View objects relating to Gladys Bentley Top image: Photograph of Gladys Bentley by an unidentified photographer, ca. In an effort to describe her supposed "cure" for homosexuality she wrote an essay, "I Am a Woman Again," for Ebony magazine in which she stated she had undergone an operation, which "helped change her life again.” She died of pneumonia in 1960, aged 52. Bentley also studied to be a minister, claiming to have been "cured" by taking female hormones. Roberts later denied that they had ever married. Known fondly during her time as the Brown Bomber of Sophisticated Rhythm, Gladys Bentley was an openly lesbian and butch-presenting blues musician who rose to. Bentley was openly lesbian early in her career, but during the McCarthy Era in the 1950s, she started wearing dresses and married (within five months of meeting) Charles Roberts, age 28, a cook, in a civil ceremony in Santa Barbara, California, in 1952. She dressed in men's clothes (including a signature tuxedo and top hat), played piano, and sang her own raunchy lyrics to popular tunes of the day in a deep, growling voice while flirting with women in the audience. Was it because she was queer Either way, I have the story of this gender-bending blues musician for you right now. In the early 1930s, she headlined at Harlem's Ubangi Club, where she was backed up by a chorus line of drag queens. Born in Philadelphia, she moved to New York City at the age of 16 and began her career as a performer at Harry Hansberry's Clam House on 133rd Street, one of the city's most notorious gay speakeasies. Gladys Bentley Track 25 on Lovely Boogie Woogie Release Date NovemView All Credits 1 Boogie’n My Woogie (1945) Lyrics Chorus Yes, I wonder whos boogien my woogie now Hey, Doc, hey.
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