Piney Brown

Piney Brown
Brown (left) reunited with Ed Wiley, Jr., after nearly 50 years, at the Blues Estafette in Utrecht, Netherlands, 2000
Background information
Birth name	Columbus S. Perry
Born	(1922-01-20)January 20, 1922 Birmingham, Alabama, United States
Died	February 5, 2009(2009-02-05) (aged 87) Dayton, Ohio, United States
Genres	R&B, blues
Occupation(s)	Singer, songwriter
Instruments	Vocals
Labels	Apollo Records, King Records, Jubilee Records, Sound Stage 7, among others

Columbus S. Perry (January 20, 1922 – February 5, 2009), better known as Piney Brown, was an American R&B and blues singer and songwriter, who has been described as a "fine, big-voiced shouter". He released a string of singles between 1948 and 1988 and issued two albums late in his career. His songs have been recorded by Little Milton and James Brown.

Perry was born in Birmingham, Alabama, and raised in Kansas City, Missouri, and joined his family's gospel singing group. He relocated to Baltimore in 1940 and made his recording debut as Piney Brown for Miracle Records in 1947. Of the four songs that were recorded, only one was released, "That's Right, Little Girl", issued by Esquire Records in the UK several years later. Perry took the stage name Piney Brown from a club owner in Kansas City in the 1930s, who was immortalized in Big Joe Turner's "Piney Brown Blues" (1940).

An item in the Chicago Defender on February 7, 1948, reported that Brown was beginning a package tour the next month. His tenure with Miracle was short-lived, and he moved the same year to Apollo Records in New York, cutting several sides in 1948, including the single "Morning Blues" backed with "Gloomy Monday Blues". He next recorded for Sittin' In With Records, at which he met his long-time friend Ed Wiley, Jr.. They worked together for the first time in 1952, on the single "Have Mercy" backed with "Kokimo" (1952). Short-term, largely fruitless, stints followed with Par (1952) and Atlas Records (1954).

In 1953 Brown recorded "Ooh You Bring Out the Wolf in Me" backed with "Don't Pass My By" for Jubilee Records and "Walk-a-Block-and-Fall" backed with "Whispering Blue" for King Records. None of his records made the national charts, but they sold well locally, and Brown was a top-performing attraction who regularly toured the country. He performed with the young guitarist Albert Collins in the early 1950s. In the music polls in the Pittsburgh Courier, Brown was regularly nominated as the "top blues artist". He performed as a duo with Billy Brooks, and they played for a time at the Club DeLisa in Chicago, as a result of which both of them recording for Duke Records. In 1959, Brown recorded "Sugar in My Tea (Cream in My Coffee)" backed with "My Love" for Mad Records, a label founded by Tommy "Madman" Jones two years earlier.