Children of the Blues

This book offers first-person recollections from a new generation of artists who applied the musical and life lessons of the fathers of the blues, stoking the 1960s blues revival that continues today. Some of these musicians, like John Hammond, Rory Block and Taj Mahal, sought out the rediscovered 1930s bluesmen at the Newport Folk Festivals. Others, like Robert Cray and Junior Watson, soaked up the west coast sounds of T-Bone Walker and Big Joe Turner in the storied ghetto clubs of Watts. Charlie Musselwhite came up on Memphis and Chicago blues, while Stevie Ray Vaughan and Marcia Ball went for the Texas grit of Albert Collins and Gatemouth Brown. By 1967, these and other young musicians were poised to breathe new life into the blues. Duke Robillard had formed the initial Roomful of Blues band. Bob Margolin was about to become Muddy Waters' guitarist. Joe Louis Walker was living with Michael Bloomfield in San Francisco. Tommy Shannon played Woodstock behind Johnny Winter. Some of the artists are actual blues offspring - Bernard Allison, Ronnie and Wayne Brooks, Kenny Neal, Shemekia Copeland, Lucky Peterson, and Jimmy D. Lane embody the traditions of their real fathers' pasts. Along with newcomer and Delta bluesman-searcher Keb' Mo,' they stand at the vanguard of the next blues evolution. Genetic or not, the musicians featured here have strengthened and energized a timeless American art form and culture - becoming caretakers and innovators of all that is the blues.