Lurrie Bell | |
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Background information | |
Birth name | Lurrie C. Bell |
Born | Chicago, Illinois United States | December 13, 1958
Genres | Chicago blues |
Occupation | Musician, |
Instrument(s) | Vocals, guitar |
Years active | 1970s – present |
Labels | JSP Records Delmark P-Vine Records Vypyr Records Aria B.G. Records |
Website | Lurrie.com |
Lurrie Bell (born Lurrie C. Bell, December 13, 1958, Chicago, Illinois, United States) [1] is an American blues guitarist and singer. His father was renowned blues harmonica player Carey Bell.
Bell started playing guitar at the age of six, and in his teens he polished his skills playing with the legends of Chicago blues scene including Eddy Clearwater, Big Walter Horton and Eddie Taylor.
In the mid 1970s, he went on to join Koko Taylor's Blues Machine and he toured with the band for four years. He made his recording debut in 1977 appearing on his father's album Heartaches and Pain and also on Eddie C. Campbell's King of the Jungle. [1] [2] It was around that time that he formed The Sons of Blues with musicians including Billy Branch on harmonica. [3] Three tracks of the band's recordings were featured in the Alligator Records compilation Living Chicago Blues Vol. 3 released in 1978. In 1989 he released his first solo effort, Everybody Wants To Win, on JSP Records.
Though Bell's career appeared to be headed in the right direction, drawing attention of the blues fans around the world as a young prodigy of the blues, he battled emotional problems and drug abuse for many years, which kept him away from performing on regular basis. [3]
He began a comeback in 1995 with the well-received album Mercurial Son, his first of several from the Delmark label. A series of albums followed thereafter, and he started to perform more frequently in the Chicago club and blues festival circuits.
Bell is featured on Gettin' Up – Live at Buddy Guy's Legends, Rosa's and Lurrie's Home, a 2007 CD and DVD release from Delmark, where he plays with his father Carey. Soon after this release, Carey died in May 2007 and this became his last recorded effort.
In 2014, Bell won a Blues Music Award for his track "Blues in My Soul", in the 'Song of the Year' category. He was nominated for a similar award in four other categories. [4] In 2015, Bell won a Blues Music Award in the 'Traditional Blues Male Artist' category. [5]
Bell's 2016 album, Can't Shake This Feeling , [6] was nominated for a Grammy Award for Best Traditional Blues Album. [7] Matthew Skoller's harmonica work featured prominently on the album, [8] and he was the record producer on Bell's earlier Let's Talk About Love and The Devil Ain't Got No Music albums. [9]
He became a 2024 inductee to the Blues Foundation's Blues Hall of Fame. [10]
Theodore Roosevelt "Hound Dog" Taylor was an American Chicago blues guitarist and singer.
Carey Bell Harrington was an American blues musician who played harmonica in the Chicago blues style. Bell played harmonica and bass guitar for other blues musicians from the late 1950s to the early 1970s before embarking on a solo career. Besides his own albums, he recorded as an accompanist or duo artist with Earl Hooker, Robert Nighthawk, Lowell Fulson, Eddie Taylor, Louisiana Red and Jimmy Dawkins and was a frequent partner with his son, the guitarist Lurrie Bell. Blues Revue called Bell "one of Chicago's finest harpists." The Chicago Tribune said Bell was "a terrific talent in the tradition of Sonny Boy Williamson and Little Walter." In 2023, he was inducted in the Blues Hall of Fame.
Carlton Weathersby was an American electric blues vocalist, guitarist, and songwriter. He worked with Albert King and Billy Branch, among others, and had a career as a solo artist. He was nominated for the W. C. Handy Award for Best New Blues Artist in 1997.
Bruce Iglauer is an American businessman and record producer who founded Alligator Records as an independent record label featuring blues music.
Billy Branch is an American blues harmonica player and singer of Chicago blues. Branch is a three-time Grammy nominee, a retired two-term governor of the Chicago Grammy Chapter, an Emmy Award winner, and a winner of the Addy Award. In addition, he has received numerous humanitarian and music awards.
Phil Guy was an American blues guitarist. He was the younger brother of blues guitarist Buddy Guy. Phil and Buddy Guy were frequent collaborators and contribute both guitar and vocal performances on many of each other's albums.
Iverson Minter, known as Louisiana Red, was an American blues guitarist, harmonica player, and singer, who recorded more than 50 albums. A master of slide guitar, he played both traditional acoustic and urban electric styles, with lyrics both honest and often remarkably personal. His career includes collaborations with artists as Muddy Waters, John Lee Hooker, Eric Burdon, and others.
Eddie C. Campbell was an American blues guitarist and singer in the Chicago blues scene.
Deitra Farr is an American blues, soul and gospel singer-songwriter.
Ken Saydak is an American Chicago blues pianist and singer-songwriter. In a long career, he has played as a sideman with Lonnie Brooks, Mighty Joe Young, Johnny Winter and Dave Specter. Saydak has released three albums under his own name since 1999. Billboard once described him as "a gripping frontman".
Samuel Julian Lay was an American drummer and vocalist who performed from the late 1950s as a blues and R&B musician alongside Little Walter, Howlin' Wolf, Paul Butterfield, and many others. He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2015.
Karen Lynn Carroll was an American blues singer. She was born to Mack Carroll and Alberta Simmons Carroll.
Aron Burton was an American electric and Chicago blues singer, bass guitarist and songwriter. In his long career as a sideman with Freddie King, Albert Collins and Junior Wells and released a number of solo albums, including Good Blues to You. His recorded work was nominated four times for a Blues Music Award in the category Blues Instrumentalist—Bass.
Bob Stroger is an American electric blues bass guitarist, singer and songwriter. He has worked with many blues musicians, including Eddie King, Otis Rush, Jimmy Rogers, Eddie Taylor, Eddy Clearwater, Sunnyland Slim, Louisiana Red, Buster Benton, Homesick James, Mississippi Heat, Snooky Pryor, Odie Payne, Fred Below, Willie "Big Eyes" Smith, and Billy Davenport.
Can't Shake This Feeling is an album by Lurrie Bell. It earned Bell a Grammy Award nomination for Best Traditional Blues Album. At the 38th Blues Music Award ceremony in May 2017, Can't Shake This Feeling won the 'Traditional Blues Album of the Year' category.
Heartaches and Pain is an album by the American blues musician Carey Bell, recorded in Chicago in 1977, but not released by the Delmark label until 1994.
Deep Down is an album by the American blues musician Carey Bell, recorded in Chicago in 1995 and released by the Alligator label.
Brian Berkowitz, known professionally as Johnny Iguana, is an American Chicago blues pianist, singer and songwriter. He has recorded albums with Junior Wells, Carey Bell, Koko Taylor, Lil' Ed Williams, Eddie Shaw, Matthew Skoller, Lurrie Bell, Carey Bell, Oh My God, and the Claudettes among many others.
Matthew Skoller is an American Chicago blues harmonicist, singer, songwriter, and record producer. He has released five albums, as well as recording his harmonica playing on other musicians work, including John Primer, Lurrie Bell, Koko Taylor, H-Bomb Ferguson, Toronzo Cannon, Bernard Allison, Larry Garner, Big Daddy Kinsey, Big Time Sarah, Michael Coleman, and Harvey Mandel. On stage, he has supplied part of the backing to Big Time Sarah, Jimmy Rogers, and Deitra Farr.