Blanche Merrill

Aliases: Grandma Merrill
Real name: Blanche Howard Merrill Smith
Born: November 27, 1892
Died: March 1972
Country: United States
IPI: 00020568504 1 work
Affiliation: ASCAP
Comments: New York pianist and composer, who took her stage name from her first husband, Norman Watters Merrill, who died very suddenly at age 26 in 1915 leaving Blanche as a widow. She then married her second husband was Willie "The Lion" Smith. In the early 1950s she found herself semi-retired, but was asked in early 1960 to record some ragtime and old show tunes on an upright piano and a star was reborn. As she was now in her late sixties she was labeled "Grandma" Merrill.

Covers by Blanche Merrill

	Title	Performer	Release date	Originally by
i	Alexander's Ragtime Band	Grandma Merrill	1960	Emma Carus PRF, Collins and Harlan REC
i	Chinatown My Chinatown	Grandma Merrill	1960	Grace Kerns and J. B. Wells
i	Down Yonder	Grandma Merrill	1960	The Peerless Quartet
i	For Me and My Gal	Grandma Merrill	1960	M.J. O'Connell
i	How Come You Do Me Like You Do / When My Sugar Walks Down the Street	Grandma Merrill	1960	Marion Harris, Wolverine Orch. – Vocal Chorus Dave Harman
i	June Night	Grandma Merrill	1960	(unknown), Bailey's Lucky Seven
i	Limehouse Blues / Bye Bye Blues	Grandma Merrill	1960	Gertrude Lawrence and Jack Buchanan, Fred Hamm and His Orchestra
i	My Blue Heaven	Grandma Merrill	1960	Paul Whiteman and His Orchestra REL, "Kenn" Sisson and His Orchestra REC
i	Then I'll Be Happy	Grandma Merrill	1960	Hall and Ryan
i	The Sheik of Araby	Grandma Merrill	1960	Joseph Knecht's Waldorf-Astoria Orchestra
i	Yes Sir, That's My Baby	Grandma Merrill	1960	Gene Austin