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The first great Delta-blues singer, Charley Patton (c. 1887–1934) developed a raw, driving and percussive kind of guitar playing that was a seminal influence on the following generation of Mississippi blues singers, including Robert Johnson, Muddy Waters, Howlin’ Wolf and John Lee Hooker. All the elements that became integral to the Delta blues – different guitar ...

Source: The Illustrated Encyclopedia of Guitar Heroes, consultant editor Rusty Cutchin

Although not really the ‘Founder of the Delta Blues’, as one reissue album title touted, Charley Patton more than anyone defined not only the genre but also the image of the hard-living, rambling Delta bluesman, leaving trouble in his wake as he rolled from plantation to plantation and woman to woman. His rough vocal timbre – combined with ...

Source: The Definitive Illustrated Encyclopedia of Jazz & Blues, founding editor Howard Mandel

(Vocals, b. 1938) With his richly textured baritone, Pride had a nearly unmatched string of 29 No. 1 country hits from the mid-1960s until the late 1980s. Perhaps more significantly, Pride is merely the symbolic tip of the iceberg – only the most visible of many gifted but far less celebrated black singers who, just like their ...

Source: The Definitive Illustrated Encyclopedia of Country Music, consultant editor Bob Allen

Few would deny that the blues has played a more important role in the history of popular culture than any other musical genre. As well as being a complete art form in itself, it is a direct ancestor to the different types of current popular music we know and love today. Without the blues there would have been no Beatles ...

Source: The Illustrated Encyclopedia of Music, general editor Paul Du Noyer

Country music has been euphemistically called ‘white man’s blues’ or ‘the poetry of the common man’. While both descriptions have elements of truth, neither is quite accurate. It is, in fact, a broad, nebulous, over-reaching category with no exact boundaries or parameters. Over the decades country music has grown to encompass a greatly varied assortment of ...

Source: The Illustrated Encyclopedia of Music, general editor Paul Du Noyer

(Vocals, guitar, 1899–1947) A resident of Brownsville, Tennessee, Willie Newbern had only one recording session, for OKeh in Atlanta in 1929. Although he was not widely known outside his area, he influenced quite a few musicians: he recorded the first known version of ‘Roll And Tumble Blues’ and is said to have taught it to ...

Source: The Definitive Illustrated Encyclopedia of Jazz & Blues, founding editor Howard Mandel

(Guitar, piano, vocals, 1906–77) Booker T. Washington White was raised on a farm outside Houston, Texas; his father taught him guitar in 1915. Two years later he learned piano and by 1921 he was working barrelhouses and honky tonks in St. Louis. Inspired by a meeting with Charley Patton, he hoboed through the South for much ...

Source: The Definitive Illustrated Encyclopedia of Jazz & Blues, founding editor Howard Mandel

(Guitar, producer, 1924–2001) Tennessee-born Chester Burton Atkins, whose father was a music teacher, was one of the most influential twentieth-century guitarists, and was initially influenced by the finger- and thumb-picking country-style playing of Merle Travis. Signed to RCA from 1947, he made scores of mainly instrumental albums, and in 1955 became the head of ...

Source: The Definitive Illustrated Encyclopedia of Rock, general editor Michael Heatley

As the first superstar instrumentalist to emerge from the modern Nashville recording scene, Chet Atkins (1924–2001) was a living legend for most of his life, but the Nashville-based guitarist was also a producer, engineer, label executive and A&R man without peer. Chester Burton ‘Chet’ Atkins was born on in June 1924 in Luttrell, Tennessee. He started ...

Source: Rock Guitar Heroes, consultant editor Rusty Cutchin

One of modern country music’s most remarkable figures, Chester Burton Atkins born in Luttrell, Tennessee, rose from rural obscurity to become one of the world’s most celebrated guitarists and one of Nashville’s most influential record producers. Atkins’ musical vision did much to shape country music during the 1950s and 1960s. Early Years Atkins was born on 20 June ...

Source: The Definitive Illustrated Encyclopedia of Country Music, consultant editor Bob Allen

(Songwriter, vocals, b. 1939) Spiro, Oklahoma-born Dallas Frazier was a quintessential honky-tonk songwriter of the 1960s and 1970s. ‘If My Heart Had Windows’ (a hit for George Jones, 1967), ‘I’m So Afraid Of Losing You Again’ (Charley Pride, 1969), ‘Johnny One Time’ (Brenda Lee, 1969) and ‘What’s Your Mama’s Name’ (Tanya Tucker, 1973) are ...

Source: The Definitive Illustrated Encyclopedia of Country Music, consultant editor Bob Allen

(Guitar, harmonica, vocals, 1910–76) Chester Arthur Burnett was born in White Station, Mississippi. Inspired by Charley Patton, Wolf earned his living as a farmer in the West Memphis, Arkansas area and was strictly a weekend performer until he was almost 40 years old. He got a radio spot in 1948 and the sound of that ...

Source: The Definitive Illustrated Encyclopedia of Jazz & Blues, founding editor Howard Mandel

(Guitar, vocals, 1910–76) Howlin’ Wolf was born Chester Burnett in West Point, Mississippi, and learned the blues from Charley Patton and harmonica from Sonny Boy Williamson, who married his half-sister. After the Army, he began performing around West Memphis, Arkansas, wowing fans with his aggressive vocals and newfangled electric guitar. Promoting himself on ...

Source: The Definitive Illustrated Encyclopedia of Rock, general editor Michael Heatley

(Vocals, songwriter, b. 1940) Born in High Point, Louisiana, Newman was one of the first Cajun artists to succeed in country music’s mainstream – though his earliest recordings bore few traces of the Cajun influence. In the early 1950s, Newman became a popular performer on the Louisiana Hayride before moving on to Nashville and the Grand ...

Source: The Definitive Illustrated Encyclopedia of Country Music, consultant editor Bob Allen

California native Joe Pass (1929–94) developed a thoroughly precise jazz technique that propelled him to virtuoso status alongside pianist Oscar Peterson and vocalist Ella Fitzgerald, with whom he made a series of essential recordings for the Pablo label in the Seventies. Pass was raised in Johnstown, Pennsylvania. He took up guitar after being inspired by singing cowboy Gene Autry. ...

Source: The Illustrated Encyclopedia of Guitar Heroes, consultant editor Rusty Cutchin
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