(Guitar, vocals, 1918–63) Elmore Brooks was born in Richland, Mississippi. He learned guitar at an early age and was playing functions by the age of 14. He often worked with Rice Miller from the late 1930s until he was drafted into the Navy in 1943. He rejoined Miller after the war and was headquartered in West Memphis, ...
The swooping, full-octave slide-guitar riff that opened Elmore James’s (1918–63) first record, ‘Dust My Broom’, in 1951 not only electrified the legacy of Robert Johnson, it also established one of the basic riffs of post-war blues. Bottleneck guitar had always been part of the blues, but James was the first to use it in a hard rocking ...
(Piano, b. 1930) Ahmad Jamal made his name with his very successful trio of the late 1950s and had a hit with his version of ‘Poinciana’ in 1958. His light touch and use of space has led some to hear too much of the cocktail lounge in his playing, but he is an inventive and influential musician and composer. ...
(Guitar, vocals, 1905–74) Arthur William Crudup was born in Forest, Mississippi and did not learn to play the guitar until his 30s. He worked functions in the Clarksdale area before moving to Chicago in 1940, signing with Bluebird in 1941 and finding considerable popularity on record. He returned to Mississippi after the Second World War and worked ...
The bluesman who took the blues into the mainstream, B.B. King (b. 1925) is also its ambassador to the world. His solid, seasoned style is heard internationally. King’s style draws on the Mississippi blues of Elmore James and Muddy Waters, the Chicago blues of Buddy Guy and Magic Sam, and the West-Coast blues of T-Bone Walker ...
Joseph Vernon Turner was born on 18 May 1911 in Kansas City, Missouri. He dropped out of school after sixth grade and worked with blind singers on the streets. The blues was in the air in Kansas City and when Turner joined in with the street singers he would make up blues lyrics. Turner was functionally illiterate and never learned ...
One of the founding fathers of rock’n’roll, Charles Edward (Chuck) Berry was born in 1926 in St Louis, Missouri, to a middle-class family. His interest in the blues began in high school, where he gave his first public performance. In 1944, he was convicted of armed robbery and sentenced to three years in an Intermediate Reformatory ...
Derek Trucks was born in Jacksonville, Florida in 1979. Trucks bought his first guitar at a yard sale for $5 at age nine and became a child prodigy, playing his first paid performance at age 11. Trucks began playing the guitar using a ‘slide’ bar because it allowed him to play the guitar with his small hands. By his ...
(Guitar, vocals, b. 1942) This Tulsa, Oklahoma native’s return to his roots as a blues player has been characterized by barnstorming live sets and albums for the Alligator label in the Chicago electric tradition, at times approximating the sound of Elmore James’s bands. Bishop, who became a charter member of the Paul Butterfield Blues Band while ...
(Vocal/instrumental group, 1973–present) Thorogood’s energetic, Delaware-based band drew inspiration from Elmore James and Hound Dog Taylor. Flash guitarist and raw vocalist Thorogood moved the band to Boston in 1974 and gained popularity on the blues circuit there, leading to its 1978 self-titled debut on Rounder Records. The 1979 album Move It On Over was a commercial breakthrough and ...
Rock’n’roll pioneer Ike Turner was born in Clarksdale, Mississippi in November 1931. He displayed an early interest in music while working for a local radio station. He was taught to play boogie-woogie piano by one of his idols, blues musician Pinetop Perkins. Inspired by other bluesmen like Howlin’ Wolf, Sonny Boy Williamson II, Muddy Waters and Elmore ...
(Guitar, vocals, 1929–67) J.B. Lenoir was born in Monticello, Mississippi; his parents were farmers as well as musicians. He learned to play the guitar at the age of eight and left home in the early 1940s to work with Rice Miller and Elmore James, before settling in Chicago in 1949 and making his recording debut in ...
Veteran Rolling Stones guitarist Keith Richards (b. 1943) was born in Dartford, Kent. After being expelled from technical school in 1958, Richards attended Sidcup Art College. The art-school environment was crucial to Richards’ development, as it was for many of his generation. Here he was able to nurture his passion for rhythm and blues, finding many fellow ...
(Vocals, harmonica, guitar, b. 1936) Iverson Minter, a.k.a. Louisiana Red, rose from childhood tragedy to build an impressive career. His mother had died and his father had been murdered by the Ku Klux Klan by the time Red was five years old. He first recorded for Chess in 1949, prior to his military ...
While blues music has produced dozens of great, innovative musicians, vocalists and songwriters, the continuing influence of Robert Johnson over the years has shown that no other performer has succeeded in combining all the elements in quite the exceptional way that he did. The fascination that Johnson holds for so many people lies not only in his extraordinary ...
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David Bowie
Fantastic new, unofficial biography covers
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