Mary Lou Williams, (born Mary Elfrieda Scruggs, May 8, 1910, Atlanta, Ga., U.S.—died May 28, 1981, Durham, N.C.), jazz pianist who performed with and composed for many of the great jazz artists of the 1940s and ’50s.
Williams received early instruction from her mother, a classically trained pianist. Picking out simple tunes at age two, Mary Lou was a prodigy with perfect pitch and a highly developed musical memory by the time she was four years old. By age 10 she was known as “the Little Piano Girl” and was performing for small audiences throughout Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Her professional debut with big bands came in 1922, at age 12, when she substituted for a pianist in the Buzz and Harris Revue, a traveling show. Billed as Mary Lou Burley, she toured occasionally for the next few years and passed through New York City several times, playing for such artists as Jelly Roll Morton, Willie (“the Lion”) Smith, Fats Waller, and Duke Ellington.
