith!

Written in 1929 by Fats Waller, “Ain’t Misbehavin’” has since become a jazz standard.

Willie “The Lion” Smith was a master of the East Coast stride piano style. Nicknamed “The Lion,” his full name was long: William Henry Joseph Bonaparte Bertholoff Smith.

This is at the Berlin Jazz Festival in 1966. Just two years before this performance he had assembled his autobiography, for which Duke Ellington wrote a flattering introduction.

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