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".
The Blues Brothers are a fictitious American blues and soul revue band founded in 1978 by comedians Dan Aykroyd and John Belushi, who met and began collaborating as original cast members of Saturday Night Live.
Electric blues is blues music distinguished by the use of electric amplification for musical instruments. The guitar was the first instrument to be popularly amplified and used by early pioneers T-Bone Walker in the late 1930s and John Lee Hooker and Muddy Waters in the 1940s. Their styles developed into West Coast blues, Detroit blues, and post-World War II Chicago blues, which differed from earlier, predominantly acoustic-style blues. By the early 1950s, Little Walter was a featured soloist on blues harmonica using a small hand-held microphone fed into a guitar amplifier. Although it took a little longer, the electric bass guitar gradually replaced the stand-up bass by the early 1960s. Electric organs and especially keyboards later became widely used in electric blues.
Walter Horton (April 6, 1921 – December 8, 1981), known as Big Walter (Horton) or Walter "Shakey" Horton, was an American blues harmonica player. A quiet, unassuming, shy man, he is remembered as one of the premier harmonica players in the history of blues. Willie Dixon once called Horton 'the best harmonica player I ever heard'.
James Henry Cotton was an American blues harmonica player, singer and songwriter, who performed and recorded with many fellow blues artists and with his own band. He also played drums early in his career.
Herman "Junior" Parker was an American blues singer and harmonica player. He is best remembered for his voice which has been described as "honeyed" and "velvet-smooth". One music journalist noted, "For years, Junior Parker deserted down home harmonica blues for uptown blues-soul music". In 2001, he was inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame. Parker is also inducted into the Mississippi Musicians Hall of Fame.
Animalism is the fifth American album by the Animals, released in November 1966. The album includes the band's usual repertoire of blues and R&B covers, while Frank Zappa contributed a song and played bass on two tracks. It was the last album recorded by the original incarnation of the Animals prior to their disbandment, after which singer Eric Burdon would assemble a mostly new lineup under the name "Eric Burdon and the Animals". This new version of the group was already touring when Animalism released.
Samuel Lawrence "Larry" Taylor was an American bass guitarist, best known for his work as a member of Canned Heat. Before joining Canned Heat he had been a session bassist for The Monkees and Jerry Lee Lewis. He was the younger brother of Mel Taylor, long-time drummer of The Ventures.
Roomful of Blues is an American jump blues and swing revival big band based in Rhode Island. With a recording career that spans over 50 years, they have toured worldwide and recorded many albums. Roomful of Blues, according to the Chicago Sun-Times, "Swagger, sway and swing with energy and precision". Since 1967, the group’s blend of swing, rock and roll, jump blues, boogie-woogie and soul has earned it five Grammy Award nominations and many other accolades, including seven Blues Music Awards. Billboard called the band "a tour de force of horn-fried blues…Roomful is so tight and so right." The Down Beat International Critics Poll has twice selected Roomful of Blues as Best Blues Band.
Hot Tuna is the debut album by the American blues rock band Hot Tuna, released in 1970 as RCA Victor LSP-4353. It was recorded live at the New Orleans House in Berkeley, California in September 1969. It peaked at #30 on the Billboard 200 album chart.
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.
Omar And The Howlers is a Texas based electric blues and blues rock band, The original Howlers was formed in Hattiesburg, Mississippi in 1973. Three years later they moved to Austin, Texas. The band has regularly toured European countries. Led by singer/guitarist Omar Dykes, they are best known for the 1987 album Hard Times in the Land of Plenty which sold over half a million copies and whose title song was a top 20 hit in America.
Kane Richmond was an American film actor of the 1930s and 1940s, mostly appearing in cliffhangers and serials. He is best known today for his portrayal of the character Lamont Cranston in The Shadow films in addition to his leading role in the successful serials Spy Smasher and Brick Bradford.
Willie Lee "Big Eyes" Smith was an American electric blues vocalist, harmonica player, and drummer. He was best known for several stints with the Muddy Waters band beginning in the early 1960s.
Robert Lee "Smokey" Wilson was an American West Coast blues guitarist. He spent most of his career performing West Coast blues and juke joint blues in Los Angeles, California. He recorded a number of albums for record labels such as P-Vine Records, Bullseye Blues and Texmuse Records. His career got off to a late start, with international recognition eluding him until the 1990s.
Steve Marriner is a Canadian multi-instrumentalist, singer, songwriter and record producer based in Toronto, Ontario. He first garnered attention in the Ottawa blues scene in his early teens as a prodigy blues harp (harmonica) player. He also plays baritone guitar, electric guitar, piano, Hammond organ, upright bass and electric bass. Since 2008, he has been the frontman, singer, one of two guitarists and harmonica player for the Canadian rock'n'roll-blues group MonkeyJunk. The band's album To Behold won the 2012 Juno Award for Blues Album of the Year.
R.J. Mischo is an American electric blues harmonicist, singer, songwriter, and record producer. To date he has released twelve albums on a number of labels, and his music has been aired on independent film scores, television commercials, and documentaries on the Discovery Channel. Mischo has contributed to a couple of Mel Bay harmonica instruction books. In addition, he was listed in that author's The Encyclopedia of Harmonica.
Percy Lee Strother was an American electric blues guitarist, singer and songwriter. After a tragic start in life, from the mid 1970s, Strother went on to become a mainstay of the Minneapolis blues scene. His music was a blend of blues, rhythm and blues and Memphis soul, and his more noteworthy songs included "Blow Wind Blow", "Down Home Blues", "Killing Floor", "Grits Ain't Groceries", "Red Rooster", and "Take My Love".
