Barbara Dane

American folk and blues singer

Barbara Dane (born May 12, 1927 in Detroit, Michigan, USA) is an American folk, blues and jazz singer and guitarist. Jazz critic Leonard Feather called her "Bessie Smith in stereo," and after she opened for him in 1959, Louis Armstrong exclaimed "Did you get that chick? She's a gasser!" and invited her to appear with him on national television's Timex Jazz show. She toured the East Coast with Jack Teagarden, played Chicago with Art Hodes, Roosevelt Sykes, Little Brother Montgomery, Memphis Slim, Otis Spann, Willie Dixon and others, and appeared on Johnny Carson's Tonight Show as a solo guest artist. Other national TV work included The Steve Allen Show, Bobby Troop's Stars of Jazz, Playboy Penthouse, PM East/West and Alfred Hitchcock Presents. In the early 1960s she founded Sugar Hill, San Francisco.