This is the third post of a multi-part series that will identify as many of the blues artists from around the world that I can locate information and/or photos of. I hope that you’ll follow along with me on this journey from the deep south to the far ends of the earth as I tell these stories.
PART Ic: Early Country Blues (continuation from Part 1b)
Name Birth Year Death year
Joe Pullum (circa December 25, 1905 — circa January 6, 1964) was an American Texas blues singer and songwriter.
Pullum, a Houston-born nightclub singer, was one of the more obscure blues stars. He was accompanied on his few recordings by two pianists; Rob Cooper on his earlier discs, and Andy Boy on his later efforts. Pullum's major success was with his self-written song, "Black Gal What Makes Your Head So Hard?" (1934). It sold in large quantities and was covered by Leroy Carr, Skip James, Mary Johnson, Jimmie Gordon, Josh White, Bumble Bee Slim, the Harlem Hamfats and Smokey Hogg. His subsequent recordings did not fare as well.
Pullum recorded four sessions, which yielded a total of 30 tracks tracks, between April 1934 and February 1936. The tracks included two intended sequels to "Black Gal," but overall sales were modest. Pullum later performed on radio on the Houston station, KTLC, backed by another pianist, Preston "Peachy" Chase. Pullum relocated to Los Angeles, California in the 1940s, and he further interpreted "Black Gal" into "My Woman", accompanied by Lloyd Glenn, on Swingtime Records in 1948. He also reputedly recorded a demo with Specialty Records in 1953.
Although he was a gifted songwriter, few of his contemporaries seemed able to recall him.
Pullum died in 1964, probably aged 58. All of his known recordings were collated on two Document albums released in 1995.
Joe Pullum 1905 1964
Ma Rainey (April 26, 1886? – December 22, 1939) was one of the earliest known American professional blues singers and one of the first generation of such singers to record. She was billed as The Mother of the Blues.
She began performing at the age of 12 or 14, and recorded under the name Ma Rainey after she and Will Rainey were married in 1904. They toured with F.S. Wolcott’s Rabbit Foot Minstrels and later formed their own group called Rainey and Rainey, Assassinators of the Blues. From the time of her first recording in 1923 to five years later, Ma Rainey made over 100 recordings. Some of them include, Bo-weevil Blues (1923), Moonshine Blues (1923), See See Rider (1924), Black Bottom (1927), and Soon This Morning (1927).
Ma Rainey was known for her very powerful vocal abilities, energetic disposition, majestic phrasing, and a ‘moaning’ style of singing similar to folk tradition. Though her powerful voice and disposition are not captured on her recordings (due to her recording exclusively for Paramount, which was known for worse-than-normal recording techniques and among the industry's poorest shellac quality), the other characteristics are present, and most evident on her early recordings, Bo-weevil Blues and Moonshine Blues. Ma Rainey also recorded with Louis Armstrong in addition to touring and recording with the Georgia Jazz Band. Ma Rainey continued to tour until 1935 when she retired to her hometown.
Ma Rainey 1886 1939
Bull City Red (born George Washington, Durham, North Carolina, United States) was an American, Piedmont blues guitarist, singer, and predominately washboard player, most associated with Blind Boy Fuller and the Reverend Gary Davis. Little is known of Red's life outside of his recording career.
George Washington's primary nickname, "Bull City Red", came from the 'Bull City' town of Durham, where he was born. He was sometimes alternatively called Oh Red. Although he was just good enough as a guitarist to imitate Fuller, with whom he frequently played, he was a very talented washboard player and also sang.
A partial albino, Red was a street musician in Durham before becoming the sole sighted member of a band managed by talent scout J. B. Long that included at various times Fuller, Sonny Terry and Davis. In 1935, then a trio featuring Red, Davis and Fuller, the band went to New York to enter the recording studio for the first time, in a session for the American Record Corporation (ARC). As his collaborators were blind, Red signaled them by touch when the recording ended. Accompanying Fuller along with Terry, Red recorded many songs for ARC's Perfect label between 1935 and Fuller's death during surgery in 1941.
Red also recorded gospel music based songs under the name of 'Brother George and His Sanctified Singers' along with Fuller, Terry, and Sonny Jones. He recorded "I Saw the Light" with guitar backing by Davis. On Fuller's latter day compilation album, Get Your Yas Yas Out, Red played the washboard on "Jitterbug Rag". Between 1935 and 1939, he struck out on his own as well, recording solo with his own vocals, guitar and washboard. His tracks included "Black Woman and Poison Blues" and "I Won't Be Dogged Around".
In 1941, Red became involved with another band. In late 1940, he had introduced Brownie McGhee and his collaborator Jordan Webb to his manager and fellow musicians Fuller and Terry. After Fuller's death, the group came together along with another washboard player, Robert Young, to record.
Bull City Red unknown unknown
William "Willie" Lee Perryman (October 19, 1911 – July 25, 1985), usually known professionally as Piano Red and later in life as Dr. Feelgood, was an American blues musician, the first to hit the pop music charts. He was a self-taught pianist who played in the barrelhouse blues style (a loud percussive type of blues piano suitable for noisy bars or taverns). His performing and recording careers emerged during the period of transition from completely segregated "race music", to "rhythm and blues", which was marketed to white audiences. Some music historians credit Perryman's 1950 recording "Rocking With Red" for the popularization of the term rock and roll in Atlanta. His simple, hard-pounding left hand and his percussive right hand, coupled with his cheerful shout, brought him considerable success over three decades.
Piano Red 1911 1985
Tampa Red (January 8, 1904 – March 19, 1981), born Hudson Woodbridge but known from childhood as Hudson Whittaker, was an American Chicago blues musician.
Tampa Red is best known as an accomplished and influential blues guitarist who had a unique single-string slide style. His songwriting and his silky, polished "bottleneck" technique influenced other leading Chicago blues guitarists, such as Big Bill Broonzy and Robert Nighthawk, as well as Muddy Waters, Elmore James, Mose Allison and many others. In a career spanning over 30 years he also recorded pop, R&B and hokum records. His best known recordings include the "classic compositions 'Anna Lou Blues', 'Black Angel Blues', 'Crying Won't Help You', 'It Hurts Me Too', and 'Love Her with a Feeling'".
Tampa Red 1904 1981
Walter Roland was an American blues, boogie-woogie and jazz pianist, guitarist and singer, noted for his association with Lucille Bogan, Josh White and Sonny Scott. Music journalist, Gérard Herzhaft, stated that Roland was "a great piano player... as comfortable in boogie-woogies as in slow blues." "Roland - with his manner of playing and his singing - was direct and rural," Herzhaft added.
Walter Roland 1900 1970
Robert Brown (July 15, 1910 – November 6, 1966), known professionally as Washboard Sam, was an American blues singer and musician.
Born in Walnut Ridge, Arkansas, United States, and reputedly the half-brother of Big Bill Broonzy, Brown moved to Memphis, Tennessee in the 1920s, performing as a street musician with Sleepy John Estes and Hammie Nixon. He then moved to Chicago in 1932, performing regularly with Broonzy, and appearing with him and other musicians including Memphis Slim and Tampa Red on innumerable recording sessions for Lester Melrose of Bluebird Records.
In 1935 he began recording in his own right for both Bluebird and Vocalion Records, becoming one of the most popular Chicago blues performers of the late 1930s and 1940s, selling numerous records and playing to packed audiences. Between 1935 and 1949 he recorded over 160 sides, including such popular numbers as "Mama Don't Allow", "Back Door" and "Diggin' My Potatoes." His strong voice and talent for creating new songs overcame his stylistic limitations.
By the 1950s, his audience began to shrink, largely because he had difficulty adapting to the new electric blues. His final recording session for RCA Victor was held in 1949, he retired from music for several years, and became a Chicago police officer. He recorded a session in 1953 with Broonzy and Memphis Slim, and in 1959 Samuel Charters included his "I've Been Treated Wrong" on the compilation The Country Blues for Folkways Records. Brown made a modest but short-lived comeback as a live performer in the early 1960s. He died of heart disease in Chicago, in November 1966, and was buried in an unmarked grave at the Washington Memory Gardens Cemetery in Homewood, Illinois.
A September 18, 2009 concert held by executive producer, Steve Salter, of the Killer Blues organization raised monies to place a headstone on Washboard Sam's grave. The show was a success and a headstone was placed in October 2009. The concert was held at the Howmet Playhouse Theater in Whitehall, Michigan. It was recorded by Vinyl Wall Productions and filmed for television broadcast in the mid-Michigan area by a television crew from the Central Michigan University. The concert featured musical artists such as Washboard Jo, R.B. and Co. and was headlined by the Big House Blues Band.
Washboard Sam 1910 1966
Dan Sane (September 22, 1896 – February 18, 1956) was an American Memphis and country blues guitarist and songwriter. He was a working associate of Frank Stokes and, according to Allmusic journalist, Jason Ankeny, "they had emerged among the most complementary duos in all of the blues, with Sane's flatpicking ideally embellished by Stokes' fluid rhythms." The best known of Sane's penned songs were "Downtown Blues" and "Mr. Crump Don't Like It." His surname was alternatively spelt as 'Sain'.
Dan Sane 1896 1956
Irene Scruggs (December 7, 1901 – probably July 20, 1981) was an American Piedmont blues and country blues singer, who was also billed as Chocolate Brown and Dixie Nolan. She recorded songs such as "My Back to the Wall" and "Good Grindin", and variously worked alongside Clarence Williams, Joe "King" Oliver, Lonnie Johnson, Little Brother Montgomery, Albert Nicholas, and Kid Ory. Scruggs achieved some success but today remains largely forgotten.
Scruggs originated in rural Mississippi, but it is believed that she was raised in St. Louis, Missouri. Mary Lou Williams recalled Scruggs being a singer of some standing when Williams travelled to St. Louis in vaudeville. Scruggs was hired by the revue company, and her career there sometimes outshone her work as a recording artist and nightclub singer. Nevertheless, Scruggs got to sing with a number of Joe "King" Oliver's bands that played in St. Louis in the mid 1920s. Scruggs was later accompanied by Blind Blake. In her live shows her song, "Itching Heel", provided the platform for interplay between the Scruggs' singing and Blake's guitar work. "He don't do nothing but play on his old guitar," Scruggs sangs, "While I'm busting suds out in the white folks' yard."
She first recorded in 1924, utilizing Clarence Williams as her pianist on Okeh Records. In 1926 she reignited her working association with Oliver. Two of the songs that Scruggs wrote, "Home Town Blues" and "Sorrow Valley Blues", were both recorded by Oliver. She recorded again for Okeh in 1927, this time with Lonnie Johnson. Scruggs formed her own band in the late 1920s, and appeared regularly performing around the St. Louis area.
Using the pseudonym, Chocolate Brown, she recorded further tracks with Blind Blake, and to avoid contractual problems also appeared billed as Dixie Nolan. By the early 1930s, Little Brother Montgomery took over as her accompanist on both recordings and touring work.
Scruggs also sang and recorded more sexually explicit material. "Good Grindin'" and "Must Get Mine in Front" (1930) were the better known examples of her dirty blues, and some of her work appeared in The Nasty Blues, published by the Hal Leonard Corporation. Scruggs only recorded a small batch of songs, and her recording career finished around 1935. In the 1940s, Scruggs left the United States for Europe, first settling in Paris, and later relocating to Germany. In the 1950s, Scruggs undertook a number of BBC Radio broadcasts.
It is thought that she died in Germany, although no definitive information has been unearthed.
Irene Scruggs 1901 1981
Alec Seward (March 16, 1902 - May 11, 1972) was an American Piedmont and country blues singer, guitarist and songwriter. Some of his records were released under pseudonyms, such as Guitar Slim, Blues Servant Boy, King Blues and Georgia Slim. His best remembered recordings were "Creepin' Blues" and "Some People Say."
Seward, one of fourteen siblings, was born in Charles City County, Virginia. Similar to Gabriel Brown, Ralph Willis and Brownie McGhee, Seward relocated from the Southern United States to New York, in his case in 1924.
Seward befriended Brownie McGhee and Sonny Terry, and retained his Piedmont blues styling despite changes in musical trends. He met Louis Hayes (who later became a minister in northern New Jersey) and the duo performed variously named as the Blues Servant Boys, Guitar Slim and Jelly Belly, or The Back Porch Boys. During the 1940s and 1950s Seward played and recorded with Lead Belly, Woody Guthrie, McGhee and Terry. Around 1947 Seward, Guthrie, and Terry, recorded several chain gang related songs including "Chain Gang Special", and some other older songs adapted to having chain gang themes. They were later released on the compilation album, Best of the War Years.
Under his own real name, Seward issued Creepin' Blues (1965, Bluesville) with harmonica accompaniment by Larry Johnson. Later in the decade Seward worked in concert and at folk-blues festivals.
Seward died at the age of 70, in New York of natural causes, in May 1972.
He is not to be confused with Eddie "Guitar Slim" Jones, Guitar Slim, Jr., James "Guitar Slim" Stephenson nor Norman "Guitar Slim" Green.
Alec Seward 1902 1972
Robert Shaw (August 9, 1908 – May 18, 1985) was an American blues and boogie-woogie pianist, best known for his 1963 album, The Ma Grinder.
Shaw was born in Stafford, Texas, the son of farm owners Jesse and Hettie Shaw. The Shaws had a Steinway grand piano and his sisters had lessons in playing, but Shaw's father was against his son learning the instrument.
Shaw worked with his father on the family's ranch, and played the piano whenever his family was out; the first song he learned being "Aggravatin' Papa Don't You Try to Two-Time Me." In his adolescence, Shaw travelled to Houston to listen to jazz musicians, and at nearby roadhouses. He then found a piano teacher and with his earnings paid for lessons.
He learned his barrelhouse style of playing from musicians in the Fourth Ward, Houston. In the 1920s Shaw was part of the "Santa Fe Circuit", named after touring musicians utilizing the Santa Fe freight trains. Although he played in Chicago, Shaw mainly restricted himself to Texas, and performed as a soloist in the clubs and roadhouses of Sugarland, Richmond, Kingsville, Houston and Dallas. In 1930, at the height of the Kilgore oil boom, Shaw played there, and two years on traveled to Kansas City, Kansas, to perform. In 1933 he hosted a radio show in Oklahoma City. He relocated to Texas, first to Fort Worth and then to Austin. Here he settled down and took up residence, owning a grocery store known as the 'Stop and Swat'.
Shaw married Martha Landrum in December 1939, but they had no children. However, Shaw had previously been married, and had a daughter, Verna Mae, and a son, William. For many years Shaw ran his grocery business in Austin in partnership with Martha, and in 1962 was named the black businessman of the year in Austin.
In 1963, Shaw recorded an album, originally called Texas Barrelhouse Piano, produced by Robert "Mack" McCormick. It was originally released by McCormick's Almanac Book and Recording Company, and Chris Strachwitz's Arhoolie Records later reissued the LP, re-titled as The Ma Grinder. The album contained old favorites such as "The Ma Grinder", "The Cows" and "Whores Is Funky", some of them too risqué to have been issued previously.
In 1967, seven years before his retirement from the grocery trade, Shaw recommenced concert playing. With the revival of his career, he played at the Kerrville Folk Festival, overseas in Amsterdam, Frankfurt, and at the Berlin Jazz Festival; as well as the Smithsonian Institution's American Folk Life Festival, the World's Fair Expo in Canada, and the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival. He played with the Preservation Hall Jazz Band at the 1973 Austin Aqua Festival, and continued to perform Stateside and in Europe intermittently during the 1970s, turning up unexpectedly in California in 1981 to help Strachwitz celebrate Arhoolie's 20th anniversary.
Shaw died of a heart attack in Austin, on May 16, 1985, and was interred at the Capital Memorial Gardens. Two weeks after his death, the Texas State Senate passed a resolution in honor of Shaw's contribution to the state's musical heritage.
Robert Shaw 1908 1985
Henry "Son" Sims (August 22, 1890 – December 23, 1958) was an American delta blues fiddler and songwriter. He is best known for his accompanist role to both Charlie Patton and a young Muddy Waters.
Sims was born in Anguilla, Mississippi, United States, the only son of five children. He learned to play the fiddle from his grandfather. Sims saw active service in France during World War I, whilst serving in the US Army.
Sims went on to be the leader of the Mississippi Corn Shuckers, a rural based string ensemble and played with them for a number of years. His profile was extended by joining his childhood friend, Charlie Patton, on a recording session for Paramount Records, which took place in Grafton, Wisconsin in June 1929 Sims both accompanied Patton on fiddle on thirteen tracks, including "Elder Greene Blues", "Going to Move to Alabama" and "Devil Sent the Rain Blues"; as well as recording four tunes of his own. These included "Tell Me Man Blues", his best known composition, and "Farrell Blues". Sims played alongside Patton at times until the latter's death in 1934, when Sims returned to working on a plantation. Sims had by then extended his playing repertoire to include the mandolin, guitar and piano.
On August 28, 1941, Sims accompanied Muddy Waters on a recording session. This took place under the direction of Alan Lomax, as part of his recordings for the Library of Congress. In the 1940s, Sims also accompanied Robert Nighthawk on several joint appearances, and continued a solo career in to the 1950s.
Sims died following renal surgery in December 1958 in Memphis, Tennessee, at the age of 68. He was buried in an unmarked grave in Bell Grove Baptist Church Cemetery, Clarksdale, Coahoma County, Mississippi.
Henry "Son" Sims 1890 1958
Amos Easton (May 7, 1905 – June 8, 1968), better known by the stage name Bumble Bee Slim, was an American Piedmont blues musician.
Easton was born in Brunswick, Georgia, United States. Around 1920 he left home to join the Ringling Brothers' circus before returning to Georgia, marrying briefly, and then heading north on a freight train to Indianapolis where he settled in 1928. There, he met and was influenced by pianist Leroy Carr and guitarist Scrapper Blackwell.
By 1931 he had moved to Chicago, where he first recorded as “Bumble Bee Slim” for Paramount Records. The following year his song, "B&O Blues", was a hit for Vocalion Records, inspiring a number of other railroad blues and eventually becoming a popular folk song. Over the next five years he recorded over 150 songs for the Decca, Bluebird and Vocalion labels, often accompanied by other musicians such as Big Bill Broonzy, Peetie Wheatstraw, Tampa Red, Memphis Minnie, and Washboard Sam.
In 1937, he returned to Georgia, then relocated to Los Angeles, California, in the early 1940s, apparently hoping to break into motion pictures as a songwriter and comedian. During the 1950s he recorded several albums, but these had little impact. He recorded his last album in 1962 for the Pacific Jazz label.
He continued to perform in clubs around Los Angeles until his death in 1968.
Bumble Bee Slim 1905 1968
Bessie Smith (April 15, 1894 – September 26, 1937) was an American blues singer.
Nicknamed The Empress of the Blues, Smith was the most popular female blues singer of the 1920s and 1930s. She is often regarded as one of the greatest singers of her era and, along with Louis Armstrong, a major influence on subsequent jazz vocalists.
The 1900 census indicates that Bessie Smith was born in Chattanooga, Tennessee in July 1892. However, the 1910 census recorded her birthday as April 15, 1894, a date that appears on all subsequent documents and was observed by the entire Smith family. Census data also contributes to controversy about the size of her family. The 1870 and 1880 censuses report three older half-siblings, while later interviews with Smith's family and contemporaries did not include these individuals among her siblings.
Bessie Smith was the daughter of Laura (née Owens) and William Smith. William Smith was a laborer and part-time Baptist preacher (he was listed in the 1870 census as a "minister of the gospel", in Moulton, Lawrence, Alabama.) He died before his daughter could remember him. By the time she was nine, she had lost her mother and a brother as well. Her older sister Viola took charge of caring for her siblings.
To earn money for their impoverished household, Bessie Smith and her brother Andrew began busking on the streets of Chattanooga as a duo: she singing and dancing, he accompanying her on guitar. Their favorite location was in front of the White Elephant Saloon at Thirteenth and Elm streets in the heart of the city's African-American community.
In 1904, her oldest brother, Clarence, covertly left home by joining a small traveling troupe owned by Moses Stokes. "If Bessie had been old enough, she would have gone with him," said Clarence's widow, Maud. "That's why he left without telling her, but Clarence told me she was ready, even then. Of course, she was only a child."
In 1912, Clarence returned to Chattanooga with the Stokes troupe. He arranged for its managers, Lonnie and Cora Fisher, to give Smith an audition. She was hired as a dancer rather than a singer, because the company also included the unknown singer, Ma Rainey. Smith eventually moved on to performing in various chorus lines, making the "81" Theater in Atlanta her home base. There were times when she worked in shows on the black-owned T.O.B.A Theater Owners Booking Association circuit. She would rise to become its biggest star after signing with Columbia Records.
By 1923, when she began her recording career, Smith had taken up residence in Philadelphia. There she met and fell in love with Jack Gee, a security guard whom she married on June 7, 1923, just as her first record was released. During the marriage—a stormy one, with infidelity on both sides—Smith became the highest paid black entertainer of the day, heading her own shows, which sometimes featured as many as 40 troupers, and touring in her own railroad car. Gee was impressed by the money, but never adjusted to show business life, or to Smith's bisexuality. In 1929, when she learned of his affair with another singer, Gertrude Saunders, Bessie Smith ended the relationship, although neither of them sought a divorce.
Smith eventually found a common-law husband in an old friend, Richard Morgan, who was Lionel Hampton's uncle and the antithesis of her husband. She stayed with him until her death.
Bessie Smith 1894 1937
Laura Smith (unknown – February 1932) was an American classic female blues and country blues singer. She is best known for her recordings of "Gonna Put You Right In Jail" and her version of "Don't You Leave Me Here". She led Laura Smith and her Wild Cats, and worked with Clarence Williams and Perry Bradford. Details of her life outside of the music industry are scanty.
Smith was probably born in Indianapolis, Indiana, although her date of birth is unknown. What is certain is that in the early part of the 1920s, Smith toured the T.O.B.A. circuit. Her recording career started in 1924 with Okeh, and she finished it just three years later by recording some tracks for Victor. Music journalist, Scott Yanow, noted that her earliest recordings were her strongest, "by the time she recorded "Don't You Leave Me Here" in 1927, much of the power was gone". Her recordings included two songs, "The Mississippi Blues" and "Lonesome Refugee", which were both written about the Great Mississippi Flood of 1927.
She was seen as part of the unrelated set of Smith women (Mamie, Bessie, Clara and Trixie) who all recorded blues songs. In total, thirty five numbers were recorded by Laura Smith. It was reported that by 1926, Smith was married to a comedian, Slim Jones, and to be living in Baltimore.
Her most notable number, "Don't You Leave Me Here" was, some ten years later, made more famous by a version recorded by Jelly Roll Morton.
Laura Smith died of the long term effects of hypertension, in February 1932 in Los Angeles.
All her available recordings have been made released on CD by Document Records (see below). She is not to be confused with the latter-day, Canadian folk singer-songwriter, of the same name.
Laura Smith unknown 1932
Charlie Spand was an American blues and boogie-woogie pianist and singer, noted for his barrelhouse style. Spand was deemed one of the most influential piano players of the 1920s. Little is known of his life outside of music, and his total recordings comprise only thirty three tracks.
There is speculation about his place of birth. Allmusic stated that some claim Spand arrived in Elljay, Georgia, whilst his self-penned track, "Alabama Blues," had a reference to his birth in that part of the country. Various blues historians also cited Spand's songs, "Levee Camp Man" and "Mississippi Blues," as evidence of connections there.
More certain is that Spand, along with others such as William Ezell, was one of those boogie-woogie pianists who, in the 1920s, performed on Brady Street and Hastings Street in Detroit, Michigan. In 1929, Spand relocated to Chicago, Illinois, where he met and began performing alongside Blind Blake. Spand recorded twenty five songs for Paramount Records between June 1929 and September 1931. The tracks were variously recorded in Richmond, Indiana, Chicago, and Grafton, Wisconsin. From the 1929 Richmond recording sessions, were seven songs which had guitar accompaniment to Spand's piano playing and singing. Most of these were directly attributed to Blake. During Spand's most notable recording, he and Blake had a small conversation during the making of "Hastings Street." Another such duet occurred on "Moanin' the Blues."
After a gap in his recording career, in June 1940 Spand recorded what turned out to be his final eight tracks, this time for Okeh Records. These were made in Chicago, when Spand was backed by Little Son Joe and Big Bill Broonzy. However, after these recordings were made, no further reference to Spand can be located.
In 1992, Document Records issued The Complete Paramounts (1929-1931). Yazoo Records' Dreaming the Blues: The Best of Charlie Spand (2002) had enhanced sound quality, but without the chronological track order favored by Testament.
Spand's track "Back to the Woods" has been recorded by Kokomo Arnold, Joan Crane and Rory Block, while Josh White recorded his "Good Gal."
Charlie Spand unknown unknown
Victoria Spivey (October 15, 1906 – October 3, 1976) was an American blues singer and songwriter. She is best known for her recordings of "Dope Head Blues" and "Organ Grinder Blues", and Spivey variously worked with her sister, Addie "Sweet Pease" Spivey, and with Bob Dylan, Lonnie Johnson, Louis Armstrong, King Oliver, Clarence Williams and Luis Russell. Spivey's recording career spanned forty years, from 1926 to the mid 1960s, and she initiated her own recoding label, Spivey Records.
Victoria Spivey died in New York on October 3, 1976, at the age of 69, from an internal haemorrhage.
Victoria Spivey 1908 1976
Freddie Spruell (December 28, 1893 – June 19, 1956) was an American Delta blues guitarist and singer.
He was variously billed as Papa Freddie or Mr. Freddie, and he is generally regarded as the first Delta bluesman to be recorded ("Milk Cow Blues", 1926). However, both Mamie Smith (1920) and Blind Lemon Jefferson (1925), pre-dated him in waxing the first 'blues' records. Details of his life are sketchy and sometimes contradictory.
Spruell was probably born in Lake Providence, Louisiana, United States, but relocated with his family to Chicago, Illinois, as a small child. His Social Security records gave his birth date as December 1893. His recordings, although classed as Delta blues, were noted for reasons of his musical styling, rather than any geographical accuracy regarding his long-time place of residence.
On June 25, 1926, Spruell cut "Milk Cow Blues" in Chicago. The track was released by Okeh Records, alongside "Muddy Water Blues" which was recorded in November that year, both sides using the Papa Freddie name. His second single release included "Way Back Down Home" and the same "Muddy Water Blues" track. He recorded two more songs in 1928, one of which was "Tom Cat Blues", and were issued by Paramount Records as by Mr. Freddie Spruell. Five further songs were recorded in April 1935, and released under the shorter Mr. Freddie name on the Bluebird Records label. This latter recording session saw him cut "Let's Go Riding", his best known number. Carl Martin played second guitar behind Spruell, on the track.
At the insistence of his own mother, Spruell's playing of secular music ended in the mid-1940s, and he became a Baptist preacher.
Spruell died in Chicago in June 1956, after a lengthy stay in hospital. He was aged 62. However, no death certificate has yet been uncovered.
All his recorded work was included in the compilation album, Mississippi Blues: Complete Recorded Works, Vol. 2 (1926-1935).
Freddie Spruell 1893 1956
Frank Stokes (January 1, 1888 – September 12, 1955) was an American blues musician, songster, and blackface minstrel, who is considered by many musicologists to be the father of the Memphis blues guitar style.
Stokes died of a stroke in Memphis on September 12, 1955. He is buried there in Hollywood Cemetery.
Frank Stokes 1888 1955
Baby Tate (January 28, 1916 – August 17, 1972) was an American Piedmont blues guitarist, who in a sporadic career spanning five decades, worked variously with guitarists Blind Boy Fuller, Pink Anderson, and Peg Leg Sam. His playing style was influenced by Blind Blake, Buddy Moss, Blind Boy Fuller, Josh White, and Willie Walker, and to some extent Lightnin' Hopkins.
Tate died from the effects of a heart attack, in the VA Hospital in Columbia, South Carolina, in August 1972, at the age of 56.
In January 2011, Baby Tate was nominated for The 10th Annual Independent Music Awards in the Blues Song category for "See What You Done".
Smithsonian Folkways released a compilation album on February 16, 2010, titled Classic Appalachian Blues. It featured the Baby Tate number, "See What You Done Done."
Baby Tate 1916 1972
Saunders Terrell, better known as Sonny Terry (24 October 1911 - 11 March 1986) was a blind American Piedmont blues musician. He was widely known for his energetic blues harmonica style, which frequently included vocal whoops and hollers, and imitations of trains and fox hunts.
Terry was born in Greensboro, Georgia. His father, a farmer, taught him to play basic blues harp as a youth. He sustained injuries to his eyes and lost his sight by the time he was 16, which prevented him from doing farm work himself. In order to earn a living Terry was forced to play music. He began playing in Shelby, North Carolina.
After his father died he began playing in the trio of Piedmont blues-style guitarist Blind Boy Fuller. When Fuller died in 1941, he established a long-standing musical relationship with Brownie McGhee, and the pair recorded numerous songs together. The duo became well-known among white audiences, as they joined the growing folk movement of the 1950s and 1960s. This included collaborations with Styve Homnick, Woody Guthrie and Moses Asch, producing Folkways Records (now Smithsonian/Folkways) classic recordings.
In 1938 Terry was invited to play at Carnegie Hall for the first From Spirituals to Swing concert, and later that year he recorded for the Library of Congress. In 1940 Terry recorded his first commercial sides. Some of his most famous works include "Old Jabo" a song about a man bitten by a snake and "Lost John" in this he demonstrates his amazing breath control .
Despite their fame as "pure" folk artists, in the 1940s, Terry and McGhee fronted a jump blues combo with honking saxophone and rolling piano that was variously called Brownie McGhee and his Jook House Rockers or Sonny Terry and his Buckshot Five.
Terry was also in the 1947 original cast of the Broadway musical comedy, Finian's Rainbow.
Terry died from natural causes at Mineola, New York, in March 1986, the year he was inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame. He died three days before Crossroads was released in theaters.
Sonny Terry 1911 1986
Henry Jackson Thomas, Jr. (born September 9, 1971) is an American actor and musician. He has appeared in more than 40 films and is best known for his role as Elliott in the 1982 Steven Spielberg film E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial.
Thomas was born an only child in San Antonio, Texas, the son of Carolyn L. (née Davis), a homemaker, and Henry Jackson Thomas, a hydraulic machinist. In San Antonio he attended East Central High School, in the ECISD district, and Blinn College in Bryan, Texas.
Shortly after his appearance in E.T., Thomas also made some appearances in commercials for the Intellivision console by Mattel, alongside George Plimpton, whom he always referred to as "Mr. Intellivision". In all these commercials, Plimpton always asked what Thomas's name is, but is never mentioned. According to Intellivision Products, Inc., Atari threatened to sue Mattel if Thomas was identified in the commercials, since Atari was securing the rights for the Atari 2600 E.T. video game at the time.
After E.T., Thomas returned to Texas, occasionally acting in film and on TV while attending school.
Thomas returned to film in the late 1980s and early 1990s and began to prove himself in adult roles, most notably as the younger version of Anthony Perkins' Norman Bates character in “Psycho IV: The Beginning”. His most prominent adult role to date was as Samuel Ludlow in 1994's “Legends of the Fall.” He is currently both an actor and musician. He starred in the 2011 film The Last Ride, in the lead role as Hank Williams Sr..
Thomas wrote songs, sang, and played guitar for the San Antonio, Texas band The Blue Heelers from the mid to late '90s. Although the band was never signed to a record label, their self-produced album Twister was warmly received and enjoyed statewide radio play. Moving to Los Angeles in 1998, the band dissolved, but Thomas continued to write and record songs. In 1998, his song "Truckstop Coffee" (recorded with the Blue Heelers) appeared on V2's soundtrack to the film “Niagara, Niagara” in which Henry Thomas also acted. In 2003, Thomas worked with Nikki Sudden on the music for Mika Kaurismaki's film “Honey Baby” which featured four original songs written and performed by Thomas as the fictitious musician Tom Brackett. An album was in the works, but their collaboration was ended by Sudden's death in 2006. Thomas continues to live and play in the LA area with the band Farspeaker.
Henry Thomas, Jr. 1971
Henry Thomas (born 1874, Big Sandy, Texas – died 1930) was an American country blues singer, songster and musician, who enjoyed a brief but notable recording career in the late 1920s. Often billed as "Ragtime Texas", Thomas bridged 19th and 20th century styles, providing the basis for what later became known as Texas blues guitar.
Thomas was born into a family of freed slaves in Big Sandy, Texas in 1874 He began traveling the Texas rail lines as a hobo after leaving home in his teens. He eventually earned his way as an itinerant songster, entertaining local populaces as well as railway employees.
Although the circumstances are not known, Thomas recorded twenty-three sides for Vocalion Records between 1927 and 1929. The repertoire on these cuts includes a combination of reels, gospels, minstrel pieces, ragtime numbers and blues. Besides guitar, Thomas accompanied himself on quills, a folk instrument fabricated from cane reeds whose sound is similar to the zampona played by musicians in Peru and Bolivia. His springy guitar-playing, probably inspired by banjo-picking styles, suggests that he performed for dances.
The whereabouts of Thomas after his last recording in 1929 have not been chronicled. While one report places him in Texas in the 1950s, most biographers indicate he died in 1930 when he would have been in his mid-50s.
Henry Thomas 1874 1930
Ramblin' Thomas (1902–1945) was an American country blues singer, guitarist and songwriter. He was the brother of another blues musician, Jesse Thomas. Thomas is best remembered for his slide guitar playing, and recording several pieces in the late 1920s and early 1930s. Blues scholars seem undecided if Thomas's nickname of Ramblin' was in reference to his style of playing, or itinerant nature.
Willard Thomas was born in Logansport, Louisiana, one of nine children. His father played the fiddle, and three brothers Joe L., Jesse, and Willard learnt to play the guitar, with Willard particularly practicing slide guitar techniques. Thomas relocated to Deep Ellum, Dallas, Texas in the late 1920s, and was influenced by the playing of Lonnie Johnson. He performed in San Antonio, Oklahoma and possibly St. Louis, Missouri in his subsequent travels. Thomas recorded in both Dallas and Chicago between 1928 and 1932, for Paramount Records and Victor Records.
Thomas reportedly died of tuberculosis in 1945 in Memphis, Tennessee. Document Records are amongst the record labels (previously there were LP issues on Heritage, Biograph, and Matchbox Records) to have released retrospective compilations of Thomas' work on CD.
Ramblin' Thomas 1902 1945
Henry 'Mule' Townsend (October 27, 1909 – September 24, 2006) was an American blues singer, guitarist and pianist
Townsend was born in Shelby, Mississippi and grew up in Cairo, Illinois. He left home at the age of nine because of an abusive father and hoboed his way to St. Louis, Missouri. He learned guitar while in his early teens from a locally renowned blues guitarist known as "Dudlow Joe".
By the late 1920s he had begun touring and recording with pianist Walter Davis, and had acquired the nickname "Mule" because he was sturdy in both physique and character. In St. Louis, he worked with some of the early blues pioneers, including J.D. Short.
Townsend was one of the only artists known to have recorded in nine consecutive decades (starting in the 1920s). He has recorded on several different labels including Columbia and Folkways Records. He first recorded in 1929 and remained active up to 2006. By the mid 1990s, Townsend and his one-time collaborator Yank Rachell were the only active blues artists whose performing lives stretched back to the 1920s.
Articulate and self-aware with an excellent memory, Townsend gave many invaluable interviews to Blues enthusiasts and scholars. Paul Oliver recorded him in 1960 and quoted him extensively in his 1967 work Conversations with the Blues.Thirty years later, Bill Greensmith edited thirty hours of taped interviews with Henry to produce a full autobiography, giving a vivid history of the Blues scene in St Louis and East St Louis in its prime.
In 1985 he received the National Heritage Fellowship in recognition of being a master artist. In 1995 he was inducted into the St. Louis Walk of Fame.
Townsend died, at the age of 96, on September 24, 2006, at St. Mary's Ozaukee Hospital, Mequon, Wisconsin, just hours after having been the first person to be presented with a 'key' in Grafton's Paramount Plaza Walk of Fame.
While [Henry Townsend] did not scorn his old recordings, he had no taste for spending his later years simply recreating them.
Blues, for him, was a living medium, and he continued to express himself in it, most remarkably in his songwriting.
-Tony Russell, The Guardian
On December 4, 2009, Henry Townsend was added to the Mississippi Blues Trail.
On February 10, 2008, The Late Henry Townsend received his first Grammy Award at the 50th Annual Grammy Awards in the Best Traditional Blues Album category for his performances on Last of the Great Mississippi Delta Bluesmen: Live In Dallas released by The Blue Shoe Project, The Grammy Award was accepted by his young son, Alonzo Townsend
Henry Townsend 1909 2006
Bessie Tucker was an American classic female, country, and Texas blues, singer and songwriter. Her best-known songs are "Penitentiary" and "Fryin' Pan Skillet Blues". Little is known of her life outside the music industry. Her known recording history comprised just twenty-four tracks, seven of which were alternate takes.
Tucker hailed from East Texas. Based on references in her songs, researcher Max Haymes has speculated that she may have been based in Greenville.
She had a light complexion and a small frame, but was said to be "a strong singer with a dark voice". In August 1928, she recorded a number of songs, most of which she wrote herself, for the Victor label in Memphis, Tennessee. She was accompanied on piano by the Dallas-born K.D. Johnson. This recording session yielded her best-known song, "Penitentiary". The subject matter of the song was allegedly not unknown to Tucker.
A second session in Dallas followed in October 1929. There she was again accompanied by Johnson, and by the guitar playing of Jesse Thomas. After this, nothing more is known of her life. Only one photograph of Tucker survives.
In 1960, Dallas pianist Whistlin' Alex Moore told an interviewer that Tucker and Ida May Mack, who had shared the 1928 recording session with Tucker, were both "tough cookies ... don't mess with them". However, in a 1972 conversation, the pianist was unable to recall the name of either singer, leading the interviewer to suspect that he had drawn his own conclusions from their recordings. Music buffs can only affirm that Tucker sang in the same style as Texas singers Texas Alexander, Victoria Spivey and Texas Bill Day, and that her lyrics refer to railroads that all served East Texas and Dallas.
Bessie Tucker unknown unknown
Sippie Wallace (born as Beulah Thomas, November 1, 1898 – November 1, 1986) was an American singer-songwriter. Her early career in local tent shows gained her the billing "The Texas Nightingale". Between 1923 and 1927, she recorded over 40 songs for Okeh Records, many written by herself or her brothers, George and Hersal Thomas. Her accompanists included Louis Armstrong, Johnny Dodds, Sidney Bechet, King Oliver, and Clarence Williams. Among the top female blues vocalists of her era, Wallace ranked with Ma Rainey, Ida Cox, Alberta Hunter, and Bessie Smith.
In the 1930s, she left show business to become a church organist, singer, and choir director in Detroit, and performed secular music only sporadically until the 1960s, when she resumed her career. Wallace was nominated for a Grammy Award in 1982, and was inducted into the Michigan Women's Hall of Fame in 1993.
Wallace was born in Houston, Texas, one of 13 children. In her youth Wallace sang and played the piano in Shiloh Baptist Church, where her father was a deacon, but in the evenings the children took to sneaking out to tent shows. By her mid-teens, they were playing in those tent shows. By performing in the various Texas shows, she built a solid following as a spirited blues singer.
Wallace came from a musical family: her brother George W. Thomas became a notable pianist, bandleader, composer, and music publisher; her other brother Hersal Thomas was a pianist and composer; and her niece (George's daughter) Hociel Thomas was a pianist and composer.
In 1915, Wallace moved to New Orleans, Louisiana with brother Hersal; two years later she married Matt Wallace, and changed her name.
In March 1986, following a concert in Germany at Burghausen Jazz Festival, she suffered a severe stroke, was hospitalized, returned to the US, and died on her 88th birthday at Sinai Hospital in Detroit, Michigan. She is buried at Trinity Cemetery, Detroit, Wayne County, Michigan.
Sippie Wallace 1898 1986
Curley James Weaver (March 25, 1906 - September 20, 1962) was an American blues musician, also known as Slim Gordon.
He was born in Covington, Georgia, United States, and raised on a farm near Porterdale. His mother, Savannah "Dip" Shepard Weaver, was a well-respected pianist and guitarist, who taught Curley together with her friend's sons, "Barbecue Bob" Hicks and Charlie Hicks. The three formed a group with harmonica player Eddie Mapp, and played in the local area.
In 1925 Weaver moved to Atlanta, working as a laborer and playing on the streets and at various social events. In 1928, he first recorded with Columbia Records, later releasing records on several different record labels. Although he recorded on his own during the 1920s and 1930s, first in the style taught by his mother and later with the spreading Piedmont style, he was best known for duets with Blind Willie McTell - with whom he worked until the 1950s - as well as Barbecue Bob, Fred McMullen, and harmonica and guitar player Buddy Moss. He was also a member of the recording groups The Georgia Browns (Weaver, Moss, McMullen) and The Georgia Cotton Pickers (Bob, Weaver, Moss), examples of the sort of bands that played house parties in those days.
His daughter Cora Mae Bryant (born May 1, 1926) continued in her father's tradition as a blues musician until her own death in late 2008.
Curley Weaver 1906 1962
Casey Bill Weldon (December 9, 1909 – 1960s?) was an American country blues musician, born in Pine Bluff, Arkansas who later lived and worked in Chicago was known as one of the great early pioneers of the slide guitar. He played upbeat, hokum and country blues tunes, both as a solo artist and as a member of the Memphis Jug Band. Playing a National steel guitar flat on his lap Hawaiian style, "Casey Bill" Weldon's was known as the "Hawaiian Guitar Wizard". He was married to Memphis Minnie in the '20s with the two making influential recordings together in the late '20s. Weldon played in medicine shows before beginning his recording career in 1927 for Victor.
In 1927 Weldon made a recording with Charles Polk and other members of what would become the Memphis Jug Band for Victor Records. In October of that year, Victor brought them to Atlanta where they recorded several sides, including "Kansas City Blues". In 1930, the last year of the Memphis Jug Band's contract with Victor, the band recorded 20 sides. The contract ended after a final recording session in November 1930 in Memphis just before the financial crash of the 1930s bankrupted Victor. Weldon went on to cut over 60 sides for Victor, Bluebird, and Vocalion. He was also an active session guitarist appearing on records by Teddy Darby, Bumble Bee Slim, Peetie Wheatstraw, and Memphis Minnie. On Memphis Minnie's last recording for Bluebird Records in October 1935, Weldon accompanied her for the first time. He played on two sides, "When the Sun Goes Down, Part 2" and "Hustlin' Woman Blues." He scored solo hits with his two most well known songs, "Somebody Changed the Lock on My Door" and "We Gonna Move (to the Outskirts of Town)."
In October 1927, when the Victor field recording unit visited Atlanta, Georgia, he recorded two sides, including a chilling, haunting song called "Turpentine Blues", which would have left him immortalized if he had never recorded again. He did not enter another recording studio until eight years later, when he laid down many recordings for Vocalion Records. Weldon also played with Charlie Burse and the Picanniny Jug Band and the Brown Bombers of Swing. Considering the fact that most slide guitarists of the era went unrecorded, Weldon maintains a healthy amount of recorded material for aficionados to appreciate.
After his divorce from Memphis Minnie, he disappeared from the public eye and stopped recording by 1938. His date of death is unknown, though assumed to be sometime in the 1960s.
He played a National steel guitar flat on his lap Hawaiian style. His slide guitar solos were emotional and unique. His style of playing was highly influential on the emerging Chicago Blues style.
Casey Bill Weldon 1909 1967
Peetie Wheatstraw (December 21, 1902 – December 21, 1941) was the name adopted by the singer William Bunch, an influential figure among 1930s blues singers. Although the only known photograph of Bunch shows him holding a National brand tricone resonator guitar, he played the piano on most of his recordings.
Wheatstraw is assumed to have been born in Ripley, Tennessee, but was widely believed to have come from Arkansas. His body was shipped to Cotton Plant, Arkansas for burial, and fellow musician Big Joe Williams stated that this was his home town
Wheatstraw's influence was enormous during the 1930s. Perhaps the most obvious example of Wheatstraw's impact can be seen in the lyrics and vocal stylings of Robert Johnson, often considered the most important blues figure of the era. Many of Johnson's own recordings were actually re-workings of other popular artists of the time, and he drew heavily from Wheatstraw's repertoire. For example, Wheatstraw's "Police station blues" forms the basis for Johnson's "Hellhound on my trail". His "Devil's son in law" nickname also reflected Johnson's similar image.
Wheatstraw, along with Leroy Carr, was one of the earliest blues singer piano players. Many elements of his style can be seen in later artists like Champion Jack Dupree, Moon Mullican and Jerry Lee Lewis. Wheatstraw also made many recordings with the very influential Kokomo Arnold, who wrote the blues standard "Milk cow blues".
Wheatstraw was still riding the crest of his success when he met his premature demise. On December 21, 1941, his 39th birthday, he and some friends decided to take a drive. They tried to entice Wheatstraw's friend, the blues singer Teddy Darby, but Darby's wife refused to let him join them. Wheatstraw was a passenger in the back seat when the Buick struck a standing freight train, instantly killing his two companions. Wheatstraw died of massive head injuries in the hospital some hours later. There is a legend that his death drew little attention, but the accident was fully reported in St. Louis and East St. Louis newspapers and obituaries appeared in the national music press. Down Beat led the front page for January 15, 1942 with the story of the accident, and an appreciation of Peetie's career under the headline, Blues Shouter Killed After Waxing "Hearseman Blues".
Peetie Wheatstraw 1902 1941
Booker T. Washington White (November 12, 1909 – February 26, 1977), better known as Bukka White, was an American Delta blues guitarist and singer. "Bukka" was not a nickname, but a phonetic misspelling of White's given name Booker, by his second (1937) record label (Vocalion).
Born between Aberdeen and Houston, Mississippi, White was the second cousin of B.B. King. White himself is remembered as a player of National steel guitars. He also played, but was less adept at, the piano.
White started his career playing the fiddle at square dances. He claims to have met Charlie Patton early on, although some doubt has been cast upon this; Regardless, Patton was a large influence on White. White typically played slide guitar, in an open tuning. He was one of the few, along with Skip James, to use a crossnote tuning in E minor, which he may have learned, as James did, from Henry Stuckey.
Bukka White 1909 1977
Joshua Daniel White (February 11, 1914 – September 5, 1969), better known as Josh White, was an American singer, guitarist, songwriter, actor, and civil rights activist. He also recorded under the names "Pinewood Tom" and "Tippy Barton" in the 1930s.
Josh White 1914 1969
Willie "Sonny Boy" Williamson (possibly December 5, 1912 – May 25, 1965) was an American blues harmonica player, singer and songwriter, from Mississippi. He is acknowledged as one of the most charismatic and influential blues musicians, with considerable prowess on the harmonica and highly creative songwriting skills. He recorded successfully in the 1950s and 1960s, and had a direct influence on later blues and rock performers. He should not be confused with another leading blues performer, John Lee "Sonny Boy" Williamson, who died in 1948.
Sonny Boy Williamson II 1914 1948
Wesley Wilson (October 1, 1893 – October 10, 1958) was an American blues and jazz singer and songwriter. His own stage craft, plus the double act with his wife and musical partner, Coot Grant, was popular with African American audiences in the 1910s, 1920s and early 1930s.
His stage names included Kid Wilson, Jenkins, Socks, and either Sox Wilson or Socks Wilson. His musical excursions included participation in the oddly named duo of Pigmeat Pete and Catjuice Charlie. Wilson recorded songs such as "Blue Monday on Sugar Hill" and "Rasslin' Till The Wagon Comes.”
Wilson retired in ill health shortly thereafter, but Grant continued performing into the 1950s. In January 1953, one commentator noted that the couple had moved from New York to Los Angeles, but were in considerable financial hardship.
Wilson died from a stroke, aged 65, in October 1958 in Cape May Court House, New Jersey.
In 1998, his entire recorded work, both with and without Grant, was made available in three chronological volumes by Document Records.
Wesley Wilson 1893 1958
That’s it for Part Ic, which brings Part I: Early Country Blues to a close. I’ll be starting Part II: Early Urban Blues next in the series. There are many more to follow so I hope you continue to follow along through each part/section of the series.
As always, I’m looking forward to receiving some honest comments from all of you. It helps me to develop my site so that it is about what you are interested in and like to see and read about.
Well once again, until next time ~ ~ ~
Musician By Night . . .
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