Blues You Should Know

Send us Fan Mail Blues You Should Know goes True Crime! Two programs about actual crimes enshrined in the blues. In Pt.1 we listened to different versions of a single case: the murder of Wm. Lyons by "Stack" Lee Shelton. In Pt.2 we check out several different crimes, from the 1890's through the 1950's. All true and all sung about by Blues Singers including John Hurt, Bukka Whit...

Send us Fan Mail Blues You Should Know goes True Crime! Two programs about actual crimes enshrined in the blues. Program #1 focuses on a single crime: the  murder of William Lyons by  "Stag" Lee Shelton , in St. Louis, MO , on Christmas 1895. How is it that a 130 year-old crime has become so embedded in our national zeitgeist? Over 502 different performers have recorded songs about “Stag...

Send us Fan Mail This program features what I, and the original interviewer Ron Weinstock,  believe is the first ever extended interview with Robert Lockwood, Jr. This took place at the studios of radio station WRUW-FM on the campus of Case-Western Reserve University  in early 1971. Present in the studio were Weinstock, Lockwood, Dave Griggs, and myself. Robert had recently emerged from a ten year...

Send us Fan Mail The second half of our two part series on blues mandolin features several of the post-war stars of the mandolin including Johnny Young, Martin, Bogan & Armstrong, Steve James, and more. This program also includes our first ever live interview, here with mandolin player/educator/promotor Rich DelGrosso. By the conclusion of this program we hope you'll agree that the mandol...

Send us Fan Mail Do you think of the mandolin as a blues instrument? You should and you will after hearing these two programs. In part 1 we'll hear some of the early practitioners of blues mandolin like Coley Jones, Yank Rachell and Charlie McCoy. We'll even hear from mandolin slingers heavily influenced by the early masters, Bill Monroe and Ry Cooder. Part 2 will feature mandolinists fr...

Send us Fan Mail In part two we explore Lonnie's post-war recordings and life. We hear how he adapts his music to a new era. Lonnie has his biggest hit, "Tomorrow Night" for King Records, in 1947 and becomes a favorite of British trad-jazz fans. In the '60s Lonnie has yet another comeback (he was the king of comebacks) and records a series of albums for Prestige Bluesville. Lon...

Send us Fan Mail Lonnie Johnson may arguably be the most influential guitarist of all time. He was the first guitarist to play single string solos in both jazz and blues styles long before even Django Reinhardt or Charlie Christian. Robert Johnson imitated him on record and BB King and many others cited him as a major influence. He was also a superb singer with a gentle, mellow voice and was a ter...

Send us Fan Mail One of the most interesting characters in genre full of interesting characters was J.B. Long of North Carolina. Long was a shopkeeper who, for reasons we may never fully understand, made recording great bluesmen a hobby/passion/obsession. In the summer of 1935 Long, along with his wife and baby girl, drove Blind Boy Fuller, Rev. Gary Davis, and George Washington (Bull City Red) to...

Send us Fan Mail One of the most interesting characters in genre full of interesting characters was J.B. Long of North Carolina. Long was a shopkeeper who, for reasons we may never fully understand, made recording great bluesmen a hobby/passion/obsession. In the summer of 1935 Long, along with his wife and baby girl, drove Blind Boy Fuller, Rev. Gary Davis, and George Washington (Bull City Red) to...

Send us Fan Mail Known today mainly for his sensitive and evocative compositions like Hit the Road Jack, Please Send Me Someone to Love, and Rivers Invitation, Percy Mayfield began his career as a big band vocalist of the Bronze Baritone genre, until a serious auto accident nearly killed him, disfigured his face, and ended his career as a matinee idol/singing heartthrob. After his recovery, he con...

Send us Fan Mail Every blues fan knows about the three Kings of the Blues, Albert, BB & Freddie, but we're going to add two more: Saunders King and Earl King. In Part 2 we explore the music and life of Earl King of New Orleans. Earl was a singer, guitarist, songwriter, record producer and mentor to dozens of young New Orleans musicians. He may be best known for his two part record, Come O...

Send us Fan Mail Every blues fan knows about the three Kings of the Blues, Albert, BB & Freddie, but we're going to add two more: Saunders King and Earl King. Part 1 takes a look at the music and life of Saunders King who was in fact, the first blues artist to solo on electric guitar, preceding T-Bone Walker by two months. Saunders was a fine guitarist in the Charlie Christian mold, and a...

Send us Fan Mail We kick off season three with a special program about blues from my home-town, Cleveland, Ohio. We start by explaining why Cleveland has never the blues center that Chicago, Detroit, Atlanta, or Mississippi were, then move on to feature some great musicians either born in Cleveland or who lived a significant portion of their lives here.  Cow Cow Davenport, Montana Taylor, Bullmoos...

Send us Fan Mail While Louis Jordan was clearly the most successful recording artist of the jump-blues era of the late '40s-early '50s, there were also quite a few great performers of that era including Tiny Bradshaw, Wynonie Harris, Roy Brown, Roy Milton, and our featured artists for this episode: Joe and Jimmy Liggins. The Los Angeles based Liggins Bros., who led separate bands, had se...

Send us Fan Mail According to legend, a young Bob Wills once rode 50 miles on horseback to hear Bessie Smith sing. Throughout his long career, Wills mined the blues for some of his best and most popular numbers. His band, Bob Wills & the Texas Playboys, were by no means strictly a blues band, but the blues was always present in his music. In this episode we take a look at his blues sources and...

Send us Fan Mail Blues You Should Know Podcast presents our final  (yes, I mean it this time) program on the music of King Records, Ohio's great eclectic record label. There was just too much great music, and too many great artists left over, so we offer one more program we're calling King Records 7.1. Hear blues from Champion Jack Dupree, & Baby Boy Warren, jazz from Eddie "Loc...

Send us Fan Mail Here in Part 7 we go over the life of King Records founder and president Syd Nathan. We also spotlight some great King artists we haven't been able to fit into the programs so far. These include some of King's biggest selling artists like Earl Bostic, Five Royales,  Mainer's Mountaineers, Roland Kirk, Bill Doggett and more. Oh, and despite what you hear me say at th...

Send us Fan Mail Part 6 of our series on King Records is devoted to one artist-James Brown. We cover the recordings he made for King from his debut single, Please, Please, Please through his recordings with Bootsy & Catfish Collins. Brown was King's biggest star and certainly his most socially significant artist. Learn about the origin of the "Cape Routine" and much more.  Suppo...

Send us Fan Mail There were indeed Kings at King Records. Two of the best known were Albert and Freddy King, but there were more! Kings of King on Blues You Should Know.  Support the show

Send us Fan Mail King records released a great deal of Bluegrass music without a large roster of Bluegrass performers. The artists they did have, though, were the top-o-the heap. Reno & Smiley, Bobby Osborne and Jimmy Martin, Napier & Moore, and of course, Ralph & Carter, the Stanley Brothers. There were no "one and done" Bluegrass artists on King. All three of their major Bl...

Send us Fan Mail The Blues on King. King wasn't a hard-core blues label the way Chess was, but blues was a significant part of its catalog. Hear John Lee Hooker, Smokey Smothers, Tiny Topsy, Cleanhead Vinson, Johnny Guitar Watson, and of course, the voice of Syd Nathan himself explaining just how things are and are going to be! Coming up next: Part 3, King Bluegrass. Support the show

Send us Fan Mail As the '40s fade into the '50s, Syd establishes a toe-hold, then a foot-hold in the R & B market while maintaining King's presence in the Country market. Hear Earl Bostic, Tiny Bradshaw, Lonnie Johnson, Moon Mullican, Hawkshaw Hawkins, the York Brothers, Billy Ward and more on part two of our eight part series on King Records, Ohio's own great eclectic reco...

Send us Fan Mail We begin our 8 part series on Ohio's great, eclectic record label King Records,  started and owned by the wonderfully colorful and irascible Syd Nathan. We begin with Syd's journey into the record business and King's early years recording country singers like Grandpa Jones, the Delmore Brothers, and Merle Travis. We'll get to his entry into the "race"...

Send us Fan Mail The film and play "Ma Rainey's Black Bottom" is a great piece of historical fiction, but it gets one thing very wrong: Ma Rainey's records were actually produced by two extraordinary African-Americans: J. Mayo Williams & Aletha Dickerson. Here is their story and, in this case, truth is far more interesting than fiction. Support the show

Send us Fan Mail Here's a look at American music's ultimate crossover song: John Henry . To African-Americans he was a symbol of racial pride; to unionists, he represented the power of the American worker and union solidarity; to poor whites; he was  personification of rugged Americanism, and to Christians; a Christ-like figure who died for our sins.  And, as a bonus, a look at two versi...