Happy Birthday Muddy Waters! Part 1 Rollin' Stone

In the run up to celebrating this true legend of
Rock'n'Roll, whose birthday is on April 4th,
I wanted to start off with a tidbit about how
the Rolling Stones got their name.

According to the book "Keith Richards Satisfaction"
by Christopher Sanford, Brian Jones, while registering
the band in a musican's union, decided to take
the name from the Water's song "Rollin' Stone".

You have to hand it to Brian's genius...
to come up
with such an incredible
name. Keith "had later
thought it made them sound
like a bunch of
irish acrobats".
Gotta love Keith's thinking.

Here's Muddy Waters performing at the
Newport Jazz Festival in 1960. The whole
band plays such few notes, but
what they do play is so powerful. Muddy's
own playing is amazing! You can just
feel the Delta in each of those notes.
One can only wonder what the
beatniks made of the "Hootchie-
Cootchie" man singing about his
Mojo!

"Rollin' Stone" was one of McKinley Morganfield,
aka Muddy Water's own compositions, a derivative
of "Catfish Blues" by Robert Petway.

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.

Happy Birthday Otis Spann!

One of the reasons Muddy Waters is just so amazing,
is his insistance on having a great backing band, and among
those that went thru Muddy's school was Otis Spann, his
pianist during the early years.

Otis was born March 21, 1930 in Jackson, Mississippi. Coming
from a music family made it easy for Otis to start playing
the piano at the age of 8. Spann moved to Chicago in the late 40's
where he had the help of Big Maceo Merriweather.

Otis provided the steady engine for Muddy's playing on tracks
like "Hoochie Coochie Man," "I'm Ready," and "Just Make Love
To Me."

Although he was to go on to a solo career, his parting with Muddy
was friendly enough that Muddy would produce and perform on
several of his albums.

One of my favorites is "The Blues Never Die!" Maybe not as
dynamic a performer as his bandleader, Otis had that relaxed
playing style where he could provide a smooth melody, and
just as quickly bite back. It was an effortless style that provided
just the right backbone for the blues. Muddy and most of his
band played on this great cd.

Otis passed away at the very young age of forty April 24, 1970.

J.B. Lenoir

J.B. Lenoir- A Unique Voice in Blues

Born in 1929 in Monticello, Mississippi,

March 5th would have been J.B.'s birthday.

Spurred on by a love of Blind Lemon Jefferson,

he moved to Chicago, and hooked up with Big

Bill Broonzy where he met alot of other

blues artists. Lenoir would go on

to record for Chess and other local labels.

Willie Dixon rediscovered Lenoir, and

produced two of his albums,

where Lenoir became quite political.

Although Lenoir might not have made it as

big as Muddy Waters, he could count many

musicians such as John Mayall as a fan.

Unlike most of the gruff, deep-voiced blues

singers, he had a unique high-pitched voice.

Very rock'n'roll. Somehow I could hear

somebody like Johnny Thunders

enjoying his singing style, not to mention

his zebra jackets. J.B. Lenoir had a great

guitar style as well, with occasional support

by one of my favorite keyboard players,

Sunnyland Slim, 2 saxes and really basic

percussion, that backed up his boogie-woogie

guitar. There's definitely a modern sound to Lenoir's

vocals that doesn't date him. With less emphasis

on guitar solos than usual for

a blues song, it makes his singing

sound urbane and the sax along with piano give

the recordings a cosmopolitan city feel.

He passed away at the age of 47, April 29th 19767

after not fully recuperating after a car accident.

Goodnight To Memphis Slim-

Memphis Slim Passes February 24th 1988



Born John Len Chatman Sept 3rd 1915 in Memphis,
Mr. Chatman started at the age of 7, playing
the keyboards. Once you listen to Slim's
carefully calibrated piano solos, it makes sense
that Jerry Lee Lewis over in nearby Ferriday
would have heard Slim, as well as Ian Stewart
over in the UK.


Back to Memphis Slim- His mentor was that
old Honeydripper, Roosevelt Sykes. It was
upon moving to Chicago that Slim hooked up
with Big Bill Broonzy. In later years, he
would team up with Willie Dixon for the Newport
Folk Festival, and perform on the same stage
as Muddy Waters at Carnegie Hall.


In the late 60's he made a permanent move to
Paris, where he was, like most blues musicians,
rock'n'roll musicians, (and actors like Jerry Lewis,
and Mickey Rourke), treated as an in-demand artist.



As a pianist, his trademark sound was what
would be the hallmark of rock'n'roll-
a steady rhythm pumped out by the left
hand, and the rolls and flourishes on the
right, in between the vocals. The riffs
were melodic, and masculine, but short,
and he certainly had a long inventory, as
very few of these would be repeated.

"Born With The Blues" is a great album to start off with!

HISTORY OF THE BLUES- THE DELTA BLUES

Sometimes the history of the blues

is a bit overwhelming,

and where do you start?

How about in the Delta. A great book

is Ted Gioia's "Delta Blues- The Life

and Times of the Mississippi Masters

Who Revolutionized American Music"

I'll admit, I get a little nervous

reading about the blues by someone

who is a jazz-cat,has lots

of college degrees, and at one point

in his book, he asks...

why a Juilliard-trained musician

couldn't be considered for the

Blues Hall Of Fame...(cough, cough)

that's kind of like Robert Johnson's

proverbial fork in the road. Hmmm....

alright college boy- do you wanna

be book smart, or street-smart?

Anyway, Mr. Gioia's book is a great

starting point for a very

rich and tangled history

of America's roots music.

In this post, I thought I'd

start off with the first

part of his book.

He begins with a brief history of

the many slaves brought over

from Africa, and how they

in turn, brought their own

various religious practices,

ways of life, communication, and

social activities.

The Griots of West Africa,

Yoruban priests, and even

islamic calls to prayer.

Praising, begging, pleading, pining,

...this is all a reminder

that music originally started

out as a channel to communicate with

the almighty- whatever his/her name.

It's all a wonderful picture of the

cross-section of African religious

practices and Christianity.

There's plenty of other books

on this whole subject available

out there.

Mr Gioia says, "Although the blues

has been called

"the devil's music, it has

always remained on speaking

terms with the ministers of the

lord". Maybe that's

why alot of our great blues

and even country performers have

either been, or wanted to be some

kind of ministers

- Little Richard, Johnny Cash,

that hellion- Jerry Lee Lewis.

Even Jerry Lee's cousin

Jimmy Swaggart who was a real

minister exuded a little too

much rock'n'roll sweat, as opposed

to his other evangelical brethern who

only had a slight "moist" fervor.

Tomorrow, I'll continue my review

of the "Delta Blues"