A Christmas Cooke

"You Send Me" Daniel Wolff's definitive biography of Sam Cooke begins the second chapter with a description of the birth of Samuel Cook and his delivery "by a midwife in Clarksdale at 2:10 in the afternoon on January 22, 1931."

Wolff goes on to describe Clarksdale of the early 1930's:

"Out of these elements -- a large colored population, a little spending money, the exhaustion of picking cotton and the exhilaration of cheap whiskey -- came a music historians have called the Delta Blues. Legendary practioners like Robert Johnson, Charley Patton, and Skip James were drawn -- like the Reverend Cook (Samuel's father) -- to the relative prosperity of Clarksdale. Here they traded lyrics and played all night dances, till the music reached a zenith of moaning double-entendres, secret protest, and contagious gut-bucket beats."

The twin of the delta blues, Wolff notes, was the church song: the spiritual. And the two were not to be crossed.

The Reverend Cook left his Clarksdale church at 2303 7th Street and hoboed up to Chicago with just thirty-five cents in his pocket. After finding work in the Chicago stockyards, he came back for his family.

This was how Sam Cooke (he added an e to his name after turning professional) made it to Chicago and the Soul Stirrers where on December 1, 1950 he replaced gospel legend R.H. Harris as lead singer. In March 1951 at 20-years-old a nervous Sam Cooke made his professional recording debut, a fact that Wolff writes did not sit well with producer Art Rupe who didn't know Harris had been replaced by a kid.

"Can he sing?" Rupe wanted to know.
"Yes sir, he can sing," Rupe was told.
"Okay" a disappointed Rupe replied angrily, "I'll allow you one mistake."

It was a decision Art Rupe of Specialty Records never regretted. There was no mistake.

Sam Cooke sang lead on eleven songs during that first session including "Peace in the Valley" and what would become the hit of the session, and Sam's breakout gospel song "Jesus Gave Me Water".

Wolff writes:

"The Sweet Mississippi accent he got from his parents dwells on each syllable and calls for attention. The third time through the chorus, Sam lets the group start and, by coming in a beat later, kicks up the excitement. And when he sings "I want to let His praises swell," Sam's voice does just that. If Art Rupe didn't know he had a hit here, he wasn't listening."

Rupe was listening. So were thousands of impressed gospel fans who made "Jesus Gave Me Water" more popular than anthing R.H. Harris had ever recorded with the quartet. More than five decades later, as another Christmas approaches, we're still moved by the spirit in Sam Cooke's voice. And we're still listening.

(Click to hear Jesus Gave Me Water by The Soul Stirrers)

(Click to hear The Soul Stirrers sing Peace in the Valley)

Blues For Christmas

Born in 1917 near Clarksdale, John Lee Hooker had 10 older brothers and sisters. His first instrument was an inner tube nailed to the barn. His first father was not musically inclined. Luckily, his mother then married a man who was. Hooker's step-father, William Moore was a guitar player. William Moore played fish fries and parties, sometimes joining blues legends Charlie Patton, Blind Lemon Jefferson and Blind Blake. William Moore also taught young John Lee how to play the blues.

It was a lesson that lasted a lifetime.

John Lee ran away from his Clarksdale home at either 14 or 15 to play the blues in Memphis. He wound up working as a movie usher, but also working with Robert Nighthawk. Then he moved to Cinncinnati to live with relatives. For the next ten years John Lee sang gospel and worked a variety of manual labor jobs.

But it wasn't enough to hold him, after a stint in the army, he settled in Detroit, working at a receiving hospital and later at Dodge and Comco Steel (possibly also as a janitor at the Chrysler car plant). Through it all, however he paid the rent, John Lee never put down his guitar. He played in clubs, but it took a little luck before John Lee got to really boogie.

Someone with connections to a local record distributor heard him playing at a house party, noticed that he was very good, and in 1948 John Lee Hooker recorded his first hit record, the classic "Boogie Chillen." It was in a style he learned long ago from his step-father back in Clarksdale.

"Blues for Christmas" isn't a boogie tune. it's far from it. "Blues for Christmas" is a laid back drinking blues with a jazzy feel augmented by Bob Thurman on piano, Jimmy Miller on trumpet and Johnny Hooks on tenor saxophone. Hooker wrote and recorded it in Detroit in 1954.

William Moore never got to hear this or any other John Lee Hooker record. He died before his step-son got to Detroit.

(Click to hear John Lee Hooker's Blues for Christmas)

Click here for John Lee Hooker Tribute Page

Forty Days With Muddy Waters

What would it have been like to watch Muddy Waters cut one of his many classic records in the legendary Chess Records studio at 2120 South Michigan in Chicago?

A new movie attempts to show us how "Forty Days and Forty Nights" might have went down in 1956 with Muddy and Little Walter.

Cadillac Records Exclusive Clip


The movie is Cadillac Records, the story of Chess Records. (see earlier blog mention) That's Jeffery Wright portraying Muddy Waters and Columbus Short as Little Walter. That's Buddy Guy's vocal on the soundtrack. The movie opens December 5th, just two days after Mississippi once again honors Muddy with a second blues trail marker. The first marker is placed at Muddy's cabin site on the Stovall Plantation in Clarksdale. This time around, a blues trail marker will be unveiled at his birthplace in Rolling Forks.

From the Clarksdale Press Register we find that the Delta Blues Museum has secured $1.8 million in grants to expand the museum, including a new home for the Muddy Water's cabin exhibit where it can be erected to its actual height. Right now, the top section of the cabin is not included, as the ceiling height of the museum is too low.

Will this star-studded new movie renew interest in Mississippi's blues greats like Muddy Waters? Absolutely. And many of those will come to check out the Delta Blues Museum in Clarksdale and the blues trail markers across the state. With 58 markers now in place, to view them all, it just might take someone, oh I don't know, something like forty days and forty nights.

Click to hear Muddy's Forty Days and Forty Nights.

News Roundup

A Mississippi Public Broadcasting story, the “Kids Write the Blues”, by Ron Brown recently won an Edward R. Murrow Award. The story features fourth graders from the Matty Akin Elementary School in Greenville reading their songs celebrating the Delta blues and heritage. “This is a positive story that hopefully inspired those who heard it,” explains Brown. “I know these kids touched my heart. If I passed that feeling along, then I did a good job. I am honored by the recognition of a national Murrow award.” Brown’s art reports are funded by the Wallace Foundation through the Mississippi Arts Commission.

Morgan Freeman and Bill Luckett will be adding a Ground Zero Blues Club in 2009 in Philadelphia, Mississippi at the Pearl River Resort. Currently, in addition to the original in Clarksdale, Freeman and Luckett also have a GZBC in Memphis.

Clarksdale's Cat Head Delta Blues & Folk Art is one of the top 17 cool record stores in the country according to Paste Magazine.

In this inteview with rapper David Banner, the Mississippi native reflects on the future of hip-hop in the South.

The Bolivar Commercial is reporting on renovations at Dockery Farms:

The Dockery Farms Foundation is getting ready to begin phase one of an estimated $800,000 refurbishing and revitalization project. The buildings to be preserved include the Seed House, Cotton Gin, Cotton Storage Shed, Hay Barn and Fertilizer Shed as well as the Old Service Station. The foundation would also like to rebuild the Commissary, which was part of the original Dockery Farms property but was destroyed by a fire years ago. “This will provide a place for other universities and any groups that want to come to Dockery for a place to study the history of the Delta and the Blues,” he said. Dockery Farms was established by Will Dockery in 1895 to produce cotton. African Americans who came to Dockery to cultivate cotton created a culture that inspired the music known as the Blues. It was home to a number of Blues pioneers. “Dockery is considered the birthplace of the Blues,” said Lester. “Charley Patton, Pops Stables, Willie Brown and others are all folks who played the Blues that has influenced popular music. It all started right here.” It was at Dockery that these musicians lived and learned from one another. In turn they left Dockery and traveled north to record. Their songs influenced the development of popular music all over the world.

Read the full story here: Dockery Farms shakes blues with restoration

The Cotton Pickin' Blues

Here comes another Mississippi Blues Trail Marker Ceremony: Friday, May 9, 2008 at 1pm at the Hopson Plantation in Clarksdale to note The Cotton Pickin' Blues.

News Update

Coke Kills Ike - Rock n' roll pioneer Ike Turner's death last month at age 76 was caused by a cocaine overdose. The medical examiner's office also listed hypertensive cardiovascular disease and pulmonary emphysema as "significant and contributing factors" to the Clarksdale, Miss., native's death. (Read the Full Story Here)

Tickle Me Elmore - Elmore James, the king of the raw and loud slide guitar of '50s Chicago blues, left something down in his old stomping grounds in Mississippi before moving north -- little Earnest Johnson. In the mid '60s, Johnson took the stage name Elmore James Jr., and he hopes to show the State Theatre during his show Friday what his biological father taught him. James Jr. was born in 1939 in James' hometown of Richmond, Miss., to a woman who ran a restaurant. His mother's husband, who he thought of as his dad back then, tended to be mean, James Jr. said from his home in Chicago. (Read The Full Story Here)

Lantana in March - Caroline Herring confidently returns to the forefront of the American roots music scene with her new album Lantana, due March 4th, 2008 on Signature Sounds Records. The Mississippi-born singer/songwriter new albulm is intimate, powerful and honest, Lantana is a masterpiece of understated intensity and in many ways an artistic re-birth for Herring. After making a name for herself in Mississippi as band member and co-founder of the now renowned Thacker Mountain Radio music series, Herring moved to Austin, TX. Herring quickly took the town by storm, releasing the critically acclaimed debut album, Twilight. She won "Best New Artist" at both the 2002 SXSW Austin Music Awards and also from the Austin American Statesman. Herring soon after released an equally impressive follow-up, Wellspring. In many ways Lantana is Herring's re-imaging of the Gothic South, with a rich alto voice that soothes the listener even as she addresses difficult subjects. Herring has a journalist's eye for detail, a poet's sense of scale and language, and a life-long Southerner's understanding of the issues that shape the culture below the Mason Dixon line. Herring's commitment to uncovering the truth in her songs led fellow artist Dar Williams to call Herring 'the elusive real thing.' There is no artifice on Lantana. It's an album full of delights, lyrically and musically. And just like Caroline Herring, her new album is the real thing. (Read More Here)

RIP Ike Turner

Clarksdale native and Rock and Roll Hall of Fame member Ike Turner passed away yesterday at the age of 76. Many consider Turner the "father" of Rock and Roll for his work in 1951 cutting the song "Rocket 88" in Memphis at Sun Studios with his band. This song is recognized as the first rock n roll song.

Izear Luster "Ike" Turner
1931 - 2007

BBC: The musical legacy of Ike Turner

Rhonda Swan: Ike Turner, Legendary Songwriter, Dead

SkyNews: Rock Pioneer Ike Turner Dies

Reuters at New York Post: IKE 'BEATS' TINA TO DEATH

Extreme Makeover: Blues Edition

52-year-old Morris Cummings, better known as Blind Mississippi Morris, can play the harmonica like nobody's business. The talented musician, born in Clarksdale, Mississippi and blind since the age of four, has performed with B.B. King, Rufus Thomas and Muddy Waters.

Bluzharp Magazine calls Morris one of the 10 best harmonica players in the world.

He and his band, The Pocket Rockets, are favorites down on Beale Street.

For months now, Morris has been in a predicament. His home on Chelsea Avenue in North Memphis is nearly a hundred years old. It's so rundown that code enforcement says it's not safe for Morris and his family to live there.

Saturday morning, volunteers showed up on Morris' front lawn with an offer he couldn't believe.

For the next several hours, nearly three dozen people of all ages, braved the summer heat to give Morris' home a makeover....As the day went on, the volunteers made progress. The staircase was rebuilt. The air-conditioning and ventilation units repaired. Leaks in the roof were patched up....As hammers pounded away and saws buzzed through pieces of lumber, the sound of Delta blues played in the background as Morris played the harmonica.

"This clean-up is a dream come true," Morris said. "I tell you, it means I get to stay here. I'm not going to be homeless."

Morris hopes to one day install a recording studio in the old home. He says he'd like to teach music to the young people to keep them off the streets and out of trouble.

The work on his home is expected to take some more time to complete. And the volunteers say they'll be back again, until it's done. (Full Story)

Festivals

The Big Muddy Blues Festival cut Ike Turner from the line-up ("after the idea drew complaints stemming from Turner's well-known violent marriage to Tina Turner. Mayor Francis Slay declined to issue a Turner proclamation — a decision that made international headlines — and the Rock and Roll Hall of Famer called in sick") but still claimed its share of Mississippi blues roots (Full Story).

The Farish Street Heritage Festival [in Jackson] will celebrate its 29th year with performances by funk legends Zapp and soul star J. Blackfoot, as well as a lineup of local performers that includes bluesman Eddie Cotton and rapper Kamikaze. (Full Story)

“The Howlin' Wolf Festival will join forces, as a part of a cross-promotional event, with the Prairie Arts Festival to present the first annual Point City Fest,” Howlin' Wolf Society of West Point program director Richard Ramsey said. (Full Story in Columbus Dispatch) - and - West Point blues fest kicks off Thursday (Full Story in MSU Reflector)

With just 42 days remaining until the 22nd annual Arkansas Blues & Heritage Festival, supporters of down home Delta Blues are answering tons of questions from fans around the world. Roger Stolle, owner of Cathead Delta Blues & folk art shop on Delta Ave. in Clarksdale Miss. is very busy helping promote the festival as well as answering masses of e-mail quires about Helena's own blues weekend that has received world wide attention. (Full Story)

Monday News Roundup

Ground Zero in Clarksdale is under new management.

Blues diva Dorothy Moore of Jackson will donate mementos from her personal collection to the Robert Johnson Blues Foundation Official Museum in Crystal Springs.

The Son House Blues Trail Marker is being unveiled today near Tunica.

Lucille and Friends will perform in a Mississippi Musicians Hall of Fame presentation at the OnStage Restaurant at Jackson Evers International Airport this Friday. Lucille is a slide guitarist and vocalist who toured with Little Milton and has played with Albert King, Dr. John, Dorothy Moore, Z.Z. Hill, R.L. Burnside, Sam Myers and others.

Wednesday News Roundup

Purvis native Johnny Rawls plays at Peterborough's Red Dog Tavern in Canada. (06/13/07)

Jackson native and Grammmy winner Cassandra Wilson will be headlining the Bucks County Jazz Restival in Pennsylvania. (06/12/07)

The St. Louis Post-Dispatch writes about the blues heritage that spread up Highway 61 from the Delta to Chicago and visits Clarksdale to see this home of the blues still jams live from juke joints to Ground Zero. Another article asks if the blues have left St. Louis and looks closer at the history of the Mississippi blues in the city. (6/10/2007)

Greenwoodians enjoyed the Family Funk Festival this past weekend (06/09/07)

Bentonia native Jimmy "Duck" Holmes is profiled in this article in prep for his performance at the Chicago Blues Festival. (06/08/07)

Beulah is planning a gospel festival for June 30. (06/08/07)

The Edinburgh Jazz Festival has sparked some controversy for booking Clarksdale's Ike Turner. Advocates against domestic violence are protesting the Grammy winner. (06/08/07)

Moss Point highschoolers took their instruments to Burlington, Vermont to thank their sister city for post-Katrina support. (06/07/07)

Pinetop Perkins DVD

Josh Perkins reviews the new music DVD documentary on Belzoni native and blues legend Pinetop Perkins.

Perkins writes: Joe Willie “Pinetop” Perkins is a national treasure. Forget Mount Rushmore and to hell with the Grand Canyon – old rocks and dead men are no match for a timeless spring of eternal blues....

He was born in Belzoni, Mississippi [in 1913] on the Honey Island plantation. Perkins has taken to saying he was “born in the honey,” a turn of phrase that now serves as the title of a 60-minute documentary on his incredible life.

He started playing music at an early age, learning both guitar and piano as a youngster before leaving home around age 16....He moved to Clarksdale in 1940, not long after the moonshine operation he helped run got broken up. His fellow entrepreneurs were apprehended by the law. He escaped and decided it was time for a change of scenery....Perkins knocked around Memphis, St. Louis, and Cairo, Illinois throughout the '50s. While in Memphis, he taught Ike Turner to play piano. He also recorded on a session with Earl Hooker for Sun Records. While there, he recorded “Pinetop's Boogie Woogie,” which was originally recorded by Clarence “Pinetop” Smith. The song meant so much to Perkins that he donned the nickname himself, becoming even more famous than its originator....

Born in the Honey assembles a wonderful cast of blues legends to both pay tribute to Perkins as well as swap stories about time spent with him. Bobby Rush has a great story about Pinetop the prankster. Ike Turner, Bob Margolin, Willie “Big Eyes” Smith, Ann Rabson, Paul Oscher, Dr. John, Lonnie Brooks, Hubert Sumlin, Taj Majal, Kim Wilson, Marcia Ball, Koko Tayler, and Bernard Allison are all interviewed during the documentary as is Pinetop himself....

Pinetop Perkins is a blues icon, and Born in the Honey does a fine job of telling his story....Also included in the package is a 10-song CD, Pinetop Perkins on the 88s. The first nine tracks are taken from a live performance.

(Read the full article here.)

Friday News Roundup

Ground Zero Blues Club celebrates sixth anniversary this Saturday. Clarksdale’s James "Super Chikan" Johnson and Tupelo’s Homemade Jamz will perform. (Full Story Here) 5/25/2007

StarNewsOnline.com (North Carolina): At the LAUNDROLOUNGE This Saturday as part of WE Festival XI: "8:30 p.m. Jennifer Glass [Jackson] Mississippi-born/NYC-based singer [Decca Records] Jennifer Glass has chops and songwriting abilities to spare. A recent performance at The Living Room will soon be broadcast on XM Radio, while Glass will also cover Bonnaroo this year as a VJ for Concert TV, an on-demand music channel." 5/25/2007

McComb native and R&B artist Ray J continues his "salacious scandal" lifestyle as reported in great detail at the Black Voices Blog. 5/24/2007

Jackson Free Press: "Larry Brown loved music. The late Mississippi author was a constant presence around the music clubs in his hometown of Oxford, and a CD was always playing in his writing room (often the disc of a local musician). Many of the musicians from the Oxford area responded in kind, becoming dedicated followers of his sparse, direct novels and short stories. Brown's death in 2004 at the age of 53 was devastating, and many are still trying to come to terms with it, the music world in particular. To celebrate his life, a group of musicians from Mississippi (and some from other parts of the country) have come together and created a special compilation CD. “Just One More: A Musical Tribute to Larry Brown,” which will be released this week by Chicago-based label Bloodshot Records, features tracks from 18 of Brown’s favorite performers." (Full Story Here) 5/23/2007

Jackson Free Press: "Mckinney “WorkHorse” Williams Jr. has plenty to rap about. With an easy-going voice, the West Jackson native doesn’t give you 16 bars of nursery rhymes. Instead, he conveys stories of what he has witnessed in the capitol city. “I got so much music in me that I literally dream songs,” Workhorse writes on his MySpace blog. His mixtape “In the Future Volume II” is available at BeBop." (Full Interview Here) 05/16/2007

News Round-up

Clarksdale native Ike Turner, a member of the Rock n' Roll Hall of Fame, was jailed in Los Angeles for a 1989 narcotics warrant (full story). 05/17/2007

Pascagoula native Jimmy Buffett has teamed with Harrah's Entertainment to open the Margaritaville Casino and Resort, part of a $700 million expansion at Harrah's Grand Biloxi property (full story). 05/16/2007

Brookhaven Daily Leader: "Thirteen-year-old Cortland Collins, of Hazlehurst, got his first drum set at age 3...And by this point [age 13], the boy has followed the beat of his own drums to the Apollo in Harlem, New York, as well as the Trumpet Awards, which honor musicians from over 185 countries..."They're not sure, but we've been told he's probably the youngest musician to ever hit the stage at the Apollo" (full story). 05/15/2007

Blues harmonica player Carey Bell, a native of Macon, died in Chicago at the age of 70. Bell was a veteran of both Muddy Waters' and Willie Dixon's bands (full story). The AP and and the UK Times Online both have write ups about his life and work. 05/07/2007

The Mississippi Development Authority added a Jimmie Rodgers marker to the Mississippi Blues Trail at the Singing Brakemen Park in Meridian. Rodgers, considered the father of country music by blending blues with folk, is a member of the Blues Hall of Fame, the Country Music Hall of Fame, and the Rock 'n Roll Hall of Fame (full story). 05/03/2007

"A 28-year-old former Tupelo newspaper reporter wants the city of Starkville to posthumously pardon musician Johnny Cash for a public drunkenness arrest in 1965" (full story). The arrest led to Cash's famous tune "Starkville City Jail." 05/01/2007