With the publication of Memphis Blues , Handy helped cultivate a musical sound that proved to be both mournful and invigorating - a sound the young musician would simply call the blues. The composer once described the emotional texture of his music as the sound of a sinner on revival day. Later compositions, from St Louis Blues to Beale St Blues. Now hear some original, W.C. Handy recordings:



 

Muscle Shoals Blues
Gulf Coast Blues
St. Louis Blues
Yellow Dog Blues

Handy's most famous composition St. Louis Blues, was published in 1914. This song proved to be his best-selling number and one of the most recorded songs in the history of music. He later created the Yellow Dog Blues, Joe Turner Blues and Beale Street Blues, named for what he said was the colored thoroughfare in Memphis where you could find the best and worst of negro life. According to Handy, St Louis Blues was inspired by a fellow musician. In all, the composer wrote some 40 songs which he personally classified as 'blues.'

Handy established his own publishing company. After mild success with his Memphis-based publishing firm, Handy and his partner, Harry Pace, decided to move their operation to New York City, where they started publishing in 1917. During the twenties, Handy continued to write songs, and in 1926, he wrote Blues: An Anthology, which contained many of his earlier compositions and explained their origins.

Racial prejudice was clearly a factor in making Handy's songs difficult to sell, but so too was the blues' unfamiliarity to most mainstream music publishers. However, this same characteristic also worked to the music's advantage by keeping it from being watered down by Tin Pan Alley. Any composer could take the title 'blues' and turn it into something it wasn't, but most found it hard to write in the real blues style.

He lost his eyesight during the 1930s and began publishing music in braille. Handy composed a number of spirituals, and in 1938 he published a book entitled W. C. Handy's Collection of Negro Spirituals. Later that year, he was given a tribute at Carnegie Hall.

In 1939, at the New York World's Fair, he was listed as a leading contributor to American culture. In 1941, he published his autobiography, Father of the Blues. He also wrote or compiled - Blues Anthology in 1926, Treasury of the Blues in 1949 .W. C. Handy died in New York City on March 28, 1958. In 1969, he was honored posthumously by the United States Postal Service with a commemorative stamp. The Beale Street area of Memphis is known today as W. C. Handy Park. He was inducted to the Alabama Music Hall of Fame in 1987.

For the past 19 years, his beloved hometown of Florence has paid tribute to the immortal Father of the Blues with the week-long W.C. Handy Music Festival.  His restored birthplace is now a museum and tourist attraction.