by Rick Hart | Feb 3, 2019 | Music History
If you talk to any great blues guitarist, I bet most would say early urban blues greats like B.B. King and Buddy Guy were big influences on them in the beginning of their blues education. But as they matured and learned more about blues guitar I bet you might hear...
by Rick Hart | Jan 28, 2019 | Music History
Ever since Muddy Waters said, “The blues had a baby and they called it rock and roll,” we’ve been arguing about when that baby was born—and what was its name. Many people say Rocket “88” by Jackie Brenston and his Delta Cats, who were...
by Rick Hart | Jan 23, 2019 | Music History
The Blues was clearly created by Negros. No one disputes that. Whether you believe it started with W.C. Handy or Charley Patton, or by some unknown cotton picker in Mississippi playing a Sears acoustic guitar, there’s no question that black men and women...
by Rick Hart | Jan 20, 2019 | For Muisicans Only, Music History
So here’s this sharecropper in Mississippi working for not a lot of money. There are no guitar stores in Clarkdale in 1920. So just where did Robert Johnson, Son House, Muddy Waters, and Charley Patton get their guitars? From a Sears catalog, that’s where....
by Rick Hart | Jan 15, 2019 | Music History
When you can see your idols and the creators of the blues in their prime you know your seeing something special. Unless you were lucky, or very hip, you probably missed Muddy, T-Bone, Howlin’ Wolf, and Sunny Boy, when they were around in the late 50’s and...