Some January Blues Births:
- January 5th.,1893-- Elizabeth "Libba" Cotton
- January 14th.,1938-- Allen Toussaint
- January 31st.,1915-- Alan Lomax
Answer to the December 2017 Blues Question: the bluesman we were looking for was/is "Blind Blake", born Arthur Blake, in 1896 (some sources say 1893), in either Jacksonville, Florida, known at that time as Fort George Island (of the Sea Islands chain), or Newport News, Virginia. If you read about him in some of the books on blues history, you'll find his supposed birth name listed as Arthur Phelps. That was updated or corrected in 2011, when a group of researchers published copies of some documents, one of which was his death certificate. That showed that his parents were Winter and Alice Blake, and that he was born in Newport News in 1896. What is known about him to be (possibly) correct is that in his younger years he hoboed throughout Georgia, Florida, Tennessee, even up into Ohio, performing on the streets and at picnics, parties, suppers, and fish fries. He moved to and settled in Chicago in the mid- 1920's, where he lived in an apartment at 31st. and Cottage Grove. He started to record for Paramount Records in 1926, and his records sold well. He remained with Paramount his entire career. Some sources show that he recorded around 80 songs. I have found 85 listed under his own name, 6 as Blind Joe Martin, 2 as Billy James, and 44 as an accompanist to other artists. What you have to consider here is that at a recording session, there might have been up to 6 takes (in those days) of a song, and that, most of the time, only one take was actually released, with the others being either shelved or scrapped. Some of the ones I tallied in my count were never released by Paramount. In his hoboing years he went by the three names I've already listed and was also known as "Blind Arthur" and "Gorgeous Weed". He married Beatrice McGee around 1931. In around June of 1932, he recorded his two final songs at the Paramount headquarters in Grafton, Wisconsin. Those songs were "Depression's Gone From Me Blues" and "Champagne Charlie Is My Name", released under both his own name and the Billy James name. Some blues history experts and some musicologists say that the "Champagne Charlie" doesn't sound like Blake's picking style or voice and may be wrongly credited to him because of that. Those last two songs were done right before Paramount went "belly-up", and ended Blake's career. I t has been said that he met a "violent death" in 1934 (possibly hit by a streetcar), but that's incorrect. In April of 1933 he was hospitalized with pneumonia, from which he didn't fully recover. After a period of declining health, Beatrice, on December 1st.,1934, called for an ambulance for him. On the way to the hospital he suffered a pulmonary hemorrhage, and passed away. The official cause of death is listed as pulmonary tuberculosis. He passed away in Milwaukee and is buried in Glendale, Wisconsin. His style of play is comparable to ragtime piano, but on guitar. Thus, he is known as one of the first to help give birth to a style of play known today as "Piedmont Blues". You can look up anyone who has ever played that style or who is playing it today and you'll find they credit Blake as their biggest influence. Oh, by the way, if you've seen either of the "Jack Reacher" movies, you know that Reacher is the main character in 17 + novels written by Lee Child. In two of his books, "Killing Floor" and "The Affair", Reacher's character mentions that in his travels he hopes to learn what happened to "Blind Blake".
Blues Question for January 2018: this gospel/blues singer and guitarist was an early "slide" player who was an influence to Robert Johnson and Howlin' Wolf, just to mention a couple. There are probably many of today's players he influences, but they don't know it because of his obscurity. He got his first instrument, the good-old "cigar box guitar", from his father at an early age. When I list some of his songs in the February blog, you'll see that a lot of today's players are covering his songs. Any ideas on who this gospel/bluesman is ??
Song(s) and Artist(s) for January 2018: I know that New Year's Eve, technically, isn't January, but it does roll into it, so I'm listing one for the "Eve" and one for New Year's Day. For the Eve the song is "New Year's Eve Blues", by Smokey Hogg. For New Year's Day the song is "Happy New Year Darling", by Lonnie Johnson.
Blues trivia for January 2018: as I have stated before, the cigar-box guitar was the first instrument that early young "bluesmen" were given by their parents, as most were poor and couldn't afford to buy them a top of the line guitar, which, at that time, would have been a Gibson or a C.F. Martin. In 1871, in Jersey City, New Jersey, the Oscar Schmidt Company was founded by Oscar and Otto Schmidt. In 1899, the Schmidt company started the Stella brand guitar production company, a low and mid-level "entry" type guitar, which became known for its reasonable price and good tone quality. They also produced instruments under the "Sovereign" and "La Scala" brand names. The company survived the Depression, but merged with another company in 1931. That organization was then merged with another one in 1935, before falling into bankruptcy. It was sold to Harmony Company in 1939 and operated under that brand until 1974. Oscar Schmidt is now, currently a subsidiary of the U.S.Music Corporation, and is located in Buffalo Grove, Illinois. They still produce Autoharps (Schmidt owns the name), ukuleles, basses, banjos, and guitars. Some of the best known names have used the Stella's. You may know some of them-- Son House, Willie Brown, Robert Johnson, Skip James, R.L. Burnside, Willie Nelson, and B.B. King, just to name a few.
Some January Blues Passings:
- January 2nd.,1998-- our friend and Robert Lockwood Jr.'s "brother"-- Fred Jones
- January 13th.,2016-- Giorgio Gomelsky
- January 31st.,2015-- Don Covay, born Donald James Randolph
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