George W. Johnson

b. George Washington Johnson, 29 October 1846, Virginia, USA, d. 1914, New York City, New York, USA. Born into slavery, during Reconstruction, Johnson moved north, eventually settling in New York. Through the 1870s and 80s he led a precarious existence before beginning a career as a recording artist. Given the date, around 1889, it is highly probable that Johnson was the first African American to make records. The date also explains why the material he recorded in the early 1890s, much of which came from minstrelsy, was often racist in content and style. Measured by the standa...