 Williams started a music publishing business with violinist/bandleader Armand J. Piron in 1915, which by the 1920s was the leading African-American owned music publisher in the country.He toured briefly with W. C. Handy, set up a publishing office in Chicago, then settled in New York in the early 1920s.In 1921, he married blues singer and stage actress Eva Taylor, with whom he would frequently perform.