Happy Birthday Pete Johnson! Part 2

The Robert Johnson Pete Johnson connection
is a brief but sad one. John Hammond
had wanted Robert Johnson to perform
at Carnegie Hall for his Spirituals to Swing
Concert in 1938. Unfortunately, Robert
Johnson had passed away a few months
earlier, so Big Bill Broonzy performed in
his place.

Pete Johnson and his trio had also
performed that night, helping to
create a Boogie-Woogie craze. I
just caught this funny short created
in the early 40's on TCM.
It's a little parody of
instructional dance movies
with people dancing the jitterbug
to boogie-woogie music.
As one might expect, it's
pretty square!

Happy Birthday Pete Johnson

More exhaustive research yields these

conclusive results-

drummers make excellent boogie-woogie

piano players!

Pete Johnson was one of those rare guys

that could swing with a piano trio-

"The Boogie Woogie Trio" with Albert Ammons

and Meade Lux Lewis. Johnson would

go on to work often with Big Joe Turner.

Born March 25th 1904 in Kansas City,

Johnson switched to piano and found his

calling. One can only imagine how great

his drumming must have been.

I hate that AllMusic.com lists him as a

"Jazz" artist, but here's his song page

and Amazon has plenty of downloads

available.

Here's a link to a performance on

Youtube

Supposedly, his "Rocket 88 Boogie"

influenced Ike Turner on his

"Rocket 88". When these cats play

boogie-woogie, they make a commitment

to the rhythm. It's fierce.