1. Anna Ottilie Patterson was a Northern Irish blues singer best known for her performances and recordings with the Chris Barber Jazz Band in the late 1950s and early 1960s.
13 Facts About Ottilie Patterson
1. 2.
Ottilie Patterson has been called the godmother of British blues and the greatest of all British blues singers, often surprising audiences with her large soulful voice and instinctive feeling for the genre.
3.
Anna Ottilie Patterson was born in Comber, County Down, Northern Ireland on 31 January 1932.
4.
Ottilie Patterson never received any formal training as a singer but was captivated by the blues from the age of ten.
5.
In 1949, Ottilie Patterson went to study art at Belfast College of Technology where a fellow student introduced her to the music of Bessie Smith, Jelly Roll Morton and Meade Lux Lewis.
6.
Ottilie Patterson joined the Barber band full-time on 28 December 1954, and her first public appearance was at the Royal Festival Hall on 9 January 1955.
7.
Ottilie Patterson was a key figure in the success of the band.
8.
When on tour with the band in the USA, Ottilie Patterson said that the night she sang, to great acclaim, with Muddy Waters' band at Smitty's Corner, was her proudest moment.
9.
Ottilie Patterson would sing with friends among the band members, but would not perform in public.
10.
Ottilie Patterson died on 20 June 2011, aged 79, in the Rozelle Holm Farm Care Home.
11.
Ottilie Patterson is buried in Movilla Abbey Cemetery, Newtownards, Northern Ireland, in the Patterson family grave.
12.
Ottilie Patterson became pregnant in 1956 and Barber insisted on an abortion, which was then illegal, and that she perform with the band two days later.
13.
Ottilie Patterson had wanted to have children but her injuries prevented this.