Vera Hall

Vera Hall (born in Payneville, Alabama in 1902, died in 1964) was an American folk singer. She grew up near Livingston, Alabama. Hall was married to a coal miner named Nash Riddle and she gave birth to her first child, Minnie Ada, in 1917.

Discovery by ethnomusicologists

In Livingston in 1937, Hall met John Avery Lomax, an ethnomusicologist who recorded American folk music. [http://www.verahallproject.com/spirit/middleyears.html#_Toc465304029] Lomax recorded Hall singing numerous songs that were put into the United States Library of Congress for preservation. Lomax's son, Alan, also championed Vera Hall -- bringing her to New York for a performance at Columbia University in 1948 and assembling "Rainbow Sign", a book based on Hall's life and stories.

Impact

She is most famous to contemporary audiences for being remixed by Moby on his single, "Natural Blues", essentially an extended remix of the song "Trouble So Hard". Hall's record, "Another Man Done Gone", was played on the BBC in 1943 as a highlight to American folk music. Also, "Another Man Gone" was played by Congress to commemorate the 75th anniversary of the Emancipation Proclamation.

A historical marker in her honor was dedicated on 21 April 2007 in Livingston.

Further reading

* [http://www.awhf.org/hall.html Alabama Women's Hall of Fame]
* [http://www.verahallproject.com The Vera Hall Project]