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Legends Of American Music: Jazz And Blues Singers — A Guide To Eight USPS Stamp Designs
The 1994 Jazz and Blues Singers issue consists of eight separate 29-cent designs. It does not depict eight performers on one stamp.
The eight designs
| Performer | Portrait artist | Stamp identification |
|---|---|---|
| Bessie Smith | Howard Koslow | 29-cent individual portrait |
| Billie Holiday | Howard Koslow | 29-cent individual portrait |
| Jimmy Rushing | Howard Koslow | 29-cent individual portrait |
| Mildred Bailey | Howard Koslow | 29-cent individual portrait |
| Muddy Waters | Julian Allen | 29-cent individual portrait |
| Robert Johnson | Julian Allen | 29-cent individual portrait |
| Ma Rainey | Julian Allen | 29-cent individual portrait |
| Howlin’ Wolf | Julian Allen | 29-cent individual portrait |
The eight separate designs were issued together on September 17, 1994, in Greenville, Mississippi, during the Mississippi Delta Blues Festival. Each stamp carries the performer’s name, the 29-cent denomination, and the Legends of American Music series identity.
The lineup contains four women and four men and deliberately joins jazz vocalists, classic blues singers, Delta blues, Chicago blues, and a big-band vocalist under one issue title. That broad grouping is useful for navigation, but it should not erase the differences among the performers’ repertories, working periods, and recording settings.
How to identify the set
Identify an item by performer, denomination, format, cancellation, and condition. A single stamp, full pane, first-day cover, and dealer-assembled set have different market contexts.
The linked museum records in the performer table establish each single’s design, artist, issue date, and printing details. A group with one of each is an eight-design set; original-pane quantity and layout are separate questions that require a contemporary USPS specification or full-pane image.
Value claims
No undated price or appreciation guarantee is given. Any market example must identify the date, item format, condition, and whether the amount is a completed sale or an asking price.
Issue structure and navigation
The shared denomination, typography, close portrait format, and Legends of American Music inscription unify the group, while the two artists’ treatments and the printed performer names keep the designs distinct. Artist assignments are given once in the table above.
Use the linked performer names in the table for museum object records and the separate performer articles for recordings, career history, and portrait context. This guide keeps the eight designs together for comparison without flattening eight different biographies into one generic musical story.
- Bessie Smith
- Billie Holiday
- Jimmy Rushing
- Mildred Bailey
- Muddy Waters
- Robert Johnson
- Ma Rainey
- Howlin’ Wolf
Format verification
| Claim being checked | Evidence needed |
|---|---|
| One of each portrait | Eight correctly identified singles; this may be a dealer-assembled set |
| Original post-office pane | Contemporary USPS specification or full-pane image showing layout, quantity, and selvage |
| First-day cover | Correct stamp plus first-day date, city, cancellation, and cover details |
| Complete issue | All eight performer designs, not merely eight copies of fewer designs |
Before treating an offer as an original pane, check its overall dimensions, selvage, perforations, adjacent stamp arrangement, and any printer markings against a documented full-pane example. A seller’s “complete set” may instead mean eight selected singles; the table above identifies those portraits without asserting an unverified pane layout.
Sources
Key facts were checked against the National Postal Museum Jimmy Rushing object record; the Bessie Smith object record; the National Postal Museum artist comparison; and the USPS subject chronology.