Alvin Youngblood Hart
Alvin Youngblood Hart (* 2. March 1963 in Oakland , California ) is an American Blues - musician from Memphis , Tennessee . Hart plays acoustic and electric guitars , as well as banjo and mandolin . His nickname Youngblood refers to his Indian ancestors.
Alvin Youngblood Hart is considered to be one of the most important interpreters of country blues of his generation, although his recordings have always exceeded the boundaries of the genre and shown stylistic diversity. As a child, Hart came to the Delta Blues through his music-making parents and grandparents . He developed his guitar playing based on his parents' blues record collection and the recordings of Jimi Hendrix and the Rolling Stones . His music, which is nourished by all American musical traditions, he himself now calls Hard Americana .
With his debut album Big Mama's Door , which was released by Sony Music in 1996 on the Okeh Records label , Hart received positive reviews from the trade press and from musician colleagues such as Taj Mahal and Eric Clapton . In the following year, Hart was honored with the WC Handy Award as best newcomer .
The successor Territory , with which Hart already moved away from pure acoustic country blues and expanded his stylistic range to include country , ska and rock, was voted album of the year by the US music magazines Down Beat and Living Blues . He also received the Living Blues Award for best guitarist that year , and in 2004 for best guitarist and singer. With Start With The Soul , Hart went a step further and made it clear with soul and southern rock elements that he does not want to be pigeonholed in a stylistic drawer. The New York Times voted the CD among the ten best records of 2000. The British BBC named it Blues record of the year.
Hart returned to acoustic country blues for the album Down In The Alley . Here he interpreted the blues of his role models Bukka White , Leadbelly , Charlie Patton , Skip James and Sleepy John Estes on restored instruments and published the result as a monophonic recording. The album was nominated in 2003 for the Grammy Award for Best Traditional Blues Album ( Best Traditional Blues Recording ).
In 2003 Hart founded the band project JoB Cain , in which Audley Freed from the Black Crowes participated. The band developed a harder guitar blues rock that was expressed on Hart's following album Motivational Speaker .
Hart performs both solo and with his band Muscle Theory . Occasionally he can also be found on stages in Germany. Alvin Youngblood Hart lives in Memphis, Tennessee, USA.
Discography
- Big Mama's Door (Okeh / Sony Music 1996)
- Territory (Hannibal Records / Rykodisc 1998)
- Start With The Soul (Hannibal Records / Rykodisc 2000)
- Down In The Alley (Memphis International Records 2002)
- Motivational Speaker (Tone Cool Records / Artemis 2005)
Web links
Individual evidence
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Hart, Alvin Youngblood |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | American blues musician |
| DATE OF BIRTH | March 2, 1963 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Oakland , California |