The Land Where The Blues Began
The Mississippi Delta stretches from Memphis in the North to 200 miles south of Vicksburg, Mississippi, from Central Mississippi eastward to the Arkansas Ozarks.
Delta style is one of the earliest-known styles of blues music. Delta-style guitar emphasizes single-string progression. The delta region was so isolated from American popular music that the music heard was a relatively pure product of early African American slave culture. The concentration of rural, uneducated blacks, segregated from the white citizenry, provided the mesh for the Delta blues to take root, grow, and flourish in its pure form.
Three significant players helped to shape Delta Style Blues:
⦁ (The first Is) Charley Patton, the Father of Delta Blues, was born in 1891 near Edwards, Mississippi. Charley Patton was your stereotypical hard driving, drinking fight, and womanizing bluesman. He was the hub where all his days of bluesmen would revolve.Charley Patton left an enduring body of work that continues to inspire musicians worldwide. His approach to playing the blues eventually led to the Chicago Blues tradition. EX;
Eddie "Son" House, born in Lyon, Mississippi, in 1902, was an essential artist in country folk blues. "Son" is often referred to as the father of this genre. His unique style of music was a blend of preaching and blues. House was the one who popularized bottleneck slide guitar playing and recorded for the Columbia Records label. "Son" House is noted for his highly emotional style of music. Eddie "Son" House passed away in Detroit, Michigan in 1988.
⦁ Born in 1911, Robert Johnson was a young bluesman who became known as the King of Delta Blues. He completed a group of men who contributed to Mississippi's lasting tradition of delta-style blues. Johnson's music was crucial in bridging the gap between rural blues and its early modern urban manifestations. EX.
There is a long list of Delta Bluesmen: Bukka White, Muddy Waters, Sonny Boy Williams, B.B. King, Little Milton, John Lee Hooker, Howling Wolf, Elmore James, and many others who would reshape the Delta style to form the distinctive Chicago style blues.
-Fruteland Jackson
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