Charity Bailey

Charity Alberta Bailey (September 7, 1904 – September 15, 1978) was an African American music educator in New York City and a children’s television pioneer who hosted the programs Sing-A-Song (1954–1956) and Here’s Charity (late 1960s). In both her classroom and educational programs, Bailey featured songs and instruments from around the world, with particular influence from Creole music and folk music. Bailey was a teacher at the Little Red School House in Manhattan and the Heathcote School in Scarsdale, New York, as well as other schools. She released children’s music recordings throughout her life. In the early 1950s she published the bestselling children’s song book Playtime with Music. Early life and education Charity Bailey was born in 1904 to a prominent African American family in Providence, Rhode Island. At age 16, she was described as a music prodigy with “sympathetic feeling as an accompanist” by The New York Age. Her sister Amy Bailey was noted as a soprano. In 1927, Bailey graduated with a degree in education from the Rhode Island College. Due to racial discrimination in Providence, she moved to Atlanta to teach at Spelman College Laboratory School, which was associated