McKinley Morganfield, known professionally as Muddy Waters, was an American blues singer and musician who was an important figure in the post-World War II blues scene, and is often cited as the "father of modern Chicago blues". His style of playing has been described as "raining down Delta beatitude".
Coahoma County is a county located in the U.S. state of Mississippi. As of the 2020 census, the population was 21,390. Its county seat is Clarksdale.
Clarksdale is a city in and the county seat of Coahoma County, Mississippi, United States. It is located along the Sunflower River. Clarksdale is named after John Clark, a settler who founded the city in the mid-19th century when he established a timber mill and business. Clarksdale is in the Mississippi Delta region and is an agricultural and trading center. Many African-American musicians developed the blues here, and took this original American music with them to Chicago and other northern cities during the Great Migration.
The Delta Blues Museum in Clarksdale, Mississippi, United States, is a museum dedicated to collecting, preserving, and providing public access to and awareness of the musical genre known as the blues. Along with holdings of significant blues-related memorabilia, the museum also exhibits and collects art portraying the blues tradition, including works by sculptor Floyd Shaman and photographer Birney Imes.
Joe Willie "Pinetop" Perkins was an American blues pianist. He played with some of the most influential blues and rock-and-roll performers of his time and received numerous honors, including a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award and induction into the Blues Hall of Fame.
Jack N. Johnson, known as Big Jack Johnson was an American electric blues musician, one of the "present-day exponents of an edgier, electrified version of the raw, uncut Delta blues sound." He was one of a small number of blues musicians who played the mandolin. He won a W. C. Handy Award in 2003 for best acoustic blues album.
David "Junior" Kimbrough was an American blues musician. His best-known works are "Keep Your Hands off Her" and "All Night Long". In 2023, he was inducted in the Blues Hall of Fame.
Juke joint is the African-American vernacular term for an informal establishment featuring music, dancing, gambling, and drinking, primarily operated by African Americans in the southeastern United States. A juke joint may also be called a "barrelhouse". The Jook was the first secular cultural arena to emerge among African-American freedmen.
Robert Mugge is an American documentary film maker. He has focused primarily on films about music and musicians, but some of his earliest films were not music focused and he is now continuing to branch out as his interests and work evolve.
James "Super Chikan" Johnson is an American blues musician based in Clarksdale, Mississippi. He is the nephew of fellow blues musician Big Jack Johnson.
The Mississippi Blues Trail was created by the Mississippi Blues Commission in 2006 to place interpretive markers at the most notable historical sites related to the birth, growth, and influence of the blues throughout the state of Mississippi. Within the state the trail extends from the Gulf Coast north along several highways to Natchez, Vicksburg, Jackson, Leland, Greenwood, Clarksdale, Tunica, Grenada, Oxford, Columbus, and Meridian. The largest concentration of markers is in the Mississippi Delta, but other regions of the state are also commemorated. Several out-of-state markers have also been erected where blues with Mississippi roots has had significance, such as Chicago.
Riverside Hotel was a hotel in Clarksdale, Mississippi, in operation since 1944. The fourth marker location on the Mississippi Blues Trail, famed for providing lodging for such blues artists as Sonny Boy Williamson II, Ike Turner, and Robert Nighthawk, it was previously the G.T. Thomas Hospital, in which Bessie Smith died in 1937.
The Yazoo and Mississippi Valley Railroad (Y&MV) was incorporated in 1882 and was part of the Illinois Central Railroad system (IC). Construction began in Jackson, Mississippi, and continued to Yazoo City, Mississippi. The line was later expanded through the Mississippi Delta and on to Memphis, Tennessee. In 1886, the IC purchased the Mississippi and Tennessee Railroad. In 1892, the IC bought the Memphis to New Orleans line, forming the Louisville, New Orleans and Texas Railway. These lines were merged into the Y&MV. Main lines included Memphis to New Orleans via Vicksburg and Baton Rouge, Memphis to Tutwiler, Clarksdale, MS to Yazoo City, Clarksdale to Jackson, MS, and Jackson to Natchez.
Po' Monkey's was a juke joint in unincorporated Bolivar County, Mississippi, United States, outside of Merigold. The juke joint was founded in the early 1960s and was one of the last rural juke joints in the Mississippi Delta. It ceased operating after the death of operator Willie "Po' Monkey" Seaberry in 2016.
The Summers Hotel was located in Jackson, Mississippi, United States, and was the city's first black-owned hotel. W. J. Summers established it in 1944 and many black musicians lodged there during the era of segregation. The Subway Lounge was opened in the basement in 1966. The Subway was a regular jazz venue and offered popular late-night blues shows from the mid-1980s until the hotel's demolition in 2004.
Smithsonian Channel's Sound Revolution is a documentary television series hosted by award-winning actor Morgan Freeman. Documentary footage, expert interviews and musical performances trace the origins of be-bop, jazz, rock 'n' roll and soul music, all emanating from “ground zero” – Clarksdale, Mississippi – and the Mississippi Delta. Each hour-long program is filled with recent performances, largely from the Montreux Jazz Festival, featuring performances by: B. B. King, Ike Tuner, Buddy Guy, Etta James, Eric Clapton, Carlos Santana, Robert Cray, Miles Davis, The Neville Brothers and many others. The show premiered in November 2008 on Smithsonian Networks. It was scripted by British writer Joe Cushley, directed by Chris Walker and produced by Alan Ravenscroft.
James H. Mathis Jr., known as Jimbo Mathus, is an American singer-songwriter, guitarist, and member of the hot jazz band Squirrel Nut Zippers.
Sam Carr was an American blues drummer best known as a member of the Jelly Roll Kings.
William O. Luckett Jr. was an American politician, attorney and businessman. He unsuccessfully ran for Governor of Mississippi in 2011 and served as Mayor of Clarksdale, Mississippi from 2013 to 2017. He was also a founder and board member of the Pinetop Perkins Foundation. From May 2001 till his death, Luckett also co-owned with business partner Morgan Freeman the Ground Zero Blues Club. He also co-owned the Madidi Restaurant with Freeman from 2001 to 2012. He was also a member of the NAACP.
