Mose John Allison Jr. (November 11, 1927 – November 15, 2016) was an American jazz and blues pianist, singer, and songwriter. He became notable for playing a unique mix of blues and modern jazz, both singing and playing piano.
He was born outside Tippo, Mississippi on his grandfather's farm, which was known as The Island "because Tippo Bayou encircles it." He took piano lessons from age five. His father, a piano stride player himself, encouraged the young Mose in his playing but also taught him the meaning of “work on the farm.” Mose picked cotton, played piano in grammar school and trumpet in high school, and wrote his first song at age thirteen.
In his youth, he had easy access, via the radio, to the music of Pete Johnson, Albert Ammons, and
Meade "Lux" Lewis. Allison also credited the songwriter Percy Mayfield, "the Poet Laureate of the Blues," as being a major inspiration on his songwriting. In high school he listened to the music of Louis Armstrong, Fats Waller, Duke Ellington, Louis Jordan, and another of his prime inspirations, Nat Cole of the King Cole Trio. He went to college at the University of Mississippi for a while and then enlisted in the U.S. Army for two years. Shortly after mustering out, he enrolled at Louisiana State University, from which he was graduated in 1952 with a BA in English with a minor in Philosophy.
Meade "Lux" Lewis. Allison also credited the songwriter Percy Mayfield, "the Poet Laureate of the Blues," as being a major inspiration on his songwriting. In high school he listened to the music of Louis Armstrong, Fats Waller, Duke Ellington, Louis Jordan, and another of his prime inspirations, Nat Cole of the King Cole Trio. He went to college at the University of Mississippi for a while and then enlisted in the U.S. Army for two years. Shortly after mustering out, he enrolled at Louisiana State University, from which he was graduated in 1952 with a BA in English with a minor in Philosophy.
He worked in nightclubs throughout the Southeast and West, blending the raw blues of his childhood with the modern pianistic influences of John Lewis, Thelonius Monk and Al Haig. In 1956 he moved to New York City and launched his jazz career as a piano accompanist with artists such as Stan Getz, Gerry Mulligan, Al Cohn, Zoot Sims, and Phil Woods. His debut album, "Back Country Suite", was issued on the Prestige label in 1957. His keyboard playing retained a delightful eccentricity throughout his career, an uncategorisable style of whirling runs and marching left-hand countermelodies that was his alone. He formed his own trio in 1958.
It was not until 1963 that his record label allowed him to release an album entirely of vocals. Entitled "Mose Allison Sings", it was a collection of songs that paid tribute to artists of the Mojo Triangle: Sonny Boy Williamson (2) ("Eyesight to the Blind"), Jimmy Rogers ("That's All Right") and Willie Dixon ("The Seventh Son"). However, it was an original composition in the album that brought him the most attention – "Parchman Farm". This was his most requested song for more than two decades, but he dropped it from his playlist in the 1980's because some critics felt it was politically incorrect.
Allison’s best songs surfaced ever more prolifically in the period between 1960 and 1964, with I Don’t Worry About a Thing, Your Mind Is on Vacation and Don’t Forget to Smile appearing on an impeccable series of albums for Atlantic. He began to tour
![]()
internationally through the 60s and 70s, and his bluesy vocals and the enthusiasm of such influential fans as Morrison helped him avoid the effects of the rock-driven downturn in jazz’s fortunes in that period.
Allison wrote some 150 songs. His own performances have been described as "delivered in a casual conversational way with a melodic southern accented tone that has a pitch and range ideally suited to his idiosyncratic phrasing, laconic approach and ironic sense of humour."
Allison was inducted into the Long Island Music Hall of Fame in 2006. Allison's March 2010 album, "The Way of the World", "marked his return to the recording studio after a 12-year absence."
In 2012, Allison was honoured with a blues marker on the Mississippi Blues Trail in his hometown of Tippo. On January 14, 2013, Allison was honoured as a Jazz Master by the National Endowment for the Arts at a ceremony at Lincoln Centre in New York. The NEA Jazz Masters Fellowship is the nation's highest honour in jazz.
![]()
Allison died of natural causes on November 15, 2016, four days after his 89th birthday, at his home in Hilton Head, South Carolina. (Compiled and edited from Wikipedia, discogs.com & The Guardian)