Wednesday, August 31, 2011

R. I. P DAVID 'HONEYBOY' EDWARDS



From The Huffington Post:
CHICAGO -- Grammy-winning Blues musician David "Honey Boy" Edwards, believed to be the oldest surviving Delta bluesman and whose roots stretched back to blues legend Robert Johnson, died early Monday in his Chicago home, his manager said. He was 96.
....

Born in 1915 in Shaw, Miss., Edwards learned the guitar growing up and started playing professionally at age 17 in Memphis.

He came to Chicago in the 1940s and played on Maxwell Street, small clubs and street corners. By the 1950s Edwards had played with almost every bluesman of note - including Howlin' Wolf, Little Walter, Charlie Patton and Muddy Waters. Among Edwards' hit songs were "Long Tall Woman Blues," "Gamblin Man" and "Just Like Jesse James."
....

"Blues ain't never going anywhere," Edwards told The Associated Press in 2008. "It can get slow, but it ain't going nowhere. You play a lowdown dirty shame slow and lonesome, my mama dead, my papa across the sea I ain't dead but I'm just supposed to be blues. You can take that same blues, make it uptempo, a shuffle blues, that's what rock `n' roll did with it. So blues ain't going nowhere. Ain't goin' nowhere."

Edwards won a 2008 Grammy for traditional blues album and received a Grammy Lifetime Achievement award in 2010. His death represents the loss of the last direct link to the first generation.
Another one of the old timers gone. Honeyboy's right. Blues ain't going nowhere.

Play the blues in heaven, Honeyboy. Play the blues for us who are left behind.

7 comments:

  1. OT: Another David (a/k/a Dah-Veed) mentioned on Anglican Down Under the other day that he is undergoing some sort of cardiac procedure tomorrow morning. Please keep him in your prayers.

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  2. Completely off topic, but in case I never comment again: apparently my blog has been stolen.

    If you try to access it (or at least if I do), I get a "blogrolling.com" page that says Tucows.com "owns" my domain name. Funny, I thought it was owned by Google.

    Anyway, I'm not sure what's happened, but if you never hear from me again, you'll know it wasn't my doing.

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  3. Paul Powers, thanks for letting me know. I'll post a prayer request for David (Dah-veed).

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  4. Rmj, that's exactly what happened when I tried to access your blog. WTF? I didn't think things like that could happen. I hope you can solve the problem soon.

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  5. I did solve it. Left over code from long ago which I never removed.

    I am a blogging luddite, and not to be allowed anything sharper than a virtual rubber ball on-line.

    All fixed now. Keep calm and carry on.

    Or something.

    Sorry for the interruption.

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  6. Rmj, you owe me. All I had to do was say the word.

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  7. I owe you for a lot of reasons, Mimi.

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