A 10-year-old boy stands over a mechanical player piano in a Chicago living room, pencil in hand, marking each key as it dips so he can teach himself the song. That boy was Albert Ammons, who grew up to become one of the defining figures of boogie-woogie piano. Born March 1, 1907 to two pianist parents, Ammons played percussion in a drum and bugle corps as a teenager, learned the blues from Chicago players like Hersal Thomas and Jimmy Yancey, and drove for the Silver Taxi Cab Company, where in 1924 he reconnected with boyhood friend and fellow cab driver Meade Lux Lewis. Together they honed a loud, fast, percussive style at rent parties before Ammons left the taxi for good in 1934 to lead a five-piece band at the Club DeLisa with bassist Israel Crosby.

In 1936, recording as Albert Ammons' Rhythm Kings for Decca, he sold a million copies of  ...