Blues is a music genre and musical form that originated amongst African-Americans in the Deep South of the United States around the 1860s. Blues has incorporated spirituals, work songs, field hollers, shouts, chants, and rhymed simple narrative ballads from the African-American culture. The blues form is ubiquitous in jazz, rhythm and blues, and rock and roll, and is characterized by the call-and-response pattern, the blues scale, and specific chord progressions, of which the twelve-bar blues is the most common. Blue notes, usually thirds, fifths or sevenths flattened in pitch, are also an essential part of the sound. Blues shuffles or walking bass reinforce the trance-like rhythm and form a repetitive effect known as the groove.
Edward James "Son" House Jr. was an American Delta blues singer and guitarist, noted for his highly emotional style of singing and slide guitar playing.
Yazoo Records is an American record label founded in the mid-1960s by Nick Perls. It specializes in early American blues, country, jazz, and other rural American genres collectively known as roots music.
Ajax Records was a record company and label founded in 1921. Jazz and blues records were produced in New York City, with some in Montreal, and marketed via the Ajax Record Company of Chicago.
"Baby, Let Me Follow You Down" is a traditional folk song popularised in the late 1950s by blues guitarist Eric Von Schmidt. The song is best known for its appearance on Bob Dylan's debut album Bob Dylan.
The Long Beach Blues Festival, in Long Beach, California, United States, was established fully in 1980, and was one of the largest blues festivals and was the second oldest on the West Coast. It was held on Saturday and Sunday of Labor Day weekend. For many years it was held on the athletic field on the California State University, Long Beach campus. The 2009 festival, the 30th annual, was held at Rainbow Lagoon in downtown Long Beach. The Festival went on hiatus in 2010, and has not been held since.
From Spirituals to Swing was the title of two concerts presented by John Hammond in Carnegie Hall on 23 December 1938 and 24 December 1939. The concerts included performances by Count Basie, Benny Goodman, Big Joe Turner and Pete Johnson, Helen Humes, Meade Lux Lewis, Albert Ammons, Mitchell's Christian Singers, the Golden Gate Quartet, James P. Johnson, Big Bill Broonzy and Sonny Terry.
The San Francisco Blues Festival was active from 1973 until 2008, and was located in San Francisco, California. It was the one of the longest running blues festival in the United States.
Bessie Mae Smith was an American blues singer from St. Louis, who recorded for the Okeh, Vocalion and Paramount record labels under a variety of names between 1927 and 1941. She is reported to have been married to Delta bluesman Big Joe Williams, who sometimes credited her with writing his song “Baby, Please Don't Go”. Her songs often included surreal imagery and sexual metaphors.
Black & Blue Records was a record company and label founded in France in 1968 that specialized in blues and jazz.
Viola McCoy was an American blues singer who performed in the classic female blues style during a career that lasted from the early 1920s to the late 1930s.
Porter Grainger was an American pianist, songwriter, playwright, and music publisher.
The Smithsonian Collection of Classic Jazz is a six-LP box set released in 1973 by the Smithsonian Institution. Compiled by jazz critic, scholar, and historian Martin Williams, the album included tracks from over a dozen record labels spanning several decades and genres of American jazz, from ragtime and big band to post-bop and free jazz.
