Henry Thomas born 1874

Henry Thomas (1874 – 1930?) was an American country blues singer, songster and musician. Although his recording career, in the late 1920s, was brief, Thomas influenced performers including Bob Dylan, Taj Mahal, the Lovin' Spoonful, the Grateful Dead, and Canned Heat. Often billed as "Ragtime Texas", Thomas's style is an early example of what later became known as Texas blues guitar. 

Thomas was born into a family of freed slaves in Big Sandy, Texas, in 1874. He began traveling the Texas railroad lines as a hobo after leaving home in his teens. He eventually earned his way as an itinerant songster, entertaining local populaces as well as railway employees. 

He recorded 24 sides for Vocalion Records between 1927 and 1929, 23 of which were released. They include reels, gospel songs, minstrel songs, ragtime numbers, and blues. Besides guitar, Thomas accompanied himself on quills, a folk instrument fabricated from cane reeds whose sound is similar to the zampona played by musicians in Peru and Bolivia. His style of playing guitar was probably derived from banjo-picking styles. 

                                    

His life and career after his last recordings in 1929 have not been chronicled. Although the blues researcher Mack McCormick stated that he saw a man in Houston in 1949 who met Thomas's description, most biographers indicate that Thomas died in 1930, when he would have been 55 or 56 years old. 

Thomas's legacy has been sustained by his songs, which were revived by musicians beginning in the folk music revival of the early 1960s. Among the first of these was "Honey, Won't You Allow Me One More Chance", which was reinterpreted by Bob Dylan on the album The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan in 1963 under the title "Honey, Just Allow Me One More Chance". Dylan reworked the melody and almost totally rewrote the lyrics, but he credited Thomas as co-writer. Thomas's song "Fishing Blues" was recorded by the folk-rock group the Lovin' Spoonful in 1965, for their hit debut album Do You Believe in Magic. The song was also recorded by Jim Keskin, John Martyn, and the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band. "Don't Ease Me In" was covered by the Grateful Dead on their first single in 1966, and on their album Go to Heaven. 

"Bull-Doze Blues" was reworked by the pianist Johnny Miller in 1927, who rewrote the words and gave it to Wingy Manone, who recorded two versions titled "Up the Country" in December 1927 for Columbia and September 1930 for Champion Records. Except in jazz circles, it remained an obscure blues number until blues-rock group Canned Heat recorded "Going Up the Country". Though rearranged, the Canned Heat song is musically the same, down to a faithful rendition of Thomas's quill solos by Jim Horn. The lyrics also borrow from Blind Willie McTell's "Statesboro Blues" (1928). Fellow band member Alan "Blind Owl" Wilson rewrote the lyrics entirely and received credit on the song's original release in 1968 on Canned Heat's third album, Living the Blues. In 2023, "Bull Doze Blues" was featured in Martin Scorsese's film Killers of the Flower Moon in an early scene where the Osage community is having their pictures taken. 

(Edited from Wikipedia)

 

Could this be Henry Thomas / Ragtime Texas? Courtesy of Axel Küstner, a 1931 silent film, at 56:30 there's a musician in Maxwell Street market, who is perhaps working with the war-bonneted 'Indian' as a medicine show.

There is a high likelihood that this is Henry Thomas. How many people played guitar and panpipes on a rack? (Here his panpipes are in some sort of decorated wooden or cardboard container.) He recorded in Chicago on four occasions between 1927 and 1929, which suggests that Chicago was his home or at least his "home base." He plays the guitar with a fast strumming technique, is capoed rather high up the neck (4th fret), and plays in G position of standard tuning, using his ring finger to alternate between the first and third strings at the third fret - all characteristics of Henry Thomas's playing. He appears to be around 50 years old, which would conform with what Mack McCormick reported about Thomas, though I myself have some degree of doubt that McCormick really identified the man. Anyway, just from the recorded repertoire and style, it's likely that Thomas was born in the 1880s if not earlier. I'm 99% certain it's Henry Thomas. Amazing! (David Evans)