The Best of Little Walter

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The Best of Little Walter
Best of Little Walter.jpg
Greatest hits album by
Little Walter
Released1958
RecordedMay 12, 1952 – January 25, 1955 in Chicago, Illinois [1] [2]
Genre Chicago blues
Length35:44
Label Checker LP 1428 [3]
Producer Leonard Chess, Phil Chess, Willie Dixon
Little Walter chronology
The Best of Little Walter
(1958)		Hate to See You Go
(1969)
Professional ratings
Review scores
SourceRating
AllMusic Star full.svgStar full.svgStar full.svgStar full.svgStar full.svg [4]
The Encyclopedia of Popular Music Star full.svgStar full.svgStar full.svgStar full.svgStar empty.svg [5]
Record Mirror Star full.svgStar full.svgStar full.svgStar empty.svgStar empty.svg [6]
The Rolling Stone Album Guide Star full.svgStar full.svgStar full.svgStar full.svgStar full.svg [7]

The Best of Little Walter is the first LP record by American blues performer Little Walter. [5] First released in 1958, the compilation album contains ten Little Walter songs that appeared in the Top 10 of the Billboard R&B chart from 1952 to 1955, [8] plus two B-sides. The album was first released by Checker Records as LP-1428, which was the first LP record released by Checker, and then released on Chess Records with the same catalog number. [3]

Contents

The album has been reissued numerous times, although it has been largely superseded by the 20-song collection Little Walter His Best: Chess 50th Anniversary Collection .

Artwork and packaging

The album cover features a black-and-white photo portrait shot by Grammy Award winning photographer Don Bronstein of Little Walter holding/playing a Hohner 64 Chromatic harmonica and liner notes by Studs Terkel, who had written Giants of Jazz. The original LP featured a black label.

Accolades

In 1991, The Best of Little Walter was inducted into the Blues Foundation Hall of Fame in the "Classics of Blues Recordings – Album" category. [3] In 2003, the album was ranked No. 198 in Rolling Stone magazine's list of the "500 Greatest Albums of All Time". [9]

Track listing

All tracks are written by Walter Jacobs (Little Walter), except where noted.

Side one
No.TitleLength
1."My Babe" (Willie Dixon)2:44
2."Sad Hours"3:15
3."You're So Fine"3:07
4."Last Night"2:46
5."Blues with a Feeling" (Rabon Tarrant, re-written by Jacobs)3:10
6."Can't Hold Out Much Longer"3:03
Side two
No.TitleLength
1."Juke"2:47
2."Mean Old World" (T-Bone Walker, re-written by Jacobs)2:57
3."Off the Wall"2:52
4."You Better Watch Yourself"3:04
5."Blue Light"3:14
6."Tell Me Mamma"2:47

Personnel

The following people contributed to the Best of Little Walter: [1] [2]

Singles chart

The songs "Juke" and "My Babe" peaked at No. 1 on Billboard magazine's R&B Singles chart. "Sad Hours", "You're So Fine", and "Blues with a Feeling" made it to No. 2 on the same chart. "Last Night" and "Mean Old World" peaked at No. 6, "Off the Wall" and "You Better Watch Yourself" reached No. 8, and "Tell Me Mama" made it to No. 10. [8]

Release history

RegionDateLabelFormatCatalog
United States 1958 Checker/Chess Records LP 1428
United States1967Checker RecordsLP3004
United States1988 MCA Records/Chess RecordsLPCH-9192
Cassette CHC-9192
CD CHD-9192

References

  1. 1 2 George R. White; Robert L. Campbell; Tom Kelly. "The Chess Label Part I (1950–1952)". Robert Campbell. Clemson, South Carolina: Clemson University . Retrieved March 9, 2011.
  2. 1 2 George R. White; Robert L. Campbell; Tom Kelly. "The Chess Label Part II (1953–1955)". Robert Campbell. Clemson, South Carolina: Clemson University . Retrieved March 9, 2011.
  3. 1 2 3 Past Hall of Fame Inductees Archived 2012-07-17 at the Wayback Machine . Blues Foundation. Go under 1991 Hall of Fame Inductees and click on The Best of Little Walter--Little Walter (Checker, 1958) to view the album review.
  4. ↑ "Album Search for "the best of little walter chess"". AllMusic. Retrieved July 16, 2025.
  5. 1 2 Larkin, Colin (2006). The Encyclopedia of Popular Music. Vol. 5. MUZE. pp. 273–274.
  6. ↑ Jopling, Norman (October 10, 1964). "Little Walter: The Best Of Little Watler" (PDF). Record Mirror . No. 187. p. 12. Archived from the original (PDF) on April 1, 2022. Retrieved August 16, 2022.
  7. ↑ The Rolling Stone Album Guide. Random House. 1992. pp. 354–355.
  8. 1 2 Whiburn, Joel (1988). Top R&B Singles 1942-1988 . Record Research. p.  613. ISBN   0-89820-068-7.
  9. ↑ "#198 The Best of Little Walter". Rolling Stone . 2003. Archived from the original on June 12, 2010. Retrieved September 20, 2010.
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