Tex Owens born 15 June 1892

Tex Owens (June 15, 1892 – September 9, 1962) was an American country music singer and songwriter, best remembered today for writing the Eddy Arnold hit Cattle Call. 

Tex Owens was born Doie Hensley Owens in Killeen, Texas. He was the son of Curcley Sly and Susan (Frances) Owens. The youngest of thirteen children, he came from a large and musically talented family who moved to Cushing, Oklahoma while he was still a boy. The name "Tex" logically seemed to stick after the move to Oklahoma. Beginning when he was 15 years old, he worked lots of jobs, especially on ranches in the surrounding area, and even spent a stint as a chuck wagon cook. He did gravitate a little toward singing as he could play guitar well enough to accompany himself, and as a lanky 6'3" vocalist, he looked natural enough as the center of attention. He made his first foray into music at a traveling tent show as a blackface singer, doubling as a hired hand, and spent up to a year with one such tent show. The life didn't appeal to him enough to stay with music, however, and by his late teens Owens was back to working more conventional and reliable jobs. 

Owens worked oil fields in Texas, and then jobs in Missouri and Kansas, and after marrying Maude Neal in1916, he spent his early years as a cowboy and oilfield worker in Texas. He later held a series of jobs in the Midwest, until his friends urged him to take his musical talents to radio in 1931. For the next ten years he co-hosted the popular Brush Creek Follies, on KMBC in Kansas City, featuring his group, the Original Texas Rangers, and his two daughters Dolpha (Jane) and Laura Lee (Joy). In the summer of 1934, Owens was signed, along with the Texas Rangers, to the newly founded Decca label. (Curiously, Decca had also signed another "Tex," with the last name of Ritter, around the same time). In 1935 Owens penned his biggest hit song, "Cattle Call," which he recorded for Decca Records. 

                                   

According to his wife, he'd written it ahead of a show during a snowstorm when they were stuck at the hotel where the radio station was headquartered, borrowing the melody from "The St. Paul Waltz." The song, one of four he recorded in Chicago that day wasn't a success at the time, and Owens' relationship with Decca ended after that session. He next recorded ten songs for RCA in September of 1936, none of which including another version of "Cattle Call" was issued and all of which are lost today. The song later became a hit recording for singer Eddy Arnold. Owens was popular enough that in 1939 the governor of Texas declared him and the Texas Rangers honorary Texas Rangers. Owens also hosted the Boone County Jamboree on WLW in Cincinnati and appeared on several other radio shows. Most of Owens' career was spent not in the recording studio, but rather on the radio, performing with either the Texas Rangers or the Prairie Pioneers; he also made personal appearances and, on rare occasions, performed in movies. 

Though Owens went back to the oilfields during World War II, he later returned to entertainment as a movie cowboy, but most of Owens' career was spent not in the recording studio, but rather on the radio, performing with either the Texas Rangers or the Prairie Pioneers; he also made personal appearances and, on rare occasions, performed in movies. His postwar career was cut short, however, when a horse fell on him and broke his back during the filming of Red River, with John Wayne, in 1950. Owens spent a year recovering and never fully got over the injuries. He returned to performing with a new backing group, the Prairie Pirates, and cut a pair of sessions with them in 1953 and 1954. The four songs from these sessions were released on the Wrightman label but failed to excite any major public interest, despite the presence of such gorgeous songs as Alice Canterbury's "Give Me the Plains at Night" as well as the Tex and Chuck Owens-authored instrumental "Porcupine Serenade." 

Owens wrote more than 100 songs, but "Cattle Call" was far and away the biggest success he ever had. Unfortunately, he never achieved a fraction of the success as a recording artist that Arnold did during those decades, and by the time Arnold's second version was topping the charts, the author was past 60 and partly forgotten; most listeners assumed Arnold had written it. 

By the end of the 1950s, Owens was retired from Hollywood. Now past 60, he'd seen his oldest daughter, Laura Lee, embark on a successful career as the first female vocalist ever hired by Wills. He and his wife moved to Baden, Texas in 1960, and it was there that Owens died of a heart attack in 1962 at the age of 70. He was buried in Franklin Cemetery in Robertson County. Nine years later, in 1971, Owens was posthumously inducted into the Nashville Songwriters' Hall of Fame in recognition of his work as a composer.

(Edited from AllMusic & Wikipedia)

Junior Walker born 14 June 1931

Junior Walker (June 14, 1931 – November 23, 1995), was an American multi-instrumentalist (primarily saxophonist) and vocalist who recorded for Motown during the 1960s. He also performed as a session and live-performing saxophonist with the band Foreigner during the 1980s. 

Walker was born Autry DeWalt Mixon Jr. in Blytheville, Arkansas, but grew up in South Bend, Indiana. He began playing saxophone while in high school, and his saxophone style was the anchor for the sound of the bands he later played in. His career started when he developed his own band in the mid-1950s as the Jumping Jacks. His longtime friend and drummer Billy Nicks (1935–2017) formed his own group, the Rhythm Rockers. Periodically, Nicks would sit in on Jumping Jack's shows, and Walker would sit in on the Rhythm Rockers shows. 

Nicks obtained a permanent gig at a local TV station in South Bend, Indiana, and asked Walker to join him and keyboard player Fred Patton permanently. Nicks asked Willie Woods (1936–1997), a local singer, to perform with the group; Woods would learn how to play guitar. When Nicks was drafted into the United States Army, Walker convinced the band to move from South Bend to Battle Creek, Michigan. While performing in Benton Harbor, Walker found a drummer, Tony Washington, to replace Nicks. Eventually, Fred Patton left the group, and Victor Thomas stepped in. The original name, The Rhythm Rockers, was changed to "The All Stars." Walker's style was inspired by jump blues and early R&B, particularly players like Louis Jordan, Earl Bostic, and Illinois Jacquet. 

The group was spotted by Johnny Bristol, and in 1961 he recommended them to Harvey Fuqua, who had his own record labels. Once the group started recording on the Harvey label, their name was changed to Jr. Walker & the All Stars. The name was modified again when Fuqua's labels were taken over by Motown's Berry Gordy, and Jr. Walker & the All Stars became members of the Motown family, recording for their Soul imprint in 1964. 

                                    

The members of the band changed after the acquisition of the Harvey label. Tony Washington, the drummer, quit the group, and James Graves joined. Their first and signature hit was "Shotgun", written and composed by Walker and produced by Berry Gordy, which featured the Funk Brothers' James Jamerson on bass and Benny Benjamin on drums. "Shotgun" reached No. 4 on the Billboard Hot 100 and No. 1 on the R&B chart in 1965, and was followed by many other hits, such as "(I'm a) Road Runner", "Shake and Fingerpop" and remakes of two Motown songs "Come See About Me" and "How Sweet It Is (To Be Loved by You)", that had previously been hits for the Supremes and Marvin Gaye respectively. In 1966, Graves left and was replaced by old cohort Billy "Stix" Nicks, and Walker's hits continued apace with tunes such as "Pucker Up Buttercup". 

In 1969, the group had another hit enter the top 5, "What Does It Take (To Win Your Love)". A Motown quality control meeting rejected this song for single release, but radio station DJs made the track popular, resulting in Motown releasing it as a single, whereupon it reached No. 4 on the Hot 100 and No. 1 on the R&B chart. From that time on, Walker sang more on the records than earlier in their career. He toured the UK in 1970 with drummer Jerome Teasley, guitarist Phil Wright, keyboardist Sonny Holley and the youthful Liverpool UK bassist Norm Bellis . The band played two venues on each of the 14 nights. The finale was at The Valbonne in London's West End. They were joined on stage by The Four Tops for an impromptu set. He landed several more R&B Top Ten hits over the next few years, with the last coming in 1972. 

In 1979, Walker went solo, disbanding the All Stars, and was signed to Norman Whitfield's Whitfield Records label, but he was not as successful on his own as he had been with the All Stars in his Motown period. Walker re-formed the All Stars in the 1980s. On April 11, 1981, Walker was the musical guest on the season finale of Saturday Night Live. Foreigner's 1981 album 4 featured Walker's sax solo on "Urgent". He later recorded his own version of the song for the 1983 All Stars's album Blow the House Down. Walker's version was also featured in the 1985 Madonna film Desperately Seeking Susan. In 1983, Walker was re-signed with Motown. In the same year, he appeared as a part of the Motown 25 television special which aired on May 16, 1983. 

Unfortunately, in 1993 his activities were severely curtailed by cancer, which claimed his life on November 23, 1995. In the wake of his death. He is buried in Oak Hill Cemetery in Battle Creek under a marker inscribed with both his birth name of Autry DeWalt Mixon Jr. and his stage name. 

(Edited from Wikipedia) 

 

Bob McGrath born 13 June 1932

Robert Emmett McGrath (June 13, 1932 – December 4, 2022) was an American actor, singer, and children's author best known for playing original human character and music teacher Bob Johnson on the educational television series Sesame Street from 1969 to 2016. 

McGrath was born in Ottawa, Illinois, the son of Flora Agnes (née Hallagan) and Edmund Thomas McGrath, a farmer He was named for the Irish patriot Robert Emmet. As a child he sang for his family while his mother played the piano. His mother enrolled him in the Roxy Theater's Amateur Program and he finished in second place. He graduated from Marquette High School. 

McGrath graduated from the University of Michigan in 1954; he went to the school of music there. He was a member of the University of Michigan Men's Glee Club and the fraternity of Phi Gamma Delta. During fraternity events he washed dishes while David Connell, a fraternity brother, waited tables, a connection Connell used when Sesame Street casting began. After graduating, McGrath was inducted into the U.S. Army; he was in Germany for two years performing for the Seventh Army Symphony Orchestra and booking for them. 

McGrath earned a Master of Music degree in voice from the Manhattan School of Music in 1959. McGrath worked with Mitch Miller and was the featured tenor on Miller's NBC-TV television singalong series Sing Along with Mitch for four seasons from 1960 to 1964. He was a singer on the Walt Kelly album Songs of the Pogo. In the mid-1960s, McGrath became a recording artist in Japan, releasing a series of successful albums of Irish and other folk songs and ballads sung in Japanese. This aspect of his career was the basis of his "secret" when he appeared on the game shows To Tell the Truth in 1966 and I've Got a Secret in 1967. 

                                   

From 1969 to 2016, McGrath was a regular cast member on Sesame Street, playing Bob Johnson. Along with series matriarch Susan Robinson, played by Loretta Long, McGrath was one of the two longest-lasting human characters on the series since the show's debut. A Noggin segment proclaimed the four decades of Bob when promoting Sesame Street on that network. In July 2016, Sesame Workshop announced that McGrath would not return to the show for its 47th season because it would be retooling the series, but that McGrath would continue to represent the Workshop at public events. 

Sesame Workshop later announced that there would be talks to bring him back and that he would still represent Sesame Street. Although McGrath had not been in any new material since season 45, he subsequently appeared in online videos for the show. He also returned for the 2019 TV special Sesame Street's 50th Anniversary Celebration. McGrath said that his two favorite moments on Sesame Street were Christmas Eve on Sesame Street (a 1978 Christmas special that included a pastiche of "The Gift of the Magi") and the 1983 sequence that candidly addressed the death of longtime character Mr. Hooper, played by his friend Will Lee, who had died the previous year. 

For 38 years, McGrath was a regular fixture on Telemiracle, a telethon broadcast annually on CTV outlets in the Canadian province of Saskatchewan. His final regular appearance at Telemiracle was in 2015, where performers at the show paid tribute to him. He returned for a special appearance in 2018. On March 3, 2006, he was awarded the Commemorative Medal for the Centennial of Saskatchewan for this work by Lieutenant Governor of Saskatchewan Lynda Haverstock. He was given the Saskatchewan Distinguished Service Award in 2013 by the Premier of Saskatchewan, Brad Wall. 

He received a Distinguished Service Award for his decades of service by the Variety Children's Charity Telethon in British Columbia. McGrath wrote many children's books, including Uh Oh! Gotta Go! (1996) and OOPS! Excuse Me Please! (1998). In 1995, he was awarded a grant from the Foundation for Contemporary Arts Grants to Artists Award.

McGrath's Sing Me a Story was nominated for the 7th Annual Independent Music Awards for children's Album of the Year. On April 10, 2010 he was the first recipient of the University of Michigan Men's Glee Club Lifetime Achievement Award. 

McGrath and his wife Ann married in 1958. They had five children and eight grandchildren. The couple lived in Teaneck, New Jersey, from 1958 until 2017, after which they moved to a ranch in Norwood, New Jersey. McGrath died from complications of a stroke at his home in Norwood on December 4, 2022, at the age of 90. 

(Edited from Wikipedia)

 

Geri Allen born 12 June 1957

Geri Antoinette Allen (June 12, 1957 – June 27, 2017) was an American jazz pianist, composer, and educator who was dedicated to the advancement of women in jazz. She taught at the University of Michigan and the University of Pittsburgh. 

Fortunately for music-making, creators emerge in every generation who balance deep understanding of the evolution of their art with a fearless relish for changing the rules moment by moment in restless working lives – and by doing so, change the game for their successors. Geri Allen was one of those. 

Geri was born in Pontiac, Michigan, and raised in Detroit. Her father, Mount Allen Jr, was a school principal, her mother, Barbara, a government administrator in the defence industry. She learned the piano from the age of seven, and by her early teens had decided to be a jazz pianist. At Cass technical school, in Detroit, she studied with the free-thinking trumpeter Marcus Belgrave, and in 1979 was one of the first graduates of the new jazz course at Howard University, directed by the hard-bop trumpet star Donald Byrd. Allen studied with the mainstream-to-bop piano virtuoso Kenny Barron in New York, and then pursued an ethnomusicology degree at Pittsburgh, studying with the saxophonist and academic Nathan Davis, and the acclaimed Ghanaian musicologist Joseph Hanson Kwabena Nketia. 

                                    

                         Here’s “Stoned Love” from above album.

Graduating in 1982, Allen returned to New York to immerse herself in the M-Base collective, imaginatively contributing to Steve Coleman’s debut album Motherland Pulse in the process. In the late 1980s, she began her rich association with Haden and Motian, took up the synthesiser in the album Open on All Sides in the Middle, worked with a variety of prominent soloists including the saxophonists Arthur Blythe, Dewey Redman and Wayne Shorter, and the trumpeter Woody Shaw, and played with the rock group Living Colour. 

In 1993, she accompanied Carter, and the following year recorded Ornette Coleman’s Sound Museum albums – the first pianist in over 35 years that he had worked with. In 1995, she married a regular playing partner, the trumpeter Wallace Roney. They later had a daughter and a son but the marriage ended in divorce. 

In 1996 Allen was awarded the Jazzpar Prize. She continued to be a prolific contributor to contemporary music as a composer, as the leader of a succession of diverse recording projects, and eventually as an inspiring teacher. In 2004, she made the dynamic trio album The Life of a Song, with Dave Holland and Jack DeJohnette, and also shared the antics of the Scottish drummer Tom Bancroft’s surreal Orchestro Interrupto band on tour. In 2006, she composed the jazz suite For the Healing of the Nations as a tribute to 9/11 victims and survivors, and contributed to Lisa Gay Hamilton’s prizewinning documentary Beah: A Black Woman Speaks. In 2008 she received a Guggenheim fellowship. 

In 2011, Allen released an astonishing sequence of albums, beginning with the flat-out dance-inspired Timeline Live, featuring the explosive percussion input of the young tapdancing phenomenon Maurice Chestnut. Later that year came Flying Toward the Sound – a solo homage to pianists from Cecil Taylor to Hancock and Monk that Allen had composed during her Guggenheim fellowship – and then the Christmas album A Child Is Born(2011) . Two years later, in the kind of double-taking contrast the pianist had sprung on listeners throughout her career, Allen made the Motown tribute Grand River Crossings (2013), bringing her own vision to classic songs by such musicians as Stevie Wonder and Marvin Gaye. 

Allen was a longtime resident of Montclair, New Jersey. For 10 years she taught jazz and improvisational studies at the University of Michigan, and she became director of the jazz studies program at the University of Pittsburgh in 2013. 

Allen died on June 27, 2017, two weeks after her 60th birthday, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, after suffering from cancer. 

(Edited from John Fordham’s obit @ the Guardian & Wikipedia) 

 

Shelly Manne born 11 June 1920

Sheldon "Shelly" Manne (June 11, 1920 – September 26, 1984) was an American jazz drummer. Most frequently associated with West Coast jazz, he was known for his versatility and also played in a number of other styles, including Dixieland, swing, bebop, avant-garde jazz, and later fusion. 

Sheldon Manne was born in New York City. Originally a saxophonist, Manne switched to drums when he was 18, following in the footsteps of his uncles and his father Max. He was influenced by swing drummer Jo Jones and was tutored by Broadway percussionist Billy Gladstone. Manne got work almost immediately with the Bobby Byrne Orchestra in 1940 and Joe Marsala's band (making his recording debut in 1941). He also briefly served in the big bands of Will Bradley, Raymond Scott, and Les Brown and played drums on Coleman Hawkins' classic "The Man I Love" session of 1943. 

Manne worked on and off with Stan Kenton (1946-1952), toured with Jazz at the Philharmonic (1948-1949), and gigged with Woody Herman (1949). After leaving Kenton, hemoved to Los Angeles and became the most in-demand of all jazz drummers, playing on recordings by Chet Baker, Jack Montrose, Stan Getz, Pete Rugolo, Jimmy Giuffre, Teddy Charles, Stan Kenton, Shorty Rogers, and many more. He served as Barney Kessel's drummer from 1954-1960 and played on recordings by Lena Horne and Peggy Lee. 

He began his recording career as a bandleader with 1952's Here's That Manne and in 1953 assembled Shelly Manne & His Men to cut a pair of eponymous LPs for Les Koenig's Contemporary label. The ever-evolving band issued a long string of recordings on Contemporary the label (1955-1962) including the classic, four-volume At the Black Hawk series (a fifth volume was released posthumously in 1991). Among Manne's sidemen were Stu Williamson, Conte Candoli, Charlie Mariano, Herb Geller, Bill Holman, Jimmy Giuffre, and many, many others. 

                                   

Manne had the good fortune to lead the recording date Modern Jazz Performances of Songs from My Fair Lady (with pianist André Previn and bassist Leroy Vinnegar. The drummer's open musical mind resulted in fairly free pieces on The Three and the Two (trios with Shorty Rogers and Jimmy Giuffre that did not have a piano or bass, along with duets with Russ Freeman), and, in 1959, played on sessions by traditionalist Benny Goodman and vanguardist Ornette Coleman. In sum, he was nearly ubiquitous during the '50s. 

Manne appeared on many film and television soundtracks and even acted in The Man with the Golden Arm. He worked with Henry Mancini very closely; Manne's seamless combinations of jazz, pop, and classical music worked well in his scores. Some of the scores he played include Breakfast at Tiffany's (1961), Hatari! (1962), and The Pink Panther (1963). He collaborated with Mancini for television as well, orchestrating the Peter Gunn series (1958-1961) and Mr. Lucky (1959-1960). Besides Mancini, Manne performed on movie soundtracks and TV shows featuring music by Elmer Bernstein, Rugolo, John Williams, and on the film soundtrack for Leonard Bernstein's West Side Story in 1961. That year, Manne wrote and recorded the score for The Proper Time. 

In 1960, the drummer founded the popular jazz club Shelly's Manne Hole and ran it until 1974. In 1962 he played on seminal recordings by Jack Sheldon (Out), Peggy Lee (Bewitching-Lee), Barney Kessel (Let's Cook!), and Art Pepper (The Artistry of Pepper). In 1964 he released My Fair Lady with the Un-Original Cast. Manne kept his music open to freer sounds. He worked with Junior Mance, Howard Roberts, and Lalo Schifrin. In 1966, Shelly Manne & His Men issued the charting Boss Sounds on Atlantic, and in 1967 he played on albums by Frank Zappa (Lumpy Gravy), and released Jazz Gunn and Daktari. For the remainder of the decade, Manne was almost too busy. In 1968, in addition to backing composer/pianist Michel Legrand at Shelly's Manne Hole, he appeared on Bud Shank's iconic Plays the Music and Arrangements of Michel LeGrand: Windmills of Your Mind.

In 1971, Manne released Alive in London, showcasing a very electric quintet. In 1972, he played on saxophonist John Klemmer's pre-fusion album Constant Throb.  In 1976 he played on more than ten albums including Pepper's The Living Legend, Art Farmer's On the Road, and the eponymous offering The Three with Joe Sample and Ray Brown. From 1976-1978, Manne played in Lew Tabakin's band on several albums. In 1979, he released French Concert featuring Lee Konitz and The Manne We Love, his final album by Shelly Manne & His Men. 

Manne continued to be active on the studio scene until his death on September 9, 1984 from a sudden heart attack, two weeks after he was honored by the City of Los Angeles in conjunction with the Hollywood Arts Council; they declared September 9 "Shelly Manne Day." 

(Edited mainly from AllMusic bio by Thom Jurek)

Arelean Brown born 10 June 1924

Arelean Brown (10 June 1924 – 27 April 1981) was a blues singer and songwriter who who started her career in Detroit in the late 1940s. She enjoyed local hit with her witty I'm a streaker in 1974. 

I came cross Arelean when I found her only compilation album, but when I tried to do some research about her, I came up with next to nothing. Hopefully with the very scarce information I could find, at least she has a mention. What made things more difficult was that she was known under two other differently spelt names which were Arlean and Arlene. 

Born in Tchula, Mississippi to the Rev. John Brown and Maggie Brown, she was nicknamed “piggy” as a child.  She came from a big family with six sisters and seven brothers with a fistful of talented musicians- particularly her half-brother Lee Shot Williams-Brown who suffered career falters in Detroit before she arrived in Chicago in 1953 with her ten-year-old son. Her other brothers Tommie J. Brown played drums in St. Louis while George Brown played lead with Howlin’ Wolf for 8 years. 

For nearly two decades, she drove a cab and ran a corner grocery store on the west side, appearing infrequently on stage before being asked to join Simmons' Revue as a featured vocalist in the early 1970's. She became friends with Little Mack Simmons for whom she recorded a handful of 45s backed by first rate Chicago musicians like Lonnie Brooks, L.V. Johnson and Scotty & The Rib Tips. Arelean Brown was already 46 years old by the time she issued her first single, and it blew the doors off nearly any release by anyone in her tier of south side club denizens. 

                                    

Although she had to make a living outside music Arelean managed to play regularly in Chicago clubs and even tour the Southern States. Here’s a positive review from Darkside Records and by this time she was in her early 50’s...“A commanding vocalist, Arelean had the power to sound both tough and tender, often within a single line. She wasn't singing about the blues - she was living them, twisting everyday heartaches and hard-won wisdom into songs that shimmered with personality and pain. 

Her delivery was theatrical yet sincere, humorous yet harrowing. And like all great blueswomen before her - think Big Mama Thornton, Koko Taylor, and Bessie Smith - she didn't just perform, she testified. Fierce, funky, and full of fire, her only album, a 1977 compilation of her earlier hits captures a powerhouse Chicago blueswoman at her raw, unfiltered best.” 

Her untimely death from cancer in Chicago 27 April 1981 prevented her to make more records and tour Europe where her singles were high praised with blues audiences. She was 57 years old. 

(Edited from Darkside Records, Sleve notes, Steve Hoffman Music Forums also Gérard Herzhaft @ Blue Eye for filling in the gaps)

Skip James born 9 June 1902

"Skip" James (June 9, 1902 – October 3, 1969) was an American Delta blues singer, guitarist, pianist and songwriter. 

Nehemiah Curtis James was born on June 9, 1902, in a segregated hospital near Bentonia, Mississippi His mother Phyllis worked as a cook and babysitter on the Woodbine Plantation, which was 15 miles south of Yazoo City. His father Eddie James, a bootlegger who was described as a "local lowlife" by Stephen Calt, left the family around 1907. He later reformed and became a preacher. As a youth, James heard local musicians, such as Henry Stuckey, from whom he learned to play the guitar, and the brothers Charlie and Jesse Sims. His mother bought him a $2.50 guitar, which was his first instrument. James later began playing the organ in his teens. He later left Bentonia in 1919, and began working on road construction and levee-building crews in Mississippi in the early 1920s, and wrote what is perhaps his earliest song, "Illinois Blues", about his experiences as a laborer. He began playing the guitar in open D-minor tuning. 

For most of the 1920s, James worked a series of illicit jobs, such as bootlegging, gambling, and procuring. In 1929, he met a local musician named Johnny Temple, who became his first protégé. The 23 year old Temple learned how to play in cross-note tuning, which was then unknown to musicians who were from the Jackson area, and also attempted to copy James' high falsetto voice, until he advised Temple to sing in his natural voice. James also operated a music school for would-be blues musicians in Jackson, giving lessons on guitar, piano, and even violin. 

James continued working locally as a street singer. In early 1931, James auditioned for the record shop owner and talent scout H. C. Speir in Jackson, Mississippi. Speir placed blues performers with various record labels, including Paramount Records. On the strength of this audition, James traveled to Grafton, Wisconsin, to record for Paramount. His 1931 records are considered idiosyncratic among prewar blues recordings and formed the basis of his reputation as a musician. 

As was typical of his era, James recorded various styles of music such as blues, spirituals, cover versions, and original compositions, frequently blurring the lines between genres and sources. For example, "I'm So Glad" was derived from a 1927 song, "So Tired", by Art Sizemore and George A. Little, recorded in 1928 by Gene Austin and by Lonnie Johnson (Johnson's version was entitled "I'm So Tired of Livin' All Alone"). James's biographer Stephen Calt, echoing the opinion of several music critics, considered the finished product totally original, "one of the most extraordinary examples of fingerpicking found in guitar music". 

                                   

Several other recordings from the Grafton session, such as "Hard Time Killing Floor Blues", "Devil Got My Woman", "Jesus Is a Mighty Good Leader", and "22-20 Blues" (the basis of Robert Johnson's better-known "32-20 Blues"), have been similarly influential. Very few original copies of James's Paramount 78 rpm records have survived. 

Skip with Son House

The Great Depression struck just as James's recordings were hitting the market. Sales were poor as a result, and he gave up performing the blues to become the choir director in his father's church. James was later an ordained minister in Baptist and Methodist churches, but the extent of his involvement in religious activities is unknown. For the next thirty-three years, James made no known recordings and performed sporadically. He was virtually unknown to the general public. Blues singer and guitarist Big Joe Williams believed that James had already passed, having been murdered in Mississippi. In 1964, blues enthusiasts John Fahey, Bill Barth, and Henry Vestine found him in a hospital in Tunica, Mississippi. According to Calt, the "rediscovery" of both James and Son House at virtually the same time was the start of the blues revival in the United States. 

In July 1964, James and other rediscovered musicians appeared at the Newport Folk Festival. Several photographs by the blues promoter Dick Waterman captured this performance, James's first in over 30 years. James subsequently recorded for Takoma Records, Melodeon Records, and Vanguard Records and performed at various engagements until his death from cancer on October 3, 1969, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, at the age of 67. 

The British rock band Cream recorded "I'm So Glad", which provided James with $10,000 in royalties, the only windfall of his career. Only 15 copies of James' original shellac 78 recordings are still in existence, and have become extremely sought after by collectors. James was honored with a marker on the Mississippi Blues Trail in Bentonia, his hometown. In 2020, James' song "Devil Got My Woman" was added to the Grammy Hall of Fame 

(Edited from Wikipedia)