What Happened to Johnny Ace?
Documentary
50 Mins
Johnny Ace was one of the biggest R&B stars of the early 1950s. Then, on Christmas night 1954, at just 25 years old, he died from a gunshot wound backstage at a show in Houston, Texas. The story of what happened that night has been repeated for more than 70 years — but the further you look into it, the less straightforward it becomes.
What Happened To Johnny Ace? traces Ace's remarkable rise from Memphis musician to one of America's most successful R&B performers, his relationship with Duke Records and Don Robey, the circumstances surrounding his death, and what happened to his music, money and family afterwards. Using contemporary newspapers, magazines, trade publications, photographs, court records and other archival sources, Traxploitation separates what we can document from the stories that grew around Johnny Ace after his death.