Huey “Piano” Smith, whose two-fisted keyboard style and rambunctious songs propelled the sound of New Orleans R&B into the pop Top 10 in the late 1950s, died on Feb. 13 at his home in Baton Rouge. He was 89. His daughter Acquelyn Donsereaux confirmed his death.
Smith wrote his first song “Robertson Street Boogie”, named after the street where he lived, on the piano, when he was eight years old. He performed the tune with a friend Percy Anderson, with the two billing themselves as Slick and Doc. Smith attended Walter L. Cohen High School in New Orleans.
Huey Smith children: Does Huey Smith have children?
Mr. Smith married Doretha Ford in 1957. They had five children before they divorced. Mr. Smith’s lyrics were full of droll wordplay and irresistible nonsense-syllable choruses. “I use slang and things like that,” he was quoted as saying in John Wirt’s biography, “Huey ‘Piano’ Smith and the Rockin’ Pneumonia Blues” (2014), “When you put the music with words and things together, the songs just make themselves
