Big Road Blues

ARTIST	SONG	ALBUM
Billiken Johnson	Frisco Blues	Texas Piano Vol. 2: 1927-1938
Billiken Johnson	Billiken's Weary Blues	Texas Piano Vol. 2: 1927-1938
Texas Bill Day	Elm Street Blues	Texas Piano Vol. 2: 1927-1938
Andy Boy	Church Street Blues	Joe Pullum Vol. 2 1935-1951
Andy Boy	Jive Blues	Joe Pullum Vol. 2 1935-1951
Andy Boy	House Raid Blues	Joe Pullum Vol. 2 1935-1951
Walter Washington	Ice Pick Mama	Joe Pullum Vol. 2 1935-1951
Walter Washington	West Dallas Woman	Joe Pullum Vol. 2 1935-1951
Joe Pullum	Black Gal...	Joe Pullum Vol. 1 1934-1935
Joe Pullum	Cows, See That Train Comin'	Joe Pullum Vol. 1 1934-1935
Rob Cooper	West Dallas Drag No. 2	Joe Pullum Vol. 1 1934-1935
Pinetop Burks	Fannie Mae Blues	San Antonio Blues 1937
Pinetop Burks	Jack Of All Trades Blues	San Antonio Blues 1937
Pinetop Burks	Shake The Shack	San Antonio Blues 1937
Big Boy Knox	Texas Blues	San Antonio Blues 1937
Big Boy Knox	Blue Man Blues	San Antonio Blues 1937
Son Becky	Cryin' Shame Blues	San Antonio Blues 1937
Son Becky	Midnight Trouble Blues	San Antonio Blues 1937
Black Ivory King	The Flying Crow	San Antonio Blues 1937
Black Ivory King	Working For The PWA	San Antonio Blues 1937
Black Boy Shine	Brown House Blues	Black Boy Shine & Black Ivory King
Black Boy Shine	Dog House Blues	Black Boy Shine & Black Ivory King
Hersal Thomas	Hersal Blues	Black Boy Shine & Black Ivory King
George W. Thomas	Fast Stuff Blues	Black Boy Shine & Black Ivory King
Moanin' Bernice Edwards	Ninth Street Stomp	Texas Piano, Vol. 1 1923-1935
Dusky Dailey	Flying Crow Blues	Rare 1930's Blues, Vol. 2 1936-1940
Whistlin' Alex Moore	West Texas Woman	Whistlin' Alex Moore 1929 - 1951
Whistlin' Alex Moore	Blue Bloomer Blues	Whistlin' Alex Moore 1929 - 1951
Whistlin' Alex Moore	Neglected Woman	Whistlin' Alex Moore 1929 - 1951
Buster Pickens	Santa Fe	Conversation With The Blues
Dr. Hepcat	Hattie Green	Juke Joint Blues

Show Notes:
Piano blues seems to have gotten overshadowed by the emphasis on the guitar. Today the piano blues tradition is in steep decline. This week’s show harks back to the glory days of barrelhouse piano, in particular a remarkable group of piano men who where based in Texas during the 1920’s and 30’s. As Paul Oliver observed: “Texas was as rich in piano blues as Mississippi was in guitar blues …A cursory glance through the discographies will emphasize the fact that a remarkable number of blues pianists came from Texas.”

All the background for this week’s show can be found in a multi-part article I posted on the Texas piano tradition.

After discussing the early Texas piano players and the Santa Fe group we turn to Dallas which was the home of a number of distinctive piano players and singers they accompanied. Among them were Texas Bill Day, Neal Roberts, Willie Tyson, Whistlin’ Alex Moore and singer Billiken Johnson. Oliver notes that “as far as is known, they were more or less contemporaries, being born at the turn of the century (Alex Moore, specifically, in 1899).” He goes on to describe Dallas during this period: “Then there were 9000 blacks in Dallas, a quarter of the population. By 1930 they totalled just short of 50,000 and made up a significant part of the whole population. The hub of the black community was an area known as Central Tracks, where honky-tonks ‘saloons, beer-parlours and brothels were wedged between warehouses, furniture stores and places of entertainment like Ella B. Moore’s Park Theatre, or Hattie Burleson’s dance hall. Urban expansion in Dallas was largely due to its importance as a railhead, and many railroads whose names are familiar to blues collectors had termini there. Among them were the “Katy”, the Missouri, Kansas and Texas line; the Fort Worth and Denver; the Gulf, Colorado and Santa Fe; the Rock Island; and the Texas a Pacific, along whose line Central Tracks was situated.”

Despite the brash and nosey environment the “Dallas blues piano style of Dallas is slow or medium-paced and contemplative in its nature …Blues in the Dallas school is about Dallas; in fact no other blues schools, with the exception perhaps, of Chicago, gives us quite such a picture of the urban life which inspired it. ..These are blues that are intended to be listened to, with words that have a strange folk lyricism about them. Here the piano is used as a complementary poetic instrument, setting off the words and the mood of the blues instead of challenging it with pyrotechnic displays.”

It’s not surprising that the railroad figure prominently in the blues of Dallas. Singer Billiken Johnson was obviously well acquainted with the rail lines as they figure in number of his blues. Johnson is a key figure though he did not play piano. His speciality was vocal effects, and he was considered rather a clown by his blues musician friends. On “Frisco Blues” [MP3] (a reference to the St. Louis—San Francisco line) Johnson provides the train sounds over the gently rolling piano of Neal Roberts who also sings. Johnson provides the same role on “Sun Beam Blues” (also known as the “Sunshine Special” that ran on the Missouri— Pacific line to St. Louis) evocatively imitating the lonesome train whistle as the unknown Fred Adams takes the vocals. Johnson also vocalizes on “Interurban Blues” which refers to the short haul trains which brought country people into the city. On these tracks Willie Tyson plays piano. Johnson’s vocal effects are also on display on “Billiken’s Weary Blues” with steady piano support from Texas Bill Day who plays in a similar style as the aforementioned Neal Roberts. Johnson surfaces again on Day’s lustily sung “Elm Street Blues” [MP3] where the pianist sings: “Ellum Street’s paved in brass, Main Street’s paved in gold/I’ve got a good girl lives on East Commerce, I wouldn’t mistreat her to save nobody’s soul/These Ellum Street Women, Billiken, do not mean you no good/If you want to make a good woman, have to get on Haskell Avenue.” The song, as Oliver says, refers “…to the respective success of the black sector of “Deep Ellum”, or Elm Street, which ran by Central Tracks, and the downtown business sector of Main.”

Sources:

-Dixon, Robert M.W., John Godrich, Howard W. Rye. Blues & Gospel Records 1890-1943. 4th edition. Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1997.

-Oliver, Paul and Smith, Francis. Notes accompanying The Piano Blues Vol. 15: Dallas 1927-1929, 1980, Magpie.

-Oliver, Paul. Conversation With The Blues. Horizon Press, New York, 1965.

ARTIST	SONG	ALBUM
Muddy Waters	Can't Be Satisfied (1977)	Breakin' It Up, Breakin' It Down
Muddy Waters	Trouble No More (1977)	Breakin' It Up, Breakin' It Down
Muddy Waters	Walkin' Thru The Park (1959)	Chicago Blues Masters Vol. 1
Muddy Waters	I Got My Brand On You (1960)	At Newport
Muddy Waters	Tiger In Your Tank (1960)	At Newport
Muddy Waters	I've Got My Mojo Working (1960)	At Newport
Muddy Waters	Wee Baby Blues (1963)	Folk Festival of the Blues
Muddy Waters	Clouds In My Heart (1963)	Folk Festival of the Blues
Muddy Waters	Train Fare Home (1968)	Private Recording
Muddy Waters	Long Distance Call (1968)	Private Recording
Muddy Waters	Hootchie Cootchie Man (1968)	Private Recording
Muddy Waters	She's Nineteen Years Old (1971)	Live In Europe
Muddy Waters	Walking Through The Park (1971)	Live In Europe
Muddy Waters	My Pencil Won't Write (1972)	One More Mile
Muddy Waters	Feel Like Going Home (1972)	One More Mile
Muddy Waters	Garbage Man (1973)	Private Recording
Muddy Waters	They Call Me Muddy... (1976)	Private Recording
Muddy Waters	Howlin' Wolf (1974)	Private Recording
Muddy Waters	What's the Matter... (1976)	Private Recording
Muddy Waters	Deep Down In Florida (1977)	Private Recording
Muddy Waters	Can't Be Satisfied (1977)	Private Recording
Muddy Waters	Mannish Boy (1978)	Muddy "Mississippi" Waters Live
Muddy Waters	Streamline Woman (1978)	Muddy "Mississippi" Waters Live

Show Notes:

What more can be said about Muddy Waters? Not much so we’ll keep this short and sweet. This week’s show was inspired by the new release “Breakin’ It Up, Breakin’ It Down” which contains an hour of music drawn from three different shows from the 1977 tour with Johnny Winter. Muddy was a mesmerizing live performer and always had great bands so I decided to play nothing but live Muddy.

Muddy’s earliest live recordings stem from 1958 with a recording from the Free Trade Hall in Manchester in England. I’m sure I have this somewhere but since I couldn’t find it the earliest recordings begin in 1959 from a date at Carnegie Hall. At Newport is one of Muddy’s most well know live dates but I really like the raw, intimate club feel of “Folk Festival of the Blues” which was recorded at Big Bill’s Copa Cabana Club in 1963. It’s a shame there’s only five cuts by Muddy. Another favorite of mine is an eleven song live session that first turned up on the 2-CD “One More Mile.” These are terrific sides cut in 1972 for a Swiss radio station featuring backing by just Mojo Buford on harmonica and Louis Myers on acoustic guitar.

Check out the complete Muddy Waters Discograpy (pdf).

Harold Holiday, known as Black Boy Shine, was one of the acknowledged leaders among the Santa Fe group of pianists. He recorded more prolifically then the rest; cutting 18 issued sides in 1936 and 1937 as well as leaving a batch of unissued sides in the can. As Oliver relates: “He played in a mellow style, with a subtler release than the sharp snap favoured by several of the piano men, and he sang in a slightly world-weary voice of the days when the “Chophouse” operated on West Dallas Street. It was a haven for pianists down on their luck, where the proprietor would prepare soup and sandwiches for them, and cook any rabbits they’d managed to club on the waste lots that still dotted the black wards of the city.” He describes this vividly in one of his best numbers, “Dog House Blues”: “Well I’m going to the Dog House/Down On West Dallas Street/When I get broke and hungry/I know I can get a feed.” “When times were better”, Oliver wrote, “and the barrelhouses were open again, Shine was to be found at Sugarland, near the sugar refineries and the State Farm Unit, or way out at Richmond. The latter is a run-down, predominately black township still, an unlovely place of old buildings fronting on the railroad tracks close to the Brazos River. Behind the tracks the roads fall back steeply for a couple of blocks to the old haunt of hustlers and whores, Mud Alley. There on Mud Alley was the Brown House, Shine’s base when he wasn’t travelling…” Both places feature in Shine’s songs; In “Sugarland Blues” he sings “I dump sugar all day/Clean until broad daylight/I done everything for that woman/Still she don’t treat me right” and in “Brown House Blues” he sings “Woke up this morning with the muddy alley blues/ I lost all my money and my alley shoes/I was playing boogie-woogie and having my fun” and then goes on describe a raid in detail, obviously a common occurrence in these kind of joints. In general his lyrics vividly reflect the harsher side of black life such as songs like “Hobo Blues” and “Ice Pick and Pistol Woman Blues.”

Both Pinetop Burks and Leon Calhoun known as Son Becky, at least on record, were more boisterous players then Shine. Both shared a single session in October 1937, each cutting six sides apiece. Oliver notes that “Black Boy Shine closely resembled Conish “Pinetop” Burks both in appearance and in piano style, at least in the recollections of their contemporaries. On record “Connie” Burks used more boogie bass figures than Shine and employed more varied approaches to his blues, a matter of some surprise to those who knew them, who considered Shine the better pianist. Burks was born and raised close by Richmond and heard all the good piano men as they passed through” Becky “…had been raised by a relative near Wharton and was known by her surname, as “Son” Becky. Becky played for country suppers and followed the barrelhouse circuit east to the Piney Woods. Here traditions met, with the Louisiana and E Texas pianists running into their Houston and Santa Fe contemporary Dave Alexander, who was known as Black Ivory King, was one of eastern group who worked the ‘Flying Crow’ line between his home to of Shreveport and Port Arthur on the Gulf Coast, where Ivory Joe Hunter knew him.” Burks lays down strong, propulsive boogie piano, displaying his skill on several fine extended solos and has a deep, expressive voice. His boogie piano is heard to good effect on “Fannie Mae Blues” a song addressed too his wife and the rollicking “Shake the Shack” which owes a strong debt to “Pinetop’s Boogie Woogie.” His “Mountain Jack Blues” features a thumping bass, ragtime flavour and is a variation of the Texas staple “”The Cows” while his “Jack of All Trades” was a re-working of Bernice Edwards’ blues of the same name. Becky was accompanied by a guitarist and a washboard player on some of his tracks, and the trio make an enjoyable ruckus on the driving “Midnight Trouble Blues” and “Mistreated Washboard Blues.” The more contemplative “Cryin’ Shame Blues” is a fine mid-tempo number featuring some strong rolling piano. King cut four sides in 1937 and had a simpler, less aggressive style than Burks and Becky. He was a fine rough voiced singer, using his limited range to fine effect particularly on the sublime “The Flying Crow” where he enhances the song with moans and piano flourishes that emulate the sound of the train. Trains also figure in “Match Box Blues” and “Gingham Dress (Alexander Blues)” while “Working For The PWA” is a fine topical number.