"Pine Top’s Boogie Woogie" is the record credited with laying the foundation for the boogie woogie craze, but its creator, Alabama-born pianist Clarence "Pine Top" Smith, did not live long enough to witness the phenomenon. Boogie woogie had been known by other names, including "Playing the Fives" and "Dudlow Joe," before Smith immortalized the new term with his Dec. 29, 1928, recording for Vocalion in Chicago. Smith died from a stray bullet in a Chicago dance hall on March 25, 1929, but his legend, his music and his name lived on, as many other pianists came to be called Pine Top or Pinetop, including Blues Hall of Famer Pinetop Perkins.
