Big Road Blues

Show Notes:

A shortened show today due to the station’s Rochester Jazz Festival coverage. Still, we have a wide and diverse mix today including several sets of artists like Blind Blake, the group of Carl Martin, Ted Bogan and Henry Armstrong, Calvin Leavy and a set of songs revolving around Lightnin’ Hopkins. We also spotlight  great new releases on Smithsonian Folkways and Southland.

We launch the program on a sad note with a trio of  sides by Calvin Leavy who passed on June 8th, a year before his release date from his Arkansas state prison sentence. He was 70. Leavy was a fine singer and songwriter who’s music intersected at the crossroads of blues and southern soul. Between the mid-1960′s and the early 1980′s he cut a string of strong singles for Acqurian, Soul Beat and Downtown including 1968′s “Cummins Prison Farm” which became a  big hit down south. That song was the result of serving time in Arkansas’ Cummins Penitentiary for a minor crime. Issued first on the small Soul beat label, the song was picked up by producer Shelby Singleton for his SSS International label and issued on the Blue Fox imprint. Leavy cut some terrific songs including “Going to the Dogs, Part 1 and 2,” “Born Unlucky, “Is It Worth All I’m Going Through,” plus excellent covers like “Nine Pound Steel”, “You Can’t Lose What You Ain’t Never Had”, and “It Hurts Me Too.” Leavy had been locked up since 1992, when he was convicted of multiple drug-related counts in Little Rock. His life plus 25 years sentence was commuted to 75 years by then-Gov. Mike Huckabee. As far as I can tell, there’s only a couple of collections of Leavy’s material available: The Best of Calvin Leavy on Red Clay and the harder to find Cummins Prison Farm on the Japanese P-Vine label. Despite his talents, Leavy remained mostly known in the south where he had a devoted following and his records were staples of the local jukeboxes. He remained outside the view of the blues revival scene, strictly cut singles and never toured widely.

We spin  a pair by Blind Blake,  one of the most popular bluesmen of the 1920’s. His only rival in popularity was fellow Paramount artist Blind Lemon Jefferson. Despite his popularity and much investigation, Blake remains a shadowy figure; What was his real name? Where was he from? And perhaps most mysteriously, how did he simply disappear after a final session circa June 1932? As for biographical details there is the following from his first Defender advertisement: “Early Morning Blues” is the first record of this new exclusive Paramount artist, Blind Blake. Blake, who hails from Jacksonville, Florida, is known up and down the coast as a wizard at picking his piano-sounding guitar. His ‘talking guitar’ they call it, and when you hear him sing and play you’ll know why Blind Blake is going to be one of the most talked about Blues artist in music.” Whatever his background there’s no doubt regarding his guitar skills. As Tony Russell elaborates: “Blind Blake’s most remarkable achievement as a recording artist was that in a career lasting almost six years, in which he made about 80 sides, he was never reduced, whether by slipping skill, waning inspiration or the single-mindedness of record company executives, from a multifaceted musician to a formulaic blues player.”

Martin,  Bogan & Armstrong were one of  the last of the old time black string bands, who surprisingly reunited after some three decades. Carl Martin played guitar and mandolin; Ted Bogan, rhythm guitar, Howard Armstrong, fiddle and mandolin (Howard’s son Tom on “doghouse bass”). They group recorded three albums, drawing from their enormous repertoire of blues, sentimental and popular songs (mostly from the 20′s, 30′s and 40′s). Our selection, “In The Bottom”, comes from the CD, That Old Gang of Mine which collects all 19 tracks from their second (Martin, Bogan & Armstrong) and third (That Old Gang of Mine) albums.

Classic Appalachian Blues From Smithsonian Folkways is an excellent new collection  spanning the late 50′s through the early 80′s. There’s great early cuts by Sticks McGhee and Sonny Terry, Pink Anderson, Gary Davis and Brownie McGhee but what’s particularly interesting  is the tracks recorded between 1971-1982. These cuts have been recently digitized thanks to a preservation grant from the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences and were made at Smithsonian’s Festival of American Folklife. From that festival we spotlight songs by Virginian blues artists John Tinsley and Archie Edwards. Tinsley played local house parties before waxing a single for the Mutual label in 1951 or 1952. He quit playing until coming out of retirement in the 70’s playing several festival and making a few recording including an album for Swingmaster in 1981. Edwards  made some fine recordings late in life for the L+R label and Mapleshade plus songs scattered on several anthologies.

As usual we hear some great piano players including a set featuring Henry Brown, Memphis Slim and Roosevelt Sykes. Brown’s “Papa Slick Head” comes from the newly reissued Henry Brown Blues. This session was recorded by Paul Oliver in August 1960 in St. Louis and issued originally on the 77 label and now reissued on CD for the first time on Southland. The last track, “Henry Brown’s Talking Blues”, was not on the LP, and is nearly nine minutes of Brown’s off-the-cuff reminiscing on the St. Louis scene of his youth underpinned by some superb playing. Notes are identical to the LP with an additional photo of Brown playing at Pinkey Boxx’s Beauty Parlor in St. Louis. I’ve always been a big fan of Brown’s recordings, not only his superb 30′s recordings, but also his later recordings, including the one we spotlighted last week, The Blues in St. Louis, Vol. 2: Henry Brown and Edith Johnson: Barrelhouse Piano and Classic Blues.

We turn our attention to Folkways again with fine piano records from Memphis Slim and Roosevelt Sykes. Slim cut several albums for the label including Memphis Slim and the Real Boogie-Woogie from 1959 of which we play the lively ”Down The Big Road Blues.” Slim was also on hand to produce Sykes’ lone album for the label, Blues by Roosevelt “The Honeydripper” Sykes from 1961. Our selection, “Ran the Blues Out of My Window” a variation on “The Cannon Ball”, a song he cut back in 1936 which seems related to Cow Cow Davenport’s seminal “Cow Cow Blues.”

Other sets include one revolving around Lightnin’ Hopkins and another twin spin of sorts. We play a couple of tributes to Hopkins including “Look Out Lightning” by Juke Boy Bonner and Brownie McGhee’s “A Letter To Lightnin’ Hopkins.” On the former Bonner addresses Hopkins:

You know I heard you were the last of the blues singers
But you know you go to make some room for me
You know it may take a long time now Lightnin’
But I’m catching up to you by degrees

On “A Letter To Lightnin’ Hopkins” McGhee boasts:

I’m going to Houston Texas, Lightnin’ Hopkins is the man I want to see (2x)
Well if you can’t stand my jivin’, Sam I’m going to give you the third degree
They say you know you’re business, but I’ve got some news for you
I’m the captain of the ship, you just a member of the crew
I’ll be in Texas in the morning, you better buy a lock and key
You’ll be lookin’ for you’re woman Sam, yes and she will be with me