Booker T. Washington White was one of the most powerful, imaginative and original country blues artists both in the pre-World War II era and during the folk blues revival of the 1960s. In between, he made his own contribution to postwar blues by helping his young cousin B.B. King get started in Memphis. White was born on a farm near Houston, Mississippi. Several dates have been given, including Nov. 12, 1906, and 1909, but White entered March 9, 1904, when he applied for a Social Security card in 1940. His guttural growl, piledriving rhythms, and facile slide technique earned him recording dates in Memphis in 1930 (under the name Washington White) and in Chicago in 1937 (as Bukka – pronounced book-a, a colloquial version of Booker – White). His next recording opportunity came when folklorist John Lomax showed up to collect songs for the Library of Congress in 1939 at Parchman Penitentiary, where White was serving time at for a shooting. In 1940, after his release, White returned to Chicago to record some of his most memorable songs, including “Parchman Farm Blues,” “District Attorney Blues,” and “When Can I Change My Clothes,” which were based on his trial and incarceration. Another 1940 recording, “Aberdeen Mississippi Blues,” provided a clue to whereabouts in 1963 when guitarist and researcher John Fahey sent a postcard to “Bukka White, Old Blues Singer, in care of General Delivery, Aberdeen, Miss.” Remarkably, the card was forwarded to White, who was living in Memphis. He was soon recording again and delivering energetic, robust performances that indicated he had lost none of his skills or his drive, and some critics viewed him as strongest performer among the older bluesmen whose careers were revived in the ’60s. Among his later recordings were two albums of “sky songs” that displayed his improvisatory abilities; as White explained, “I just reach up and pull them out of the sky – call them sky songs – they just come to me.” He died in Memphis on February 26, 1977.
