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| 2008 Blues Hall of Fame Inductees Announced The following esteemed individuals and recordings have been selected for induction into the Blues Hall of Fame by The Blues Foundation. The Hall of Fame committee is chaired by Jim O'Neal, founding editor of Living Blues, and David Sanjek, recently of the BMI Archives. The induction ceremony will be held at The Blues Foundation's Charter Member Dinner on Wednesday, May 7, at the Tunica RiverPark in Tunica, Mississippi, the night before the 2008 Blues Music Awards. The 2008 inductees include living performers Jimmy McCracklin and Hubert Sumlin, as well as late artists Johnny "Guitar" Watson, Peetie Wheatstraw, Jimmy Witherspoon, and the Mississippi Sheiks. John Hammond and Paul Oliver are the non-performers inducted this year. The play 7 Guitars, by August Wilson, and the book, Moanin' at Midnight: The Life and Times of Howlin' Wolf by James Segrest & Mark Hoffman, were also selected. The following singles or album tracks will be inducted during the ceremony: "Back-Water Blues" by Bessie Smith; "Double Trouble" by Otis Rush; and "My Babe" by Little Walter. These albums were also chosen for induction: Piney Woods Blues by Big Joe Williams; Members Only by Bobby Bland; Rocks the House by Etta James; Freddy King Sings by Freddy King; and I'm Jimmy Reed by Jimmy Reed On May 8, the night after the Blues Hall of Fame inductions, The Blues Foundation will present the Blues Music Awards for the first time in their 29-year history in the Mississippi Delta, the birthplace of the Blues. Performers, industry representatives, and fans from around the globe will celebrate the best in Blues recording and performance from the previous year at the Grand Casino Event Center in Tunica Resorts, Mississippi, just down the road from Memphis, the Awards' home since their 1980 inception. The presenting sponsor will once again be The Gibson Foundation. In 2008, the State of Mississippi, the Tunica Convention and Visitors Bureau, and the Grand Casino and Resort are sponsoring the Blues Music Awards. BMI, Casey Family Programs, Eagle Rock Entertainment, FedEx, Sierra Nevada Brewing Company and XM Satellite Radio also sponsor the Blues Music Awards. The Blues Hall of Fame is a program of The Blues Foundation, a non-profit organization established to preserve Blues history, celebrate Blues excellence, support Blues education and ensure the future of this uniquely American art form. The Foundation consists of a worldwide network of 165 affiliated Blues societies and has individual memberships spanning the globe. In addition to the Blues Hall of Fame, the Foundation also produces the Blues Music Awards, the International Blues Challenge and the Keeping the Blues Alive Awards. For more information or to join The Blues Foundation, log onto www.blues.org. Performers Jimmy McCracklin One of the pioneers of West Coast blues, Jimmy McCracklin has been recording since 1945 – longer than any other living blues piano player. Born Aug. 13, 1921, in Helena, Arkansas, McCracklin was influenced in St. Louis by singer-pianist Walter Davis, one of the most popular bluesmen of the 1930s. But McCracklin always kept up with the times, and his records accordingly progressed from basic blues piano outings to West Coast jump into boogie, R&B, soul, and funk-tinged blues. His hits include The Walk, I Got to Know, Every Night, Every Day, and Think; in addition, he composed (but did not credit for) Just a Little Bit by Rosco Gordon, co-wrote Tramp with Lowell Fulson, and played piano on B.B. King's Rock Me Baby. McCracklin is still active as a songwriter and performer in California. Hubert Sumlin Hubert Sumlin made his mark with his sharp, innovative and unpredictable guitar work on Howlin' Wolf's classics such as Killing Floor, Shake for Me, and Hidden Charms, but he has since gone on to acclaim for his own solo career in the 32 years since Wolf's death. Born on a plantation outside of Greenwood, Mississippi, on Nov. 16, 1931, Sumlin was an adolescent blues partner of James Cotton in Arkansas, where he started following Howlin' Wolf. After Wolf moved to Chicago, he summoned Hubert to join him, and together they weathered turbulent times as Wolf fired his protégé time after time, only to hire him back. Sumlin even went over to play for Wolf's main rival, Muddy Waters, at times, but Wolf was like a father to him and he was never out of the fold for too long. His guitar work with Wolf was so legendary among other musicians that even Jimi Hendrix reportedly said: "My favorite guitar player is Hubert Sumlin." Accolades from the rock world have continued to accrue to Sumlin in recent years as he has shared stages with the Rolling Stones, Eric Clapton, Aerosmith, Santana, and many others. Johnny "Guitar" Watson Johnny "Guitar" Watson reinvented himself as a flamboyant funkster and ultra-hip player extraordinaire in the 1970s, when his career reached new heights with hits such as A Real Mother For Ya, Superman Lover, and Lover Jones. Few of his new fans realized that he was already a veteran blues guitarist, a product of Houston's Third Ward where he came up alongside guitar slingers such as Joe Hughes, Johnny Copeland, and Albert Collins in the shadow of Gatemouth Brown. Born in Houston on February 3, 1935, Watson cut his first records at the age of 17 under the name Young John Watson after moving to Los Angeles. Many of his early recordings demonstrated his hard-hitting guitar style; in the 1960s he recorded as a soul singer and pianist as well, before reemerging with his blues integrated into a contemporary groove of stylized funk that would help shape the rap and hip-hop that followed. One of his '70s hits, Gangster of Love, was a remake of a blues he had originally cut in 1957. Watson suffered a fatal heart attack while performing onstage in Yokohama, Japan, on May 17, 1996. Peetie Wheatstraw The colorful persona of Peetie Wheatstraw – The Devil's Son-in-Law (The High Sheriff From Hell) belonged to William Bunch, a singer, pianist and guitarist from Ripley, Tennessee. Born on December 21, 1902, Bunch was using the Wheatstraw name by the time he made his first recordings in 1930. He went on to become one of the most popular and influential blues artists of his era, whose songs and signature "Ooh, well, well" vocal lines were adopted by many others. Among his followers was Robert Johnson, who not only sang of the devil and hell, but also borrowed lyrics and music from various Wheatstraw tunes such as Police Station Blues. If Wheatstraw has not risen to the iconic, near-mythological status of Johnson, perhaps it's because Johnson's songs seem so serious, whereas Wheatstraw was obviously having fun with his character. Comedian Rudy Ray Moore, author Ralph Ellison, and others have invoked the folk legend of Peetie Wheatstraw, the Devil's Son-in-Law, in their works. The "real" Peetie Wheatstraw died in a car crash in East St. Louis, Illinois, on December 21, 1941. His stature was such that even Variety magazine ran an obituary, an honor afforded very few blues musicians of the time. Jimmy Witherspoon Jimmy Witherspoon was one of the most prominent of the blues shouters who emerged in the 1940s and '50s, a smooth vocalist whose style made him a favorite among jazz audiences as well as blues and R&B listeners. Witherspoon was born in Gurdon, Arkansas, probably on August 18, 1922 (some sources say a year earlier or later), and moved to Los Angeles in the late 1930s. His first recordings were done with Jay McShann, the Kansas City bandleader who had moved to California; although Witherspoon's music has been strongly associated with Kansas City jazz, blues and swing, he never lived in K.C. In 1949 "Spoon" entered the record books when his hit Ain't Nobody's Business for the Supreme label stayed on the Billboard rhythm & blues charts for an incredible 34 weeks. In later years he recorded in a variety of musical settings, backed by jazz, soul, and rock musicians on various sessions, but Spoon always delivered the blues. He died on Sept, 18, 1997, in Los Angeles. Mississippi Sheiks The Mississippi Sheiks were the premier African-American string band of the pre-World War II era, responsible not only for creating new hits for the blues audiences but for keeping alive a tradition that predated the blues. Fiddlers once ruled the roost in rural black music, before the guitar came to prominence, and the music intertwined with white old-time and country traditions. The Mississippi Sheiks’ fiddler was Lonnie Chatmon, a member of a prolific musical family from Bolton, Mississippi, all of whom performed as members of the Sheiks at times. His brothers Bo Chatmon, better known as Bo Carter, and Sam Chatmon both had significant careers in the blues as solo acts. While apparently the Sheiks might include any number of Chatmons at their dances, on record the unit usually consisted of just Lonnie Chatmon and guitarist Walter Vinson. Their major contribution to the blues came at their first session in 1930 when they recorded Sitting on Top of the World and Stop and Listen Blues. Muddy Waters once said that when he lived in Mississippi, he walked ten miles to see them play. Non-performers John Hammond John Henry Hammond Jr. qualifies for any number of Halls of Fame in the music business for his many accomplishments as an A&R man, producer, critic, and promoter. In his role at Columbia Records in New York, he helped introduce such talents as Bob Dylan, Aretha Franklin, Count Basie, and Bruce Springsteen. His blues credentials go deep as well, dating back to 1930s productions with Bessie Smith and Ida Cox, and the promotion of the legendary Spirituals to Swing concerts at Carnegie Hall. Hammond knew enough about blues in 1938 to try to put Robert Johnson on the Carnegie Hall bill – but when he learned that Johnson had just died, he gave Big Bill Broonzy t write your comments about the article :: © 2008 Jazz News :: home page |