Trouble In Mind (1926)

One of the most celebrated blues of all time is Richard Jones' "Trouble in Mind." Here is the celebrated original recording that featured Jones piano and the cornet of Louis Armstrong. It was a recording that Armstrong celebrated being part of and redid this for his musical autobiography in 1957 which he introduced.

One of my favorite recordings of this is Dinah Washington's 1952 Mercury recording with Ben Webster taking the tenor sax solo.

Sister Rosetta Tharpe is one of many who put their own stamp on this classic.

Here is Lightnin' Hopkins putting his distinctive touch to this.

It is a song that has become a staple of American music. Here is Merle Haggard doing a Western Swing based rendition. Bob Wills, a major influence on Merle, recorded this years before.

Here is Big Bill Broonzy.

Here is B.B. King performing it. Sounds like one of his many recordings for the Bihari Brothers in the 1950s or early 1960s with probably a Maxwell Davis arrangement.

Here is the legendary Sam Cooke's take on this classic.

Finally the greatly neglected Georgia White

Hope you enjoyed this look at a blues classic and some of its interpretations.

Chris Barber's Blues Legacy Lost and Found

Trombonist Chris Barber has been a mainstay of the British trad jazz scene for over five decades. With Lonnie Donegan he helped lunch the skittle music scene with ‘Rock Island Line,’ while his own band backed numerous legends including some from the world of blues and gospel. Not long ago he came across some old 1/4 inch magnetic tapes of some of the legendary blues artists he brought over to England in the 50 and 60s. The result are three volumes, Chris Barber Presents The Blues Legacy: Lost and Found Series (MVD Audio).

Volume 1 opens with Barber introducing Sister Rosetta Tharpe, the legendary gospel singer and guitarist. When she arrived in England with her arrangements from her days with Lucky Millender’s Big Band, Barber and his combo was flustered, but were able to back her on a variety of her classic sacred repertoire including Every Time I Feel the Spirit, Didn’t It Rain, Up Above My Head I Hear Music In The Air, and Old Time Religion, with the backing provided by barber and his band matching the exuberance of her performance if the overall sound of the performances occasionally sounds messy and chaotic. This Train, is performed solo with some fine guitar featured and her effectively dramatic vocal. Vocalist Ottilie Patterson joins her for one of two renditions of Old Time Religion, and When the Saints Go Marching In. The rest of this volume is devoted to performances by Sonny Terry and Brownie McGhee who mostly perform without a band and are in typical form for the two opening with Midnight Special, Climbin’ on Top of the Hill (a reworking of Sitting on Top of the World), the remarkable harmonica feature Fox Chase, How Long How Long Blues, another harp solo Callin’ Mama Blues, and Betty and Dupree. While the repertoire will be familiar, these concert performances are strong ones. Also included is an joyous duo version of When the Saints Go Marching In, followed by Little Light of Mine, on which Barber and band and accompaniment although playing somewhat more restrained here. Chris Barber and Band close with another gospel number with Ottilie Patterson taking the front stage.

Volume 2 opens with Chris Barber’s contemporary recollections of the 1958 recordings by Brownie McGhee & Sonny Terry that open this volume. There is a nice duo of Poor Man Blues, while Ottilie Patterson takes lead on the vocal backed by Barber and the duo on When Things Go Wrong, and How Long Blues. Barber provides another spoken introduction to the performances by Muddy Waters with Otis Spann presented here, which he noted was an amazing experience. Muddy and Spann were terrific and Barber’s band does a credible job in support although the drummer on several tracks is a bit stiff and tad heavy handed. Repertoire played included Hootchie Kootchie Man, Blow Wind Blow, Baby Please Don’t Go, Long Distance Call, I Can’t Be Satisfied,Blues Before Sunrise (an interesting to hear Muddy refer to this as originally made by a friend of his before he died), and Walking Through the Park. Muddy goes solo on ‘Rolling Stone,’ and revisits ‘Feel Like Going Home.’ Spann is exceptional while Barber and the band try to be unobtrusive in supporting Muddy, who certainly sounds fine here. Perhaps not indispensable, these tracks are a nice addition to Muddy’s discography in any event Next up are fine three tracks by Champion Jack Dupree including a nice Christmas blues, a humorous lament about his mother-in-law, and his own very distinctive rendition of Tampa Red’s When Things Go Wrong. The disc closes with a 1962 performance by the great Louis Jordan with whom Barber’s traditional jazz band provides nice support for a nice duet between the saxophonist-vocalist Jordan and Ottilie Patterson on T’aint Nobody’s Business. There is a nice mix of performers and some genuinely good performances on this volume.

Sonny Boy Williamson opens the final volume, Volume 3, with some performances from 1964. Barber mentions the great shows presented by Lippman and Rau which led to his performance that opens with United Blues/ Help Me as the band plays the melody before Williamson enters with his harp and launches into the song. Then Barber recalls some of the performances of him including some jazz songs like ‘C-Jam Blues,’ as well as staples of his repertoire as So Sad to Be Lonesome, his reworking of Robert Lockwood’s Take a Little Walk With Me, Bye Bye Bird, Your Funeral, My Trial, and Pontiac Blues. Like Brownie and Sonny, he closes his set with some gospel songs, Saints, and This Little Light of Mine, with Ottilie Patterson sharing the vocal.’ The music does get a bit chaotic but still remains fun with the joyful sound and Sonny Boy’s harp blends well with the trad jazz backing. Jimmy Witherspoon came over in 1964 and played at a festival Barber helped organize, and Spoon sounds terrific on his first trio of tunes, although the backing remains a bit rough on Times Getting Tougher Than Tough, and Roll ‘Em Pete. The backing behind Howlin’ Wolf with Hubert Sumlin seems a bit tighter as Wolf howls through Howlin’ For My Darling, Dust My Broom, and May I have a Talk With You. Sumlin sounds really good if a bit underamplified while Wolf’s vocals are ferocious, and the backing band almost sounds like a urban blues band as opposed to a Dixieland group. Jimmy Witherspoon has five more vocals to close this set, and the backing is a bit more together here as he reprised Everyday I Have the Blues, and When I’ve Been Drinkin’.

There are some very good performances on all three volumes although I give the nod to those on the latter two volumes. One would be hard-pressed to call any of these essential but fans of Muddy, Sonny Boy, Wolf and Spoon will especially find performances that may merit their consideration.

I recently received a double CD in commemoration of Chris Barber’s 80th Birthday which I hope to write-up shortly. I noticed that I had never posted this review of three blues-related CDs by this important English musician and music evangelist. This review originally appeared in the July 2008 Jazz & Blues Report (Issue 306). I likely received my review copy from a publicist.

Memphis Gold's Story Part 2

Memphis Gold at JV's (Annandale VA)
mid 1990s. Photo © Ron Weinstock

In August 2009, Joe Kessler and I had a chance to interview Chester Chandler, the blues performer known as Memphis Gold for the Dutch publication Block. This interview was translated into Dutch for publication, but we have felt it would be helpful to have the interview in English. Joe transcribed it and left our questions out.  This is the second of several parts that will be running the next few days. I should point out that interviews with Memphis Gold have appeared in Jefferson Blues, Blues & Rhythm and Living Blues.

Church was pretty much my first recollection of music. My grandfather and father were musicians. My father had twelve sisters and brothers who played steel guitars and other things. They had the Chandler Band out of Bells Tennessee. They used to get their instruments at the general store. What was so great about that is my father said he used to be able to go in there and get anything he wants on his father’s name. “Oh, you’re Dan Chandler’s boy. Get what you want.” So they would get mandolins, violins and all these instruments of the day. I heard my older uncles and aunts play piano. They (the Chandler Band) played music that was a little rag-timish. The Tennessee string band music they used to play was not like the Mississippi music. Maybe like the jug band music, maybe like Gus Cannon. My dad said he knew Yank Rachell and others who played around Tennessee.

Memphis Gold's father on piano and others in Church.
Photo © Memphis Gold

They used a lot of open tunings (on their stringed instruments) like Robert Wilkins. I did too. I started playing a lot in open tuning, E tuning (tuned to an E chord). My father played in the family band and a lot at church.

Once a year, the people from the Church of God in Christ in other cities would converge in Memphis for 30 days - even people from the other chapter in California. Preachers and musicians would go 24 hours a day for a month. I went to school in the day and every night at ten o’clock, that’s when Rev Utah Smith came. That was his time. He would come in with wings, two wings, with the Sisters behind him. (Starts singing) “Two Wings … heaven gonna be my home.” Two Wings is the Gospel Tune I used to hear.

Cover of Lynn Abbott's book-cd of legendary
evangelist and guitarist Elder Utah Smith

Rosetta Tharpe and the Mattie Moss Clark Sisters would come in. Mattie Moss Clarke was a young woman at the time but that’s how the The Clark Sisters started out of Detroit. They had a piano for her (at the church). Sometimes she would play and sometimes my dad would play for her. My dad liked to play the Fender bass though; that was his main instrument. He liked the stand-up bass and he played a lot like Willie Dixon. He always had his own bass and took it home after church – it was all nicked up. 

Anytime I wanted to play it in church, they would put me up on a stool, and I could stand up and hit those strings “boom boom boom boom…” and keep the time.

I don’t think my father played anywhere but in the church. I think because he had a great conversion after losing one of his children. I could hear the influence even in his piano playing. They called ‘em templing (?) keys, a little ragtime type feel.

At home, I would listen to the gospel hour on WDIA early in the morning. As the day progressed, they started playing BB King’s music and all the secular music. I heard Honeymoon Garner and Rufus (Thomas) as DJs. We could catch Randy out of Nashville too (Randy out of Nashville really means We could catch WLAC out of Nashville too. WLAC had programs by John R and others sponsored by Randy's Records of Gallatin, TN). When the Beatles came out (I was about eight) my young friends and I would sing “She Loves You, yeah, yeah, yeah.” A lot of my brothers and sisters were too old. 

Eight of us siblings are still alive, eight out of fourteen. My oldest sister is 84, she is the oldest of the fourteen. Four boys and four girls are left.

My father was making his living as a tree surgeon. My mother was a house maid and house wife. She worked for a lot of rich white people. I used to get a lot of passed down clothes and shoes. I can remember when I would have to go to school with cardboard in my shoes (covering) where I wore out a big hole. Some of the kids mother’s then, in the 60’s, were getting to be teachers. Black folks were getting to be a little more educated in my town. My parents were getting to be so old though that I didn’t know anything else. I burned wood, I went to the woodshed. I burned coal. I didn’t know anything else; I was an old soul. 

There was a park in front of my house that was over 200 yards long and 60 or 70 yards wide. The police would come by in old Mayberry cars and throw us out. The white kids would say to us “come on over and play football with us.” We’d get over there and start playing and all of a sudden the police were kicking us out. The park was just across the street but when you crossed the street in our neighborhood, that was the white side. The other side was Orange Mound. Orange Mound, where I come from, is one of the oldest black communities in the United States where people owned their homes.

I would get kicked out of the park and then the rock (or brick?) throwing started. When I was a kid, we would do some devilish stuff. The cops would come by, this is around ‘65 or ’66, and we would throw rocks. We would knock the cops off their motorcycles. It was getting crazy you know?

I was an average student and had a lot of general street knowledge and old sense. When I was ten, my father was 60 and his friends like Robert Wilkins were 70s or 80s. I graduated 12th grade and went to church so much that I used to tell myself that when I ever grow up, I’m never going to church again. When church would start, they would literally be praising god until 1 or 2 or 3 o’clock in the morning. I would go to the last bleacher and go to sleep. Many nights, they would close the church up with everyone wondering where I’m at. I’m up under the last bleacher. One night they had a funeral. At that time they used to leave the body overnight in the church with two little bulbs, light they would leave on over the casket. I woke up and saw this casket with the lights and went (racing) to the front door. I was always hiding out and nobody would find me.

My father showed me church music. It was Dan Norman, Robert Balfour’s brother-in-law, who starting showing me stuff like Muddy Waters and Howlin’ Wolf. He had to have played with Muddy because the stuff that he played; I knew that they had to have some type of connection. My mother would say “Dan, don’t be showing that boy all that devil music.” She never wanted me to play blues but I was picking up little boogie tunes you know. Dan Norman (who was showing me) was born 1917. My father was older than him, he was born 1905. Norman and Muddy were about the same age, both born in 1917. That’s my earliest guitar playing. Every morning he would come to work with my father because he was my father’s ground man. Early morning about 6 o’clock or something, before I would go to school, he would pick a guitar or I would play a little something. He had a guitar that he would bring to my house but my father finally bought me a guitar down on Beale Street where there was Nathan’s Pawn Shop. The first guitar I got might have been from$75 to 90 dollars when I was about six.

Addendum: My memory may be failing me as I thought we discussed the Church more, but maybe it was Memphis and me talking before Joe came with the tape recorder. Anyway Memphis himself responded to an email, ""Yes Utah was a great influence on my playing! I used to sit under him and my father at the Holy convocation each year along and play for Sister Arizona Dranes in the early sixties! I was about 6/7 playing mandolin myself and guitar! I would spend a whole Month playing as the convocation then went 30 days! every nite around ten o'clock he would start two wings and the Saints would shout until late in to the nite! I loved going with my father, even though I would have to go to school the next day! I would see sister Rosetta Tharpe come and play also, She would have Mason Temple jumping!"

(To be continued)

Memphis Gold's Story Part 1

Charles Solomon, Memphis Gold, unknown, Charlie Sayles
at Whitlow's on Wilson in Arlington Virginia Feb 1998

In August 2009, Joe Kessler and I had a chance to interview Chester Chandler, the blues performer known as Memphis Gold for the Dutch publication Block. This interview was translated into Dutch for publication, but we have felt it would be helpful to have the interview in English. Joe transcribed it and left our questions out. I was hoping I would have the full transcript, but apparently I was only sent what was sent to Block. There was substantial material on Elder Smith and Memphis' experiences in Church as a youth that is not in this transcript. This is the first of several parts that will be running the next few days. I should point out that interviews with Memphis Gold have appeared in Jefferson Blues, Blues & Rhythm and Living Blues.


I should note that Memphis has a new CD available on Stackhouse, Pickin’ High Cotton. Ordinarily I would recview this CD but since my photo graces the cover, it would be inappropriate. Anyway, now Memphis Gold tells his story. This full Engish interview is copyright Joe Kessler and Ron Weinstock

Memphis Gold at  3
Photo © Memphis Gold

I was born March 4th 1955 and I was the 8th son of 14 kids, the 13th youngest of 14 kids - I have a sister younger than I am. Sometimes they see her as more mature than me because she’s all sanctified and all that. She carries herself a lot more mature than I do, you know what I’m saying? She’s never really left Memphis; she’s just kind of steadily been married, raising kids. And I’ve always been on the wild, I’m the only one I’m kind of like the prodigal son.

Well my parents—my father, he’s from Tennessee and his mother’s name was Mary Freeman, and her mother’s name was Rachel Lee and her mother’s name was Harriet Hemming and her mother’s name was Sally Hemming. And, it is so ironic that I’m here in Virginia. I think there are about 3,000 sons out in Tennessee, and I’m the only one here in Virginia.

She’s the Sally Hemming from the Thomas Jefferson stories. Harriet left Monticello with her brother Beverly around 1822. She met one of Robert H. Lee’s Mulatto… They went to Jackson Tennessee as a free people, given thirty dollars and a buggy. I don’t know why they chose to go south to Tennessee. He was on the board of and a founder of a little Methodist college, Lane College. They were educated. His name was Robert H. Lee and they had a daughter Rachel Lee. She married a Freeman. Then my grandmother Mary Freeman (daughter of Rachel Lee) married Dan Chandler. This is my father’s mother and father.

Now on the other hand, my mother was from Mississippi. They met each other when she was a maid or servant and he was a tree surgeon. They met one day when he was working at a lady’s house (where my mother worked). They got married. My mother was in Memphis at the time though she originally was from Mississippi – Stovall’s Plantation. Muddy Waters was there when she was there. She used to see him and when I started playing, she used to tell me stories about seeing Muddy Waters and hearing Muddy Waters. Also the Normans lived nearby too, Robert Balfour who married into the Norman family – they all know each other. They were all bluesy musicians, especially Dan Norman who could play the Muddy Waters stuff. She used to see Muddy on the Plantation, in house parties, juke joints and around Clarksdale. Muddy was a little older than her. He was born around 1917 and she was born 1924. She used to see John Lee Hooker in town too. She was a young girl or teenager when she used to go out and see them. She may have been a young teenager, but girls were going out early then and even getting married early at 14, 15, 16…

When she married my father, she already knew about the Church of God in Christ. My grandfather, a Chandler, was one of the founders of the church along with C. H. Mason and R. E. Hart. My grandfather was in Bells Tennessee in the early 1900’s – 1920, about 60 miles from Memphis. They were Methodists first before they became Pentecostal.

One guy who used to work for a German Kaiser was Charles H. Mason. He was a preacher that went from town to town, backpacking. My grandfather was already established in his church when Mason asked the name. My grandfather said “The Church of God in Christ.” He had taken that name from Humbolt, TN and Bells TN to Memphis. Mason had access to a lot of money because of the German Kaiser. My father, who was a tree surgeon, cleaned all the land off for the mason temple. They hired him and my brothers to clean all the land off.

My family has been tree surgeons for generations, going back to when they were slaves. They logged and built cabins. The house my father grew up in was a replica of (one of) Robert E. Lee’s house – made like an H (shape) with a long foyer going across with two columns. You could tell the influence of the houses. When I went to Robert E. Lee’s house, it was the same exact thing, so I could tell they (my family) built a replica of it.

My grandfather was a sharecropper. He had a lot of people working for him and around that time, I don’t know how he did it, he acquired 600 acres of land. When I went through the archives in Washington DC, there was a guy named John Chandler, a white guy, and some kind of way my grandmother inherited the land. My grandfather came in and they took over 600 acres in Bells Tennessee.

It was right on the Tenn. River. My father said his family they left for Memphis when there was a big flood that flooded out the cotton fields. That was around 1920. He (my father) worked for the Memphis Light, Gas and Water Company from 1920-1930 as a tree surgeon on the tree trucks. My father and his siblings all moved to Memphis; they walked off and left 600 acres of land. They just left it and later they lost it.

My mother grew up really, really poor. She said it was hard for her in Mississippi, picking cotton all the time. Even when I was five years old, I remember getting into what they called a cotton bus going down to Mississippi to pick cotton. I was a little boy watching the old men playing checkers while the women were out in the fields picking cotton and going up and down the rows. If you couldn’t pick 300 pounds of cotton, you didn’t really make any money. My aunts and uncles would always try to get at least 300 pounds in a day – that’s a lot of cotton – to make some money.

They were singing all kinds of stuff in the fields. The old guys were called field hollerers. They weren’t really singers. And that’s what I consider myself. I’m not really a singer. Sings “Ohhhh Somebody”

I had an uncle, I could sit on the back of the tractor with him and there was the exhaust pipe that would come up. He would sing by the sounds of the exhaust pipe, different phrases. I remember picking cotton; I am probably one of the last of the cotton pickers before they brought in the machinery. After working all week, the people in Memphis used to go back to Mississippi on Saturdays just to make money (because) there weren’t that many jobs in the city. My mother and aunties used to go back to Northern Mississippi, Olive Branch or Clarksdale and all down 61 there would be a lot of farms. I could tell it was hard for the farmers because there were no more slaves. Everyone had left for the city so they were scraping hard and knew they had to pay people at least two or three dollars a day I expect but the money went a long way back then, especially down south.

I used to see mules. That is how the ice man used to come by and the rag man too. The milk man was on horses. I grew up really, really fast because I was around a lot of old people.

They were singing Swing Low Sweet Chariot and old slave songs. I can still hear them singing Jesus on the Mainline, tell him what you want. He sings “Glory Glory Hallelujah, since I lay my burden down.” ]They weren’t singing old blues songs or popular songs, they were singing about god and how to get from under oppression. They knew Muddy Waters and knew he went up north, but they were singing what it took to help make it through the day. They were hard workers. I would do my little share. The old guys would sit in the shade drinking moonshine and playing checkers on big checkerboards – chewing tobacco and talking crap.

Going back, I remember (Sister) Rosetta Tharpe with my father on bass and Arizona Danes singing solos. She was a great soloist. Arizona Dranes singing and playing piano solos.

My dad told me he took me to a parade one time and he knew I was going to play music because I was keeping time to the rhythm. So my earliest music was those drumbeats. Then I made my own little guitars and then got a mandolin, they called it a mando-leen. 

(To be continued)

Utah Smith almost makes me a believer

A recent post on Memphis Gold noted the deep influence his upbringing in the Church of God in Christ had on his music. When chatting about it and the name of Utah Smith came up he launched into an a cappella Smith's iconic number "I Got Two Wings," and recalled seeing Smith perform wearing his wings. To reiterate a point I made, while Robert Wilkins showed Chester Chandler specific things on playing the guitar, Utah Smith's music is part of the musical DNA of his music as displayed on his recent albums.

When I was in New Orleans this past spring I came across (at the Louisiana Music Factory) Lynn Abbott's book on Utah Smith, "I Got Two Wings which comes with an accompanying CD that includes several versions of "Two Wings," including some previously unreleased versions and recordings by associates (Arizona Dranes, Sister Rosetta Tharpe) and his daughter, on this intriguing biographical study that I recommend enthusiastic. Additionally the CD has some wild fervent music. There is a review on amazon that is also helpful. You can get it from either www.louisianamusicfactory.com or amazon.

Marie Knight's loving tribute to Rev. Gary Davis

Fans of Sister Rosetta Tharpe may be familiar with the name Marie Knight whose alto could be heard with Tharpe’s soprano and guitar on such records as Up Above My Head, I Hear Music, and Didn’t It Rain. Knight, who had her own gospel hit with Gospel Train, was located and participated in MC Records highly praised tribute to Tharpe, Shout, Sister, Shout, and is now featured on a stunning new MC records release, Let Us Get Together: A Tribute to Reverend Gary Davis. Produced by Larry Campbell, who played lead guitar and other instruments in Bob Dylan’s Band from 1997-2004 but has played with numerous acts such as Paul Simon and Willie Nelson. Campbell in the early 1970’s became obsessed with Rev. Gary Davis’ music and as he shows on this release, is a marvelous guitarist in the Piedmont finger style approach. His guitar is the foundation for Knight who still remains a vigorous vocalist that invests her renditions of Lord I Feel Like Goin' On, I Belong To The Band, Samson & Delilah, I Am The Light Of This World, 12 Gates, and Death Don't Have No Mercy, with such fervor. Perhaps her range is diminished a tad with age but her phrasing and delivery belies her age. Five selections are solo including Lord I Feel Like Goin’ On and Samson and Delilah, while several, including I Am the Light of the World, have a backing band that may get occasionally messy but do not detract from the exuberance and celebration. Catherine Russell contributes an effective backing vocal here while Kim Wilson adds harmonica in addition to the rhythm to Twelve Gates to The City, and Death Don’t Have No Mercy. The latter track is the recording’s longest and Knight is compelling on this spellbinding performance that is perhaps the highlight of a truly excellent disc. In addition, there is a short Quicktime video which gives Marie Knight a chance to tell us about herself and she is as vivacious as in her performances. Gary Davis’ memory is served well by this disc that is also a reminder that the magnificent Ms. Knight is alive and very well. One of the best discs in any genre this writer has heard this year.