It’s tricky to find much online about Olivia Cook—unless you’re seeking her almost-namesake Olivia Cooke, the English actress who starred in Psycho prequel Bates Motel. But you’re not: you’re seeking the late New Orleans pianist and bandleader better known as “Lady Charlotte”—a woman denied her concert pianist dream by dint of her race, who nevertheless graced jazz festival stages right up to her demise. Did I mention that she taught Harry Connick Jr. to play? Read on for a biography, drawing on the fascinating research of jazz historian Sherrie Tucker and the dusty archives of the Times-Picayune.
Cook was born Olivia Williams in 1913 to Rose Williams, a railroad maid. (Little is known about her father Roland, who “didn’t stay with us very long,” Cook told one interviewer.) They lived with her maternal grandparents: midwife Olivia Mayo and William James Mayo, who was a church musician and Pullman railroad porter. The younger Olivia took lessons in praise music from her grandfather, performing on piano and organ at his church from the age of just six. She was also a student of Juilliard-trained musician “Miss Beatrice” Stewart Davis, who taught her the classical etudes—music young Olivia fell in love with.
Davis arranged for Olivia to attend Juilliard, winning her a scholarship to do so, but her mother wouldn’t allow it as she couldn’t bear to be separ
