Welcome to My Show on The Blues, America’s Music
My Discovery
It was mid-June 1956, at the age of 16 that I took the Milwaukee Road train from Minneapolis to Chicago for a summer job in my Uncle Aksel’s restaurant near North Avenue and Harlem Street. It was to be my first real experience of working and being in close proximity to African Americans or, as they were called back then, Negroes. I had gone to an integrated grade school for half of my fifth and sixth grade years, but the few Black students pretty much stayed together and didn’t mingle with us, or maybe it was the other way around, but bottom line, we never got to know one another. So that summer in Chicago was a totally new experience for me.
When I debarked at the Central Station downtown, I was to take the Clark Street bus to North Avenue, transfer on that line running west to Harlem Avenue to my uncle’s house. Missing the bus, I decided that, rather than standing on the corner waiting for the next bus, I started to walk. The first couple of blocks were just typical downtown activity, but as I progressed north, it was apparent that Clark Street was primarily a Black and Puerto Rican area. As I passed pawn shops, pool halls, juke joints, and $2-a-night hotel rooms, I was definitely aware that I “was no longer in Kansas.” The further I walked, shifting the weight of my suitcase from one side to the other, the more intrigued I was with my surroundings. There were streets full of excitement and commerce, street-corner hustlers pushing their wares, as well as different smells and sounds from the shops and upstairs apartment windows. Men were hanging around in front of some establishments, having a smoke and passing a bottle wrapped in brown paper, laughing and telling stories. For me, a White kid from a “white toast” Minneapolis neighborhood, it was an experience—like being in a totally different country—that I would never forget. I ended up walking the whole way to North Avenue, about sixteen blocks, before catching the North Avenue bus to Aksel’s house, which was across the street from the restaurant.
I started work the next day and discovered that, apart from some of the waitresses and the chef, I was the only white-face in the kitchen. There were the cooks, Clyde and Jimmy, the Porta Rican dishwashers and bus boys, and the Japanese pantry chefs. This was going to be a summer of personal growth and understanding for me!
At the risk of going slightly off topic, Clyde, the night chef, was a super mellow guy in his 40s that was so laid back and cool, I could have sworn he was stoned, which of courses, he wasn’t—just a super cool guy. The line cook, Jimmy, on the other hand, was just the opposite—outgoing, gregarious, an infectious smile (with a big gold front tooth) and laugh. I really enjoyed both of these guys and had the good fortune of working with them again a couple of years later when I was a student at the Art Institute of Chicago. In addition, about fifty years later, my wife and I were in the cafeteria line at the Art Institute, and as the guy behind the counter was asking for my order, I was struck by how much he looked like Jimmy. I responded, “Hey dude, you look like a guy that I used to work with years ago.” He asked, “Who’s that?” I replied, “His name was Jimmy.” His matter-of-fact response, “That was my father’s name,” was a surprise. After a bit more exchange, he was in fact Jimmy’s son! Taking his break, he joined us for lunch. I thought it was so ironic that I should have met him, in all places, my alma mater.
Now back on topic, I had only been in Chicago a few days when I heard a radio station that played, what was then referred to as “race music.” During the evening hours, the DJ was a colorful character called “The Big Hunk of Man.” His rough, gravelly voice and boisterous persona was captivating. “This here is the Big Hunk of Man tallkin’ at cha—Awwweeee.” (I’m convinced that a decade later, “Wolfman Jack” emulated a modified version of his persona.) One of the advertisers on his show was Colegate Toothpaste. He would growl, “I use Colgate, and when I stand here lookin’ at these pearly whites in the mirror, I gotta say, ‘Oh, you Big Hunk of Man, you!’” His song intros were unique as well, “Now we’re gonna hear from the Tail Dragger, his-self, Howlin’ Wolf,” then he would howl like a wolf. He introduced me to the unique, rhythmic and soulful sounds of artists like Muddy Waters, Howlin’ Wolf, Bo Diddly, Screaming Jay Hawkins, and the self-proclaimed “architect” of Rock and Roll, Little Richard. There were also early Doo-Wop groups and soulful singers, like Ruth Brown. I was absolutely blown away, “What were these strange sounds that moved me—like nothing I had ever experienced?” It’s hard to explain, but I didn’t just hear it; but rather, it resonated with me, moving me to want to get up and dance.
When I received my first paycheck, I boarded a bus for the South Side, looking for the record store that advertised on the radio station. Three transfers later, I was in the heart of what my cousins referred to as “No (white) Mans Land.” Walking into the store, I received curious stares—"What was this skinny (98-pound) White kid doing in here?” However, once I started asking questions about artists that I’d heard, they welcomed me with open arms and introduced me to other artists, like BB King, Lightning Hopkins and many more. I had found a gold mine and visited that store a few more times over the summer. With an impressive collection of those little records with the big hole in the middle (45s), I was anxious to share them with my younger brother, Gary, and my friends back home.
When Gary heard my records, he immediately stopped his formal piano lessons and started playing Blues and Rhythm & Blues by ear. Within a couple of years, Gary was playing in one of the more popular local teen bands, and just a year or so later, he had the privilege of sitting in with Muddy Waters for a jam session, which he experienced several times over the next couple of decades, as well as occasional invitations to his home. As for my classmates’ acceptance of the new sounds that I brought home? Well, let’s just say, I was invited to a lot more parties with the request to bring my records!
Within a year or two, Blues and Rhythm & Blues became more mainstream, and the Rock & Roll sounds of Little Richard and Chuck Berry exploded into “White” America—possibly from people like me, sharing our discovery with our friends, but more likely from the exposure given by Ed Sullivan, Dick Clark and others in the media who had discovered what is truly American music.
The Evolution of The Blues
I certainly don’t claim to be an expert on anything, especially music, but here are my overly simplified views on how I think The Blues evolved. Its roots, of course, come from Africa, where the beating of drums was a method of communication, sort of like a telegraph. With the additional cries, chants and other instruments, it also became a language of both celebration and sorrow.
During the years of slavery and chain gangs, the rhythm grunts, chants and cries became, again, a method of communication amongst themselves. After slavery, we had “Jim Crow” when state and local laws enforced racial segregation and discrimination, which was actually just another form of slavery, keeping African Americans under the thumb of white supremacy. While, in my opinion, it was a disgraceful time in our U.S. history, it did give us something positive—The Blues, an expression of freed African Americans, influenced by work songs and field hollers, minstrel show music, ragtime, church music, and the folk and popular music of the white population, creating a Black American art form. (Brittanica)
Guitars could be bought from Sears & Roebuck for about two dollars, in some cases, a whole day’s wages, and early pioneers taught themselves how to play and express their feelings of suppression and their sorrow, as well as the pain and joys of love.
Slaveowners had converted most of their slaves to Christianity with the hopes that it would make the slaves more honest and subservient. The result became the Black church and gospel music. Their rhythms and sounds were very similar, but the church people considered The Blues to be the devil’s music. White people, in their racist manner, called it, “jungle” music. BB King once took a gospel song, replaced the word “God” with “Babe” and had an R&B hit with it.
Most of the early Blues musicians were “rolling stones,” rambling from town to town, playing at street corners, house parties and juke joints—anyplace a few people would gather and throw extra change in their hat. A lot of them, such as BB King, left playing in the church to play The Blues, because nobody paid to hear gospel music, but nickels and dimes would fall in his hat when he played The Blues.
With the invention of the cotton gin, work became scarce for Black people in the South, so the lure of jobs in Northern cities brought thousands of people to places like Chicago and Detroit. Blues musicians followed their audience to play in juke joints and bars, where with the addition of electricity, the Blues that we enjoy today was born. My main source of interest is, of course, the Chicago Blues scene, where I discovered it.
When I talk to people about art, I quite often hear, “I don’t know much about art, but I know what I like.” That pretty much sums up my view of music—I don’t know much about it, but I do know what I like—and I love the Blues!