Una Mae Carlisle (1915 – 1956) was an American jazz singer, pianist, and songwriter, born in Xenia, Ohio. She was “discovered” by Fats Waller while still in her teens. Waller strongly influenced her boogie-woogie/stride piano style. Humour was also a part of her act.
[Waller] invited her to play on his radio show at station WLW in Cincinnati during Christmas week when Una Mae turned seventeen. She was still in High School at the time, and her mother had approved her Christmas vacation in Cincinnati because she was to stay with her elder sister. When her vacation was over, she refused to return home, becoming a professional musician working with Waller at WLW.
She was successful as both a performer and a songwriter. As a songwriter, her catalog includes “I See a Million People” and “Walkin’ by the River,” which were covered by many artists including Cab Calloway and Peggy Lee.
She also had her own radio and television programs late in the 1940s, though retired in 1952 due to illness. She died in New York City in 1956.
Her discography languished between her death and the mid-’80s when the first Carlisle reissue came out on the Harlequin label. Subsequently there have been reissues by RCA, which owns the Bluebird catalog, and the French Melodie Jazz label.
AllMusic
Full discography and session information can be found here. This is a Carlisle original called “It Ain’t Like That.”