King of the Delta and Pre-war Country Blues Robert JohnsonRobert JohnsonDescription: PRODUCT DESCRIPTION This Fine Album Contains A Wonderful 8-Page Booklet With Detailed Biographical Notes Copies Of The Only 2 Photographs Of Robert Johnson In Existence And Full Listings Of All 29 Tracks - His Total Recorded Output. This Amazing Disc Plays For An Incredible 75 Minutes 29 Seconds. All Compositions Are Written And Performed By Robert Johnson. Robert Johnson was and remains to this day the most legendary artiste in the whole history of the blues. The only sound mementos from his career consist of twenty-nine songs recorded from 1936 to 1937. The themes of his blues are love women unhappiness friendship alienation and pain; he anticipated the existential drama of end-of-century man. Legend has it that Robert Johnson was a witch doctor linked to devilish creatures and his untimely death has a plethora of differing versions. He was definitely a key artiste in future musical developments and many modern-day musicians such as Eric Clapton The Rollong Stones Led Zeppelin and Sting. These and many others have been inspired by his work and have covered his compositions. (1911). Born in Hazlehurst Mississippi on 8th May to Julia Major Dodds and Noah Johnson (another source gives his date of birth as 1914) Johnson spent his early years in the area around Memphis. At about the age of seven he learnt to play the mouth-organ. Having left his stepmother he settled in Robinsonville and started to work in the fields still at a very young age. At fifteen he enrolled in the Indian Creek School but he soon realised that he was not cut out to study. He left full-time leave education and took up the guitar. (1930-32). This was the period in which Robert performed as a traveling musician. He played all over from Itta Bena to Helena from Memphis to St.Louis. (1935). His next move was to Hughes Arkansas from whence he went on a number of tours alongside Johnny Shines. They played several in states Tennessee Missouri Texas Kentucky and Illinois amongst them. (1936). On 23rd November Robert Johnson was brought to the recording studio by Eric Oertle a local talent scout who in two sessions made him record sixteen numbers; Rambling On My Mind Cross Road Blues I Believe I'll Dust My Broom and several others. (1937). Between the 19th and 20th of June Robert returned to the studio to record a further thirteen numbers which included Traveling Riverside Blues and Little Queen Of Spades. He next joined up with David Honeyboy Edwards and continued his career as a traveling musician. (1938). On 16th August in Greenwood Robert's career was tragically cut short when he was murdered. ABOUT THE ARTIST If the blues has a truly mythical figure it is Robert Johnson. He remains the most celebrated artist in the history of the blues his legend being immensely fortified by the fact that he also left behind a small legacy of recordings that are considered the emotional apex of the blues itself. The legend of his life - which by now even folks who don't know anything about the blues can cite to you chapter and verse - goes something like this: Robert Johnson was a young Black man living on a plantation in rural Mississippi. Branded with a burning desire to become a great blues musician he was instructed to take his guitar to a crossroad near Dockery's plantation at midnight. There he was met by a large Black man (the devil) who took the guitar from Johnson tuned it and handed it back to him. Within less a year's time in exchange for his everlasting soul Robert Johnson became the King of The Delta Blues singers able to play sing and create the greatest blues anyone had ever heard. As success came with live performances and phonograph recordings Johnson remained tormented constantly haunted by nightmares of hellhounds on his tail his pain and mental anguish finding release only in the writing and performing of his music. Just as he was about to be presented at Carnegie Hall to perform in John Hammond's first Spirituals To Swing concert the news came from Mississippi that Robert Johnson was dead poisoned by a jealous girlfriend while playing a jook joint. Those who were there swear he was last seen alive foaming at the mouth crawling around on all fours hissing and snapping at onlookers like a mad dog. His dying words (either spoken or written on a scrap of paper) were: 'I pray that my redeemer will come and take me from my grave'. He was buried in a pine box in an unmarked grave his deal with the devil at an end. Robert's playing partner Johnny Shines said that 'some of the things that Robert did with the guitar affected the way everybody played. He'd do rundowns and turnbacks. He'd do repeats. None of this was being done at the time. In the early thirties boogie on the guitar was rare something to be heard.' In the mid-60's Columbia Records released King Of
