Sister Lottie Peavey: When I Move to the Sky (1945)

It's always remarkable what you can discover on a cheap album. I bought this Lu Watters/Bunk Johnson record from Rough Trade in Bristol for ₤3 (about $6.50) and what bargain it proved to be.

Unbeknownst to me at the time these recordings by cornet player Lu Watters and his band (on one side) and trumpeter Bunk Johnson and his band (on the other) were a goldmine of great playing which, according the legendary Nesuhi Ertegun and Ralph J Gleason who wrote the liner notes, led to a revival of New Orleans music in the Fifties.

But the real find was the hitherto unheard voice -- for me -- of gospel singer Sister Lottie Peavey who had two songs with Johnson's band: When I Move to the Sky (which I think Sister Rosetta Tharpe wrote, she certainly sang it years before Peavey) and the equally powerful Nobody's Fault But Mine.

I've tried to find out about her but there is very little information available other than she was scheduled to record four sides with Bunk Johnson's band but only did those two, so powerful that it forced Johnson – who'd arrived late to his own session – to up his game.

She was certainly a serious Christian. She was slated to sing Down by the Riverside but considered it too secular.

I'll keep looking but meantime check out When I Move to the Sky and, as a bonus pulled From the Vaults, her treatment of Nobody's Fault But Mine at the same session.

Nobody's Fault But Mine

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For more oddities, one-offs or songs with an interesting backstory check the massive back-catalogue at From the Vaults