I Ain't Got Nobody
| "I Ain't Got Nobody" | |
|---|---|
Sheet music cover
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| Song | |
| Published | 1915 |
| Genre | Jazz |
| Composer(s) | Spencer Williams |
| Lyricist(s) | Roger A. Graham |
"I Ain't Got Nobody" (sometimes referred to as "I'm So Sad and Lonely") is a popular song copyrighted in 1915. Roger A. Graham (1885–1938) wrote the lyrics, Spencer Williams composed it, and Roger Graham Music Publishing published it. It became a perennial standard, recorded many times over following generations, in styles ranging from pop to jazz to country music.
Chicago and Saint Louis ragtime pianist and blues composer Charles Warfield (1878–1955) claimed to have originally written the song and a copyright dated April 1914 attributes Warfield as the composer, David Young as the lyricist, and Marie Lucas as the arranger. The title of the song is given as "I Ain't Got Nobody and Nobody Cares for Me". Williams's copyright entry from 1916 under a shorter title attributes the composition to Davy Peyton and himself and the lyrics to publisher Roger Graham.
In 1916, Frank K. Root & Co., a Chicago publisher(né Frank Kimball Root; 1856–1932), acquired the Craig & Co. copyright, and, later that year, also acquired the Warfield-Young copyright.
Clarence E. Brandon, Sr. and Billy Smythe, both St. Louis musicians, both claim that they wrote the first version, words and music, of "I Ain't Got Nobody", filed two copyrights 1911, and published it that same year.
"I Ain't Got Nobody" is best known in a form first recorded by Louis Prima in 1956, where it was paired in a medley with another old standard, "Just a Gigolo". Prima started pairing the songs in 1945 and the idea was revisited in the popular arrangement in a new, jive-and-jumping style, created by Sam Butera for Prima's 1950s Las Vegas stage show. The success of that act gained Prima a recording deal with Capitol Records, which aimed to capture on record the atmosphere of his shows. The first album, titled The Wildest! and released in January 1957, opened with "Just a Gigolo/I Ain't Got Nobody", which then became Prima's signature number and helped relaunch his career.
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