Ms. Smith had been a presence in the jazz scene for three decades when in 1989 she was cast as one of the singers in the bluesy revue Black and Blue, a show that featured music by such 1920s and '30s blues and jazz titans as Duke Ellington, Eubie Blake, Louis Armstrong and Fats Waller. She sang the standards "Big Butter and Egg Man," "Am I Blue" and "I Gotta Right to Sing the Blues." The show ran for 829 performances. Carrie Louise Smith was born in Fort Gaines, GA, on Aug. 25, 1925. She started her career as a gospel singer, appearing at music festivals like the Newport Jazz Festival and Great Harvest Baptist Church in Newark. In 1961 she gave a solo concert at Town Hall in Manhattan. In the 1960s Ms. Smith sang with the pianist Big Tiny Little's band and a sextet led by the trombonist Tyree Glenn. By the next decade, she had developed a solo career, though she gained more renown in Europe than she did in United States.

Her albums included "Confessin' the Blues," "Do Your Duty," "Nobody Wants You," "When You're Down and Out," "Carrie Smith" and "I've Got a Right to Sing the Blues."

Ms. Smith has no immediate survivors.