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Sonny Terry

Sonny Terry, American singer and harmonica player (died 1986)

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Born
October 24, 1911
Died
March 11, 1986
Zodiac sign
Scorpio
Birth year
1911

About Sonny Terry

Saunders Terrell, known as Sonny Terry, was an American Piedmont blues and folk musician, who was known for his energetic blues harmonica style, which frequently included vocal whoops and hollers and occasionally imitations of trains and fox hunts. In 1938, Terry was invited to play at Carnegie Hall for the first From Spirituals to Swing concert, and later that year he recorded for the Library of Congress. Terry and McGhee were both recipients of a 1982 National Heritage Fellowship awarded by the National Endowment for the Arts, which is the United States government's highest honor in the folk and traditional arts.

Biography source: Wikipedia. The profile adds birthday-specific historical context from the Celebs Birthday Today editorial database.

Sonny Terry timeline

  1. In 1938, Terry was invited to play at Carnegie Hall for the first From Spirituals to Swing concert, and later that year he recorded for the Library of Congress.
  2. Terry and McGhee were both recipients of a 1982 National Heritage Fellowship awarded by the National Endowment for the Arts, which is the United States government's highest honor in the folk and traditional arts.

The world when Sonny Terry was born

Sonny Terry was born in 1911. The year snapshot below places that birthday in its cultural and historical setting: the music and films people were following, the headlines shaping public life, and the everyday prices families encountered.

Culture in 1911

  • Best-selling book"The Broad Highway" – Jeffery Farnol

Headlines and milestones

  • Major sports momentFirst Indianapolis 500 race
  • Top headlineTriangle Shirtwaist Factory fire kills 146 workers
  • Technology milestoneFirst transcontinental airplane flight (49 days)
  • World population~1.71B

United States snapshot

  • U.S. leaderWilliam Howard Taft
  • U.S. population93.4M

1911 versus 2026

These figures put everyday life in Sonny Terry's birth year beside the site's latest United States snapshot.

Measure19112026
Population93.4M341 million

Sources and editorial standards

This profile combines a biographical source with structured birthday and historical context. Sources recorded for this profile: Wikipedia, MusicBrainz, Wikidata. See our editorial policy for sourcing, corrections, and review standards.

Read the source biography on Wikipedia. Wikipedia text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License.