Pony Blues — Charley Patton (Paramount, 1929)
Of the 14 tracks Charley Patton recorded at his 1929 debut session, Paramount chose 'Pony Blues' and 'Banty Rooster Blues,' as the two sides of his first single, which proved to be his biggest hit [...]
Big Boss Man — Jimmy Reed (Vee-Jay, 1960)
If there ever was a blues theme for the proletariat, it was Jimmy Reed's 1961 smash, Big Boss Man. 'You got me workin', boss man, workin' 'round the clock, I want me a drink of [...]
Long Distance Call — Muddy Waters (Chess, 1951)
Out of the many classics recorded by Muddy Waters, 'Long Distance Call' was Muddy's own personal favorite, and understandably so. A sterling performance by Muddy as a singer and slide guitarist with Little Walter on [...]
Robert Cray
Robert Cray helped reenergize the blues scene in the 1980s with a fresh, appealing blend of blues and soul music that even crashed the pop charts. Between 1986 and 1999 his consummate vocals and guitar [...]
Percy Mayfield
Percy Mayfield was a popular recording artist in the early 1950s when he had a No. 1 R&B hit with “Please Send Me Someone to Love,” but after a disfiguring injury in an auto accident [...]
Sonny Terry
Often cited as the greatest and certainly most famous of the acoustic blues harmonica players, Terry was also famed for the exuberant whoops and hollers he worked into his blues numbers, fox chase imitations, and [...]
Willie Mae ‘Big Mama’ Thornton
“Willie Mae 'Big Mama' Thornton is in my opinion the greatest female blues singer of this and any other decade,” renowned producer Chris Strachwitz proclaimed in the liner notes to the 1965 Arhoolie album Big [...]
Hound Dog Taylor
“Have some fun!” Those were Hound Dog Taylor's favorite words to his audiences, and in the history of the blues, few performers have so engagingly used the blues to further the cause of having fun [...]
Big Bill Blues: William Broonzy’s Story as told to Yannick Bruynoghe
London: Cassell & Company, Ltd., 1955. Before authors Sam Charters and Paul Oliver published their pioneering histories of the blues, bluesman Big Bill Broonzy took it upon himself to do a book about the blues [...]
Blues Fell This Morning: Meaning in the Blues by Paul Oliver
The first in British blues authority Paul Oliver’s series of books documenting the history and analyzing the blues, Blues Fell This Morning was a landmark work in its interpretation of the language, lyrics, and subject [...]