Some August Blues Births:
- August 4th.,1921 -- Mitchell Herbert "Herb" Ellis
- August 13th.,1921 -- James David Walker Jr., aka Jimmy McCracklin
- August 24th.,1924 -- Louis "Little" Boyd
Answer To The July 2025 Blues Question: The bluesman we were looking for was/ is John Louis Sibley, aka Johnny Williams, but best known by his professional name -- Johnny Dollar, born November 23,1941, on a plantation near Greenville, Mississippi, as his family were sharecroppers. Greenville was the birthplace of several blues people, like Eden Brent or Tyrone Davis, and it was and still is a center for blues music fans, so you/ they can visit the famous Nelson Street, with all of it's blues and jazz clubs, which gets it compared to Beale Street in Memphis. I couldn't find any reference as to who taught him to play guitar, but he reputedly had an older brother, a musician, who may have given him the rudiments of playing. Johnny's family moved from Greenville to Chicago in '51, where it has been reported that Johnny worked with Magic Sam (Maghett), but I found no record of that in Magic Sam's bio or discography. Johnny had been suffering some abuse by his stepfather, so his mother sent him to live with his aunt Lilly and uncle, Shakey Jake Harris. None the less, Johnny's fledgeling start was interupted by going into the military for eight years. He was underage, so he used his older brother's info as a "smoke screen" to join the U.S. Marines. It took the Marines three years to figure this out, but when they did, he was sent back to Chicago. When he reached legal age, he went back into the service, via the draft, and did two tours in Vietnam. When he was finally discharged later in the decade, he went back to Chicago. He joined the Sound Masters, a family group, consisting of the Fisher brothers Charles, Eddie, Jim, and Thomas, as the only non-family member, serving as their lead vocalist. They did make some notable recordings. By the '70's Johnny wanted to go solo, but he needed to earn more money, so he joined the Chicago Police Department. He made it through two Vietnam tours with no injuries, but walking a police beat in some tough Chicago neighborhoods wasn't quite as healthy. He survived five gunshot wounds, which gave him some scars on his stomach and back. He also survived a gunshot wound to the head. It was another accident in the late '70's that ended his career in law enforcement. Johnny, in his spare time in the '80's and '90's, continued performing in clubs in Chicago and the general area, because the effects of the beginnings of congestive heart failure limited longer distances traveling. In 1980 he did do a stint in Europe, and, while in France, recorded his debut album, "My Soul Is Blue", on the Isbel label. He had a fondness for a drink, and definately had an eye for the ladies, both of which frequently got him in situations that brought trouble. On November 1,1999, he was struck by a car. After remaining in a coma at/ in Northwestern Memorial Hospital, he was transferred to another hospital in West Chicago. People at Northwestern never knew his name, but when he got to the one in West Chicago, they went through items that had been sent with him. In those things they found his wallet and the clothes he was wearing when he was hit. Now he had a name and, when conscious, he had to learn about and deal with a broken pelvis,a broken arm, and a head injury that often left him disoriented and with memory problems. After months of rehab, Johnny took the stage at a Thanksgiving evening party, singing and playing his guitar like a miracle had happened to him. Less than three months after the party event, Wolf Records recorded and released his first album since the one done in '86, which had been titled "J. D.'s Blues" on the B.L.U.E.S R&,B Records label, the title of the Wolf records release was/is "My Baby Loves Me". All of his albums are currently available, with that last one, done in 2001, on c.d.. Johnny passed away on August 29,2006, in Chicago. No other info have I yet found. And if you think some of today's players have had a tough time in the blues world just think about what Johnny went through.
Blues Question For August 2025: This bluesman you might call an itinerant performer --- but that's what he was. He is only known to have recorded six tracks in his career. He was part of a group known as "The Santa Fe Group", all of them piano players. As I was working on this, a little light went on in my skull --- I remembered the date of these recordings and their location, and realized that this recording studio must have been an extremely large place, with many recording rooms, because there is a large list of people who all recorded that same day, and in all different genres, and the recording company released these recordings on at least three different labels. I know that that's a shakey, half-empty description, but do you have any idea who this bluesman might be ??
Blues Song(s) And Artist(s) For August 2025: The song is "Truthful Blues", and the artist is Leroy Carr. It was recorded on August 14, 1928, in Chicago, on the Vocalion label, #1232, recording #C2221. The "B" side was "You Got To Reap What You Sow", recording #C2223. The main artist was/is Leroy Carr on vocals and piano, with Francis Hillman "Scrapper" Blackwell on guitar.
Blues Trivia For August 2025: Vocalion recordings done in Chicago were manufactured by "The Brunswick - Balke - Collender Company", and the labels they printed/ used on the actual record were either a square design, or a "swirl" style label.The Song Of The Month that I picked was never going to be a hit, but these two recorded one that was and still is a hit and has been recorded by many blues people. It was recorded on Vocalion on June 19,1928, in Indianapolis - "How Long, How Long Blues". Come to find out that it was based on a 1925 recording by Ida Cox and Papa Charlie Jackson, "How Long Daddy ?". It's melody was used by Robert Johnson on hts recording of the song "Come On In My Kitchen". Although Leroy and Scrapper recorded many songs together, Scrapper felt that he wasn't being paid what he should have been for his work. That disagreement came to a head, when, at their last recording session together, Scrapper stormed out of the session, leaving Leroy to finish with the last song alone, aptly titled "Six Cold Feet In The Ground". This was on February 25,1935. Also, Leroy was a severe alcoholic, and he died on April 29,1935, of nephritis, so it really was his last recording session, and of his life. Scrapper got a phone call letting him know that Leroy had died, and he wrote a song in tribute to him -- "My Old Pal Blues".
Some August Blues Passings:
- August 9th.,1995 -- Jerome John "Jerry" Garcia
- August 17th.,2016 -- Preston Hubbard
- August 31st.,2000 -- Saunders Samuel King
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