HILL, BERTHA (CHIPPIE
). Blues singer ( in Charleston, South Carolina; in New York, New York). Her family moved to New York when she was a child, and she began singing in Harlem cafes and nightclubs at an early age. Later she toured with Ma Rainey and on the TOBA (Theater Owners' Booking Association) circuit. She settled in Chicago, Illinois, during the mid-1920s, where she soon established herself as an important blues figure. She first recorded...