Here are – again – some true wonders from way back when…
1. Pete Steel – Pretty Polly
Recorded by Alan Lomax in 1940 in Louisiana.
2. Charlie Segar – Key to the Highway
The earliest recorded version of “Key to the Highway” was by Charles "Charlie" Segar" Key Board Wizard Supreme", recorded in Chicago on February 23, 1940.
Segar plays piano and sings. He's accompanied by a drummer, probably Fred Williams. The versions of "Key To The Highway" that everyone knows all have 8 bar verses, but Segar's is in a 12 bar form.
3. Sam Montgomery – Mercy Mercy Blues
Sam Montgomery, also known as the 'King of Spades'. Montgomery recorded a dozen titles for Arc in April 1936 (eight were issued). It's clear from the sound of the recordings that Sam played a National guitar, a sign of success as at that time Nationals cost $35-$100,, a fortune in those days. "Where the Sweet Oranges Grow" is of the family of blues inspired by Kokomo Arnold's "Old Origninal Kokomo Blues" (1934). Rather than Kokomo, Sam is bent on Florida as his paradise. Seven months after Sam recorded "Sweet Oranges" Robert Johnson would record a similar "Sweet Home Chicago" with its celebrated geographic gaffe placing the windy city, (ie.Chicago) in the 'land of California".
4. Charlie Jordan – Just a spoonful
A Saint Louis Bluessinger. (1890-1954)
Jordan recorded numerous singles for Vocalion and Decca between 1930 and 1937, and also performed with some well-regarded bluesmen from the 1920s to the 1940s. Jordan recorded with Peetie Wheatstraw, Roosevelt Sykes, and Memphis Minnie. In 1928, he suffered a spinal injury due to a shooting accident
5. Texas Alexander – Levee Camp Moan Blues
From Texas, of course.
In 1939 Alexander murdered his wife and was sentenced to prison from 1940 to 1945. When he got out of prison he hit the streets again with Lightnin' Hopkins and the pair recorded in 1947 on the Aladdin label. Texas Alexander made his last recording in 1950 with Benton's Busy Bees and died of syphilis in 1954.
6. Dock Boggs – Country Blues
One of the heroes, who recorded in the twenties, then was forgotten for decades and finally rediscovered during the folk-boom in the sixties.
7. William Moore – Barbershop Rag
The Barbershop bluesman of Rappahannock
With a solid repertoire of ragtime dance tunes, Moore was no doubt popular in the Tidewater towns and countryside near his home, playing fish fries, dances, schools, and house parties. His "Barbershop Rag" testifies to both his fine playing and his profession.
8. Papa Charlie Jackson - Skoodle – um – Skoo
When it comes to the discussion of blues and jazz throughout the early part of the twentieth century, there are bound to be crossovers, musicians who played and recorded as both solo blues acts and as ensemble players in the early hot jazz bands. Let's not forget that blues was considered a type of song, not a genre as it is today. One such person was “Papa” Charlie Jackson, a very sophisticated player of the six-string banjo who was one of the earliest and most successful of the solo blues singer/instrumentalists.
Although it took Little Richard only two takes to record “Tutti Frutti”, he might have well listened to this Papa Jackson tune. In fact this is the first tune where the words “"I got a gal her name is Sue, she knows just what to do" were heard in.
9. Leadbelly – Alberta
It was in the Louisiana State Penitentiary in July 1933 that Huddie met folklorist John Lomax and his son Alan who were touring the south for the Library of Congress collecting unwritten ballads and folk songs using newly available recording technology. The Lomaxes had discovered that Southern prisons were among the best places to collect work songs, ballads, and spirituals but Leadbelly, as he now called himself, was a particular find.
Over the next few days the Lomaxes recorded hundreds of songs. When they returned in the summer of 1934 for more recordings Leadbelly told them of his pardon in Texas. As Allen Lomax tells it, "We agreed to make a record of his petition on the other side of one of his favorite ballads, 'Goodnight Irene'. I took the record to Governor Allen on July 1. On August 1 Leadbelly got his pardon. On September 1 I was sitting in a hotel in Texas when I felt a tap on my shoulder. I looked up and there was Leadbelly with his guitar, his knife, and a sugar bag packed with all his earthly belongings. He said, 'Boss, you got me out of jail and now I've come to be your man'"
Huddie Ledbetter, the Big man singing for his girl
10. Blind Boy Fuller – Jitterbug Rag
He played a steel National Resonator Guitar. He was criticised by some as a derivative musician, but his ability to fuse together elements of other traditional and contemporary songs and reformulate them into his own performances, attracted a broad audience. He was an expressive vocalist and a masterful guitar player, best remembered for his uptempo ragtime hits including "the Jitterbug Rag"
11. Robert Petway – Catfish Blues
The original recording of “Catfish Blues”. He was a friend to Tommy McClennan
12. Ishman Bracey – Left Alone Blues
He was an associate of Tommy Johnson, and the pair performed together in medicine show in the 1930s. By the time he was "rediscovered" in the late 1950s, he had become a preacher and a performer of religious songs, and was uninterested in recording or discussing his time as a blues performer. However, he did help in the rediscovery of his contemporary Skip James.
13. Ramblin’ Thomas – No Job Blues
Thomas rambled, indeed he did. He was discovered by recording scouts playing in Dallas, but prior to that had performed in San Antonio and Oklahoma. His style also seemed influenced by the double threat of blues guitarist and pianist Lonnie Johnson, suggesting a possible St. Louis sojourn as well. Thomas played quite a bit in the key of E, making him harmonically quite a typical Delta bluesman. His picking style is curious, however, and even more interesting is his timing. His rhythmic variations suggest that his nickname might have been handed out by a musician attempting to accompany him, and not just relate to his geographical roaming.
14. Jazz Gillum – Stavin’ Chain
Bill “Jazz” Gillum was from Mississippi. After running away from home at the age of 7, Bill Gillum spent the next few years in Charleston, Mississippi, working and playing for tips on local street corners. He moved to Chicago in 1923, meeting up with guitarist Big Bill Broonzy. The duo started working club dates around the city and, by 1934, Gillum started recording for ARC and Bluebird.
15. James “Ironhead” Baker – Black Betty
Another singing convict. James ("Ironhead'') Baker, a Negro who had been sentenced to life imprisonment in Texas. At John Lomax' request Governor James V. Allred granted Baker a furlough to tour as a minstrel, visit penitentiaries in Mississippi, Florida, South Carolina, Virginia, sing his songs so that other convicts will understand what Lomax wants for his folk-song files in the Library of Congress.
This should be the original recording of “Black Betty”
16. Leadbelly – Blind Lemon Blues
Blind Lemon Jefferson, blues musician, son of Alec and Cassie Jefferson, was born in Coutchman, Texas, in July 1897 (an estimated date since no records are available).
He was born blind and was known all his life as Blind Lemon Jefferson. Jefferson received no formal education and instead traveled from town to town in the Wortham area, playing his guitar and singing songs, most of which were his own compositions. He later moved to the Dallas-Fort Worth area and became a well-known figure in the Deep Ellum district of Dallas. There he met Huddie Ledbetter (better known as "Leadbelly"), and for a time they played together in some of the brothels of Texas' cities.
Leadbelly's "Blind Lemon Blues" was in honor of his friend and one time companion
17. Ozella Jones – I been a bad bad prisoner Blues
Again, a singing convict.
Ozella Jones is known for only two tracks recorded by Alan Lomax at the State Farm in Raiford, FL, in 1936 as part of the Archive of American Folk Song project. Her unaccompanied singing on the weary, wistful, and haunting "Prisoner Blues" (the song is sometimes listed as "I Been a Bad, Bad Girl," released on Columbia Records in 1930), recorded May 4, 1936, is a true marvel
18. Doc Boggs – Down South Blues
Dock Boggs recorded only 12 songs in the 1920s, but his raw, powerful singing and distinctive banjo-playing caused Harry Smith to include him in his “Anthology of American Folk Music” and Mike Seeger to search for him in the hills of Kentucky in 1963.
19. Willie Walker – Dupree Blues
Willie Walker is a little known guitarist from South Carolina who never achieved the fame of his contemporaries but was remembered as the best guitarist around by all who had heard him. Walker was originally from rural South Carolina. Like so many other Piedmont musicians, Walker was born blind, so music was his way to make a living, perhaps his only way.
20. Gus Cannon – Poor boy long way from home blues
From Red Banks, Mississippi.
Between 1928-30, he recorded with his Cannon Jug Stompers on the Victor label producing some the finest, bluesy jug band music. As music tastes changed, Gus again found himself playing in the streets for money. By the time the Rooftop Singers recorded he was almost destitute -- he even sold his banjo for coal for his stove.
21. Walter Rhodes – Crowing Rooster Blues
Walter "Pat" Rhodes made the only commercial recordings of a black Mississippi accordionist in 1927. He was from Sunflower County, an area that would provide a wealth of blues musicians in the following years.
This is probably the original recording of “little red roster” covered by the Rolling Stones
22. Moses Mason – Molly Man
The Rev. Moses Mason recorded eight songs for Paramount in 1928, including sacred songs ("John the Baptist," "Go Wash in the Beautiful Stream") under his own name as well as a few secular songs ("Molly Man," "Shrimp Man")
23. King Solomon Hill – The Gone Dead Train
He recorded only eight tracks in 1932.
24. Clarence Ashley – Little Sadie
From Tennesse. He played the Clawhammer Banjo.
One of the Giants of old time mountain music
25. Bayless Rose – Original Blues
Guitarist/singer Bayless (probably) Ross.
The obscurity of this performer should not keep vintage blues fans away, for the music is quite enjoyable in addition to being truly very rare.
26. Dock Boggs – Oh Death
The Master with a true original. (Later used in “Oh Brother, where art thou”, sung by Ralph Stanley)
http://lix.in/f6e870Peace
