Carrie Jacobs-Bond
About
Born in Wisconsin, Carrie Jacobs-Bond composed at a young age, and her only formal training came from with local teachers. At 18, she married E. J. Smith, and after their son was born, the two separated. She remarried to Frank Lewis Bond in 1889. Her first song was published in 1894, the same year that her husband died, and soon afterwards, she moved to Chicago and began her own publishing company, Carrie Jacobs-Bond & Son, due to frustration with established publishing companies.
In order to have her songs heard, Jacobs-Bond played and sang them herself, and baritone David Bispham sang an entire recital of her songs in Chicago in 1901. Of her 175 published songs, two became very popular: I Love You Truly (1901) and Perfect Day (1910). The publishing business continued throughout her lifetime, and after moving the company eight times, it finally settled in Hollywood. In 1927, Jacobs-Bond published her autobiography, The Roads of Melody, but stopped composing after her son’s suicide in 1928.
–Christie Finn
Source: New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians
Related Information
Public Domain Music
pdmusic.org/bond.htmlParlor Songs
parlorsongs.com/bios/cjbond/cjbond.phpSongwriters Hall of Fame
songhall.org/profile/Carrie_Jacobs_BondSongs
Video
Records
1938
Paul Robeson – The Complete EMI Sessions
Charles Wakefield Cadman, Henry T. Burleigh, Benjamin Carr, Will Marion Cook, Stephen Foster, Langston Hughes, Carrie Jacobs-Bond, Ethelbert Nevin, Oscar Rasbach, Oley Speaks
Sheet Music
First Solos: Songs by Women Composers, Volume I: High Voice
Half-Minute Songs
2. First Ask Yourself
3. To Understand
4. How to Find Success
5. The Pleasure of Giving
6. Answer the First Rap
7. A Good Exercise
8. A Present from Yourself
9. Now and Then
10. When They Say the Unkind Things
11. Keep Awake
12. Doan' Yo' Lis'n