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Reverend Gary Davis, also Blind Gary Davis, (April 30, 1896 – May 5, 1972) was a blues and gospel singer and guitarist. His unique finger-picking style influenced many other artists and his students in New York included Stefan Grossman, David Bromberg, Roy Book Binder, Woody Mann, Nick Katzman, Dave Van Ronk, Tom Winslow, and Ernie Hawkins. He has influenced the Grateful Dead, Bob Dylan, Wizz Jones, Jorma Kaukonen, Keb' Mo', Ollabelle and Resurrection Band. Born in Laurens, South Carolina, Davis became blind at a young age. He took to the guitar and assumed a unique multi-voice style produced solely with his thumb and index finger, playing not only ragtime and blues tunes, but also traditional and original tunes in four-part harmony.
In the mid-1920s, Davis migrated to Durham, North Carolina, a major center for black culture at the time. There he collaborated with a number of other artists in the Piedmont blues scene including Blind Boy Fuller and Bull City Red. In 1935, J. B. Long, a store manager with a reputation for supporting local artists, introduced Davis, Fuller and Red to the American Record Company. The subsequent recording sessions marked the real beginning of Davis' career. During his time in Durham, Davis converted to Christianity; he would later become ordained as a Baptist minister. Following his conversion and especially his ordination, Davis began to express a preference for inspirational gospel music.
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Reverend Gary Davis • Reverend Gary Davis Discography |
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James Henry "Jimmy" Dawkins (born October 24, 1936, Tchula, Mississippi) is a blues guitarist and singer. He moved to Chicago in 1955. He worked in a box factory, and started to play local blues clubs, gaining a reputation as a session musician.
In 1969, thanks to the efforts of his friend Magic Sam, he released his first solo album Fast Fingers on Delmark Records, winning the "Grand Prix du Disque" from the Hot Club de France. In 1971 Delmark released his second album All For Business with singer, Andrew "Big Voice" Odom, and the guitarist, Otis Rush. Dawkins also toured in the late 70's backed up by blues greats James Solberg (of Luther Allison and Nighthawks fame) on guitar and Jon Preizler (The Lamont Cranston Band), a Hammond B-3 player known for his soulful jazz influenced style.
Dawkins began to tour in Europe and Japan, and recorded more albums in the United States and Europe. Dawkins also contributed a column to the blues magazine, Living Blues. In the 1980s he released few recordings, but began his own record label, Leric Records, and was more interested in promoting other artists, including Taildragger,
Queen Sylvia Embry, Little Johnny Christian and Nora Jean Wallace. In 1991 he
began to tour and record more regularly.
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Jimmy Dawkins • Jimmy Dawkins Discography |
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Malcolm John "Mac" Rebennack, Jr. (born November 21, 1940), better known by the stage name
Dr. John (also Dr. John Creaux), is an American singer/songwriter, pianist and guitarist whose music combines blues, pop, jazz as well as boogie woogie and rock and roll. Born in New Orleans, Louisiana, his professional musical career began in New Orleans in the 1950s. He originally concentrated on guitar and he gigged with local bands including Mac Rebennack and the Skyliners, Frankie Ford and the Thunderbirds, and Jerry Byrne and the Loafers. He had a regional hit with a Bo Diddley influenced instrumental called "Storm Warning" on Rex Records in 1959.
Rebennack's career as a guitarist came to an end when his left ring finger was injured by a gunshot while he was defending singer/keyboardist Ronnie Barron, his bandmate, Jesuit High School classmate, and longtime friend. After the injury, Rebennack concentrated on bass guitar before making piano his main instrument; pianist Professor Longhair was an important influence on Rebennack's piano stylings. He moved to Los Angeles in 1963 where he became a "first call" session musician on the booming Los Angeles studio scene in the Sixties and Seventies, providing backing for Sonny & Cher, Canned Heat - on their classic albums Living the Blues (1968) and Future Blues (1970) - and many other acts.
• Dr John Website • Dr John Discography |
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William Thomas Dupree, best known as Champion Jack Dupree, was an American blues pianist. His birth date is disputed, given as July 4, July 10, and July 23, in the years 1908, 1909, or 1910. He died on January 21, 1992. Champion Jack Dupree was the embodiment of the New Orleans blues and boogie woogie pianist, a true barrelhouse "professor". His father was from the Belgian Congo and his mother was part African American and Cherokee. He was orphaned at the age of 2 and sent to the New Orleans Home for Colored Waifs (also the alma mater of Louis Armstrong).
He taught himself piano there and later apprenticed with Tuts Washington and Willie Hall, whom he called his 'father' and from whom he learned "Junker's Blues". He was also "spy boy" for the Yellow Pochahantas tribe of Mardi Gras Indians and soon began playing in barrelhouses and other drinking establishments.
As a young man he began his life of travelling, living in Chicago, where he worked with Georgia Tom, and Indianapolis, Indiana, where he met Scrapper Blackwell and Leroy Carr. Whilst he was always playing piano, he also worked as a cook, and in Detroit he met Joe Louis, who encouraged him to become a boxer. He ultimately fought in 107 bouts and winning Golden Gloves and other championships, and picking up the nickname 'Champion Jack', which he used the rest of his life.
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Champion Jack Dupree • Champion Jack Dupree Discography |
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