Adelaide Hall

Ella Fitzgerald, Billie Holiday, Josephine Baker – we’ve all heard of the greats of the jazz age. But Adelaide Hall? Who’s she? Only the greatest singer you’ve never heard of . . .

Ella called her the first lady of jazz. She was the first to dance the Charleston, one of the richest Black women in America, the highest paid female entertainer in Britain during the war – so whatever happened to Adelaide Hall?

Join Oswin and Carla as we hear Adelaide sing and find out from the cultural historian Stephen Bourne all about Adelaide’s life, the Cotton Club, the Harlem Renaissance, the Blitz, music halls and why we should know more about her.