Auntie – back then old colored folks was scared of white people – she didn’t know what to do. I heard the car door slam and then a white man’s voice, talking low, talking to my gal’s auntie. Then I played in Jonestown for that bootlegger Son Collins on a Saturday night, and the next morning I was laying up in my woman’s bed and woke up out of a dead sleep. I told him where I lived, but I thought he was just some honky talking out the side of his mouth. We talked for a while and he said he’d like to do an interview and a recording with me. He walked up after I got done playing and told me who he was, how he was recording different musicians. I saw him one time in Clarksdale and then when I was playing in the streets of Friars Point one Saturday evening, drunk, cap turned back on my head and hollering. “Alan Lomax was going around the South recording folks for the Library of Congress. As Edwards recalled in his autobiography, The World Don’t Owe Me Nothing, David Honeyboy Edwards autobiography, The World Don’t Owe Me Nothing. On 20 July, 1942, Alan Lomax made the first recordings of David “Honeyboy” Edwards. Son House performed alone on this session, which produced eleven songs: Special Rider Blues, Special Rider Blues, Pt.II, Low Down Dirty Dog Blues, Depot Blues, American Defense, Am I Right Or Wrong, Walking Blues, County Farm Blues, The Pony Blues, The Jinx Blues, Pt.1 and The Jinx Blues, Pt.2. Clack’s Grocery Store is no longer standing, nor is there any evidence of it having been there.ġ942 – On 17 July, Alan Lomax recorded another session with Son House, this time in Robinsonville. There is now a Mississippi Blues Trail marker commemorating Son House near the site of Clack’s Grocery. The session also produced several recordings of Willie Brown, Fiddlin’ Joe Martin and Leroy Williams performing in various combinations, the best known songs being Fiddlin’ Joe Martin’s Four O’Clock Blues, Willie Brown’s Make Me A Pallet On The Floor and the acapella Camp Hollers. The sound of the passing train on Walkin’ Blues is mentioned in every history of this session. The session is particularly notable for the sound of a passing train (Clack’s Grocery was also a train depot and the rail tracks ran nearby) about two minutes into Walking Blues. Lomax recorded five songs with Son House at this session: Levee Camp Blues, Government Fleet Blues and Walkin’ Blues with all four musicians performing as a quartet, Delta Blues, with Son House accompanied by Leroy Williams on harp, and Shetland Pony Blues, with Son House performing solo. CD cover, Legends of Country Blues, on JSP Records, features the complete early recordings of Son House, Skip James, Bukka White, Tommy Johnson and Ishmon Bracey Down dirt roads, along a railroad track into the back of an aging country store that smelt of licorice and dill pickles and stuff.” The “aging country store” was Clack’s Grocery, near Highway 61, where Lomax recorded a now legendary session of Son House and his friends playing on the front porch of Clack’s Grocery.Ĭlack’s Grocery was selected as a recording location because it had electricity to run Alan Lomax’s recording equipment. Lomax drove House on a circuitous trip on which they picked up Willie Brown, Fiddlin’ Joe Martin and Leroy Williams.Īlan Lomax recalled, “I don’t know where House took me.
When Lomax asked Son House to record, Son House said he had to get his band together. On September 3, Alan Lomax found Son House on a plantation near Robinsonville in Tunica County. There is now a Mississippi Blues Trail marker at the site. On August 31, they recorded Muddy Waters at his home on Stovall Farm outside Clarksdale in Coahoma County. CD cover, Muddy Waters – The Complete Plantation Recordings contains all the Muddy Waters sides recorded by Alan Lomax at Stovall Farms in 1941-42. Handy for the Library of Congress.ġ941 – In August 1941 Alan Lomax went into the Missippi Delta with John Work of Fisk University. His music career was dormant at the time and he was working as the manager of a small nightclub in Washington, D.C.Īlan Lomax made several recordings of Jelly Roll Morton for the Library of Congress. Jelly Roll Morton had ben one of the leading musicians of the 1920’s but the Depression had had a major effect on Morton’s fortunes. Here are some of the highlights of Alan Lomax’s career which relate to Mississippi and the Delta blues.ġ938 – Alan Lomax meets Jelly Roll Morton in Washington, D.C. He also recorded David “Honeyboy” Edwards (1942) and other Delta bluesmen. He also made historic recordings of Son House in Tunica County 19. He made the first recordings of Muddy Waters (1941-42) at Stovall Farm near Clarksdale.