Question for fans of Blues music.

[DanCa]

I have a two part question for Blues fans. Who is currently your favorite Blues artist? Right now I am listening to John Lee Hooker and Missippi John Hurt. My second question is if you can recommend any books related to this field of music? Thanks everyone you guya are the best.

[tigereye]

1. Shamekia Copeland

I'll have to ask my sister, the blues fanatic, for some book recommendations.

[DanCa]

2. Thank you

I did read, " Escaping from the Delta," and was enthralled by it.

[taterguy]

3. Lost Highways by Peter Guralnick is a masterpiece

It's not just about blues but also country performers and their lives on the road.

[kwassa]

4. I like both of those guys ...

I don't have one favorite, but many favorites. My favorite all-time blues singer is Howlin' Wolf, the ultimate blues voice to me. Muddy Waters is probably my favorite Chicago blues player. Elmore James. Albert Collins.

Blues is a vast universe with many styles and practitioners, from country and city blues, acoustic and electric, solo to group to big band, black blues players and white blues players. There are some very fuzzy boundries between blues and other genres of music, with jazz and rock being most closely related. Even zydeco has a lot of blues in it. Also, some country western.

I mostly listen now to whatever is playing on Bluesville on XM Radio as I drive. There are also many Internet radio stations devoted to blues. XM is also running a history of the blues DJ's by Keb Mo. I tend to like electric blues more than other areas, with slide guitar work.

You might listen to the radio stations to see what artists you like best.

[KG]

5. the Rev. Billy C. Wirtz

[taterguy]

6. How can a Reverend play the devil's music?

[wildhorses]

13. he plays the hell out of it ...thats how!!

the Rev RAWKS:thumbsup:

[Beer Snob-50]

7. Etta James is awesome

and I have never read a book on the genre.

[querelle]

16. Oh Absolutely

I love Etta James. I bought a 2 cd compilation of her music released by Chess records last year. Called "The Essential Etta James". I also saw her last month at a local blues festival that we have every year. Heaven........

Q

[speedoo]

8. Muddy Waters and Buddy Guy are two of my favorites.

But there are so many great ones. You might check out Martin Scorcese's Blues series on PBS and the CD's from it. Lots of great music and history of the blues.

You can't be too far from Chicago... have you been to any of the blues clubs there? If not, you really should check them out. There is nothing like live blues.

[Magrittes Pipe]

9. Skip James. Charley Patton. Furry Lewis. Blind Willie McTell. Bukka White.

If you like John Hurt, you'll like these gentlemen. :thumbsup:

[nothingshocksmeanymore]

10. One of the greatest blues books I've ever read is

I Say Me for a Parable: The Oral Autobiography of Mance Lipscomb by Glen Alyn.

The book is entirely written in Lipscombs' dialect which makes it a bit cumbersome to read, but by doing so the author makes you hear Mance's story the way it was intended to be heard. In Mance's words.

There are so many great blues artists, it's hard to have a favorite, but if anyone is going to actually study the blues then there are really several artists one has to know at some point.

Clarence "Gatemouth" Brown
Katie Webster (she was Otis Redding's pianist)
Mance Lipscomb
Robert Johnson
Albert King
Sippy Wallace

That's just to name a very few.

[Bossy Monkey]

11. Mississippi Fred McDowell; don't know about the books n/t

[bbernardini]

12. Johnny "Guitar" Watson

Both his original blues stuff and his 70s funk work are spectacular.

[mitchum]

14. Unfortunately, many blues "scholars" are actually blues mythologists...

more interested in rehashing tired tropes and spooky stories rather than engaging in historical examination. Wald's "Escaping The Delta" is an excellent book which does not fall into this trap. All of Gayle Dean Wardlaw' work is very good. Hoffman and Segrest's Howlin Wolf biography, "Moanin' at Midnight" is also first rate.

My favorites?

Son House is king of the blues
Howlin' Wolf is the greatest rocknroll star of all time
Cannon's Jug Stompers
Tampa Red
The Rolling Stones
Fred McDowell
Skip James
Memphis Minnie
Junior Kimbrough
Little Milton
Willie Johnson

[Blue-Jay]

19. One of these things is not like the others,

One of these things just doesn't belong,
Can you tell which thing is not like the others
By the time I finish my song?

[argyl]

15. Lightnin' Hopkins deserves a mention as does James Cotton, great harp

player.Hell,where's the three kings, B.B.,Freddie and Albert? Of those three I actually prefer the guitar playing of Freddie and Albert;much rawer than B.B.

Albert was something to see live. He was a big man who played left handed on a right hand strung guitar and he'd make that thing shriek and wail.

Last time I saw him play he was opening for ZZ Top on their Eliminator tour. He inspired Billy Gibbons to pull out all the stops when he came on.Gibbons's studio work has always been more restrained in comparison to what he can do live and that night he really put his Les Paul through its paces.

As fine a blues playing as I've ever heard live by a white boy, and I'm including Duane,Clapton,and Stevie Ray(well, maybe not Stevie Ray.)

[astral]

17. Charlie Musselwhite

[RevCheesehead]

18. Danny!!!

:loveya: