Closing Date Set For The Devil’s Music: The Life and Blues of Bessie Smith Off-Broadway

The one-woman blues musical The Devil’s Music: The Life and Blues of Bessie Smith will play its final performance on June 25. Written by Angelo Parra and starring Miche Braden as Bessie Smith, The Devil’s Music opened June 22, 2011, at off-Broadway’s St. Luke’s Theatre.

Based on the life of the legendary blues singer, The Devil’s Music takes place on the night of her tragic death in 1937. Smith (Braden) takes center stage in a Memphis “buffet flat” to tell her life story. The Devil’s Music features classic Bessie Smith songs including “I Ain’t Got Nobody,” “St. Louis Blues” and “Nobody Knows You When You’re Down and Out.”

Known as the “Empress of the Blues,” Smith was one of the most popular female blues singers of the ’20s and ’30s. In addition to singing on over 160 recordings for Columbia Records, Smith appeared on Broadway in Pansy. On September 26, 1937, the singer was injured in a car accident and died the following morning.