Robert Johnson (blues musician)

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Robert Leroy Johnson (born May 8, 1911 as Robert Leroy Dodds in Hazlehurst , Mississippi , † August 16, 1938 in Greenwood , Mississippi) was an American blues musician. He is considered one of the most famous guitarists , singers and songwriters in the history of the blues . In reference to the Mississippi Delta , he is also called the King of the Delta Blues .

His influence on other guitarists began during his lifetime. After his early death and a lively legend about his talent as a guitarist, he was only known to blues collectors and musicians. Even then, other blues musicians recorded pieces by Robert Johnson, but did not always name Johnson as the author. Sometimes Johnson's pieces were simply referred to as traditionals . Johnson became known to a wide white audience in 1961 with the release of the album King of the Delta Blues Singers . From then on, many blues- and rock-oriented bands such as Cream and The Rolling Stones played pieces by Johnson at concerts and in the studio. Guitarists like Eric Clapton or Keith Richards called his style an essential inspiration for their music careers. Today Johnson is considered the most influential guitarist and songwriter of the Delta Blues.

In 1980 he was inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame . Rolling Stone's David Fricke placed Johnson 5th on his list of the 100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time in 2004. He ranks 71st in the regular list.

Life

Childhood and youth

The Dockery Plantation , on which Robert Johnson et al. a. Charley Patton and Son House met

Robert Johnson was born in Hazlehurst as Robert Leroy Dodds to Julia Ann Dodds, nee Majors, and her lover Noah Johnson . He had a total of eleven older half-siblings on his mother's side, including a pair of twins who had already died in childbirth. His grandparents were born slave children.

His mother was actually married to Charles Dodds, who had injured a white man in a fight before Robert was born and fled a lynch mob to Memphis, where he changed his name from Dodds to Spencer. Around 1914, Robert's mother moved her son to Memphis to live with her husband, where they adopted his new name. A few years later she left her husband and left Robert with him. Robert didn't have a very good relationship with his stepfather, who hit him often. Then around 1918 Dodds / Spencer sent him back to his mother, who had meanwhile married Willie "Dusty" Willis. When his mother explained to him as a teenager who his birth father was, Robert changed his last name from Spencer to Johnson.

With his mother and stepfather, Robert moved to Robinsonville , about 30 kilometers from Memphis, in 1918 , where he also went to school until 1927. There he attended the Indian Creek School in Commerce from 1924 to 1927 . It is believed that his early school leaving was related to an eye condition; he may have had a cataract in his left eye . His half-sister Carrie said she bought him glasses, but he rarely wore them. After finishing school, Johnson initially worked as a plantation worker.

Musical beginnings

Robert Johnson: Terraplane Blues , 1936 ( Info ):

Robert Johnson has played the harmonica since childhood . As a teenager he bought his first guitar and also built a stand for the harmonica so that he could play both instruments at the same time. One of the first pieces he learned to play the guitar was Leroy Carr's How Long - How Long Blues .

In 1928 Johnson met the blues musician Willie Brown , then known in the Mississippi Delta, in Robinsonville , who was the sideman of Charley Patton , the "father of the Delta Blues". Brown became Johnson's first guitar teacher, and occasionally Johnson followed Patton and Brown to appearances in which he sought to improve his playing by watching.

In February 1929 Johnson married Virginia Travis, who died in childbirth with the child on April 19, 1930. In 1929 the blues musician Son House had also arrived in Robinsonville, and he soon played frequently with Patton and Brown. House's simple but intense style impressed Johnson, who, however, found no connection with the trio; There is a record of a statement by Son House that Johnson was a bad guitarist but a passable blues harp player. Often, however, Johnson was the target of ridicule among the three. At the time, Johnson played with Frank House (the brother of Son House) and pianist Punk Taylor, as well as Wash Hemp and Willie Moore. He left Robinsonville in 1931.

In search of his father he went to Hazlehurst and on the trip met his second wife Caletta "Callie" Craft, whom he married in 1931, and the blues musician Ike Zimmerman , who was an excellent guitarist and taught him during the year of traveling together . In 1932 Johnson returned to Robinsonville and surprised with an excellent guitar technique for which he would later become famous.

Intersection in Clarksdale, Mississippi, where Johnson is believed to have sold his soul to the devil

Since Johnson's guitar playing had improved so much in a short period of time, it was said that he had sold his soul to the devil and in return he had been instructed in the secrets of playing the guitar. This statement goes back to a statement by Son House, who transferred the legend originally attributed to Tommy Johnson to his namesake. Robert Johnson willingly adapted this legend and developed it into one of his central metaphors.

Over the next few years, Robert Johnson became a sought-after musician for Saturday night events in Mississippi.

Career as a musician

In 1934 Johnson came to the city of Helena in Arkansas on his now vagabond wanderings , where he met a number of blues musicians who were already well-known at the time. With his guitar playing there he impressed Sonny Boy Williamson II , Robert Nighthawk , Howlin 'Wolf and Memphis Slim . In 1936 the first recordings were made for the American Record Corporation . His first release, the Terraplane Blues , sold reasonably well (around 500 copies), so that Johnson was able to record more songs in a second recording session in 1937. However, all further publications were not granted commercial success; sometimes only double-digit sales figures were achieved. In total, Johnson recorded 29 songs in 41 takes in his two sessions.

death

Tombstone for Robert Johnson

Johnson died in August 1938 at the age of 27. The exact cause of death is unclear. There are different theories. According to a story going back to Sonny Boy Williamson II, he was poisoned by a jealous husband. Another theory is that he died of syphilis . Johnson was probably buried in a small cemetery in Three Forks; however, the tomb is not known. He is also occasionally included in the circle of well-known musicians called Club 27 who died at the age of 27. In Morgan City, Mississippi, there is a memorial stone to Robert Johnson that reads:

“Robert Johnson. 'King of the Delta Blues Singers.' His Music struck a chord that continues to resonate. His Blues adressed Generations he would never know and made Poetry of his Visions and Fears. "

Robert Johnson's fortune was only awarded to his only son Claud L. Johnson (born December 16, 1931 - June 30, 2015) in 1998.

plant

I Believe I'll Dust My Broom

Johnson's merit lies primarily in transforming the early blues music of Charlie Patton , Son House and Skip James ( Delta Blues ) into a new style, which was then picked up by musicians such as Muddy Waters and Elmore James . Unlike the songs of his contemporaries, his compositions were characterized by great unity. This resulted from the fact that Johnson composed his pieces specifically for the conditions of the shellac record, which offered a maximum playing time of three minutes per side. So far, country blues musicians had adapted the structure and structure of their pieces to appearances in juke joints and at parties, where volume and length counted; her recordings were mostly just excerpts from it, which were interrupted after three minutes.

Another peculiarity of Johnson's songs is that he sometimes moved with singing and guitar playing in different rhythms. This gave the impression that several people were playing. His singing style, which sometimes sounds almost crying and sometimes exulting, is atypical for the blues music of the time and makes his songs unmistakable. His guitar playing was always associated with singing, only in his first recorded song Kind Hearted Woman Blues he played a short guitar solo at the beginning of the piece. In the standard tuning of the guitar, he preferred the keys A and E; in open tunings ( open D tuning , open G tuning ), also called open tunings , he mostly used G and C. He held the respective dominant or subdominant either with an outstretched finger or with a glass or metal cylinder, which he held put over a finger of the left hand ( bottleneck technique).

Like many blues musicians of his time, he mainly dealt with everyday occurrences in his compositions. Several songs are about his wanderings, including the famous Walkin 'Blues . In it, Johnson reflected on his musical apprenticeship at Son House, alternating between a quiet and docile student game and the defiant own style. Other songs on this theme include the Traveling Riverside Blues and I'm a steady rollin 'man . His lyrics were inspired by everyday life and dealt with women (Kind Hearted Woman Blues , Little Queen of Spades) and money (Sweet Home Chicago) , but also with a handgun (32-20 Blues) or an automobile (Terraplane Blues, after the Hudson Terraplane ).

Johnson is considered to be an original songwriter, who was influenced by older musicians like Kokomo Arnold , Skip James , Peetie Wheatstraw , Lonnie Johnson and a. was inspired and left a multitude of blues classics that can be found in the repertoire of musicians as diverse as Eric Clapton , the Rolling Stones , Elmore James , Muddy Waters , but also the older Big Bill Broonzy , who wrote his version of in the 1950s Child-hearted Woman - just like Waters before him - took on. The 32-20 Blues is a variation of Skip James' 22-20 Blues , Kokomo Arnold's Old Original Kokomo Blues and Milk Cow Blues became Sweet Home Chicago and Milkcow's Calf Blues , respectively, and Peetie Wheatstraw's King Of Spades became the Little Queen Of Spades , Lonnie Johnson's Life Saver Blues can be found in Malted Milk and Drunken Hearted Man .

Recordings by Robert Johnson

Robert Johnson: Milkcow's Calf Blues , 1936 ( listen ? / I )Audio file / audio sample

1936

1937

  • Drunken Hearted Man *
  • From Four Till Late
  • Hellhound On My Trail
  • Honeymoon blues
  • I'm a steady rollin 'man
  • Little Queen of Spades *
  • Love in Vain *
  • Malted milk
  • Me and the Devil Blues *
  • Milkcow's Calf Blues *
  • Stones in My Passway
  • Stop Breakin 'Down Blues *
  • Traveling Riverside Blues

(*) there are alternative versions

effect

Robert Johnson is now considered one of the great icons of popular American culture. The spread of his songs and his appreciation began long after his death.

While Johnson had earned some respect from musicians like Howlin 'Wolf and Sonny Boy Williamson II during his playing days , his influence was little and was limited to musicians like Robert Lockwood Jr. , David Honeyboy Edwards and Johnny Shines . Johnson was hardly known to anyone in the Afro-American population and was known only to a few black blues musicians. Current research now rates it as almost insignificant at this point in time, especially when compared to musicians like Charley Patton , Blind Lemon Jefferson or Son House . Elijah Wald put it this way: “As far as the development of black music is concerned, Robert Johnson was an extremely insignificant figure, and very little of what happened in the decades after his death would have been any different if he had never at all would have played a note. "

Johnson remained completely unknown to the white American population during his lifetime; few specialists even knew his name. When one of them, John Hammond , wanted to win Robert Johnson for his concert evenings From Spirituals to Swing , he had to learn that he had died shortly before. The person Robert Johnson and his music were almost forgotten. It was not until the 1950s that his name began to gradually become better known among blues lovers and shellac record collectors.

Love in Vain

The first re-release of his music on the album King of the Delta Blues Singers (Columbia) in 1961 finally led to his rediscovery, albeit with a predominantly white audience; At this time the circumstances of his life and death were researched for the first time. With around 25,000 copies sold, the album was not a great success with the public; But it mainly reached young blues rock musicians, who then included some of Johnson's compositions in their repertoire (often, however, as in the case of the Rolling Stones, without specifying the original author). Musicians as diverse as Jimi Hendrix , Mike Bloomfield , John Fogerty and Bob Dylan cited these songs as an important inspiration, Keith Richards called him "the greatest folk blues guitarist who ever lived" and for Eric Clapton Robert Johnson is " the greatest singer, the greatest songwriter ”.

When Columbia published a collection of the complete recordings of Robert Johnson in 1990 and calculated a total print run of around 20 to 30 thousand copies, his music unexpectedly also caught on outside the specialist audience. The double CD sold over two million copies worldwide in 2006. In 1991 it was awarded a Grammy for Best Historical Album .

In addition to Clapton and Dylan, Robert Johnson inspired a variety of musical groups including Cream , Fleetwood Mac , Led Zeppelin , the Stones, Keb 'Mo' and others. Several tribute albums were also dedicated to the artist, including Clapton Me and Mr. Johnson ; by Peter Green Splinter Group - The Robert Johnson Songbook ; by John Hammond - At the Crossroads u. a.

When it was founded, Johnson was inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame in 1980, as were his songs "Sweet Home Chicago", "Cross Road Blues" and "Come on in My Kitchen" later. When Rolling Stone magazine listed the "Hundred Greatest Guitarists of All Time" in 2003, Robert Johnson was named fifth. Even a techno club named itself after Johnson (see Robert Johnson (Club) ).

His recordings, published on a total of twelve shellac records and originally badly sold, became extremely rare collector's items, of which today mostly only a double-digit number of copies exists. The total number of all remaining Robert Johnson shellac records is estimated at only 159 to 229. Collectors now pay more than $ 3,000 for these originals, a copy of Love in vain Blues / Preaching Blues , of which only ten copies remain, even fetched a price of $ 17,000.

There are only three photos that have been shown to actually depict Robert Johnson; two of them were first published in 1986 and 1989, respectively, and another, showing Johnson and his nephew in US Navy uniform, is unpublished in the private collection of Mack McCormick . In January 2007 a photo was offered on eBay in the United States for $ 795,000 allegedly showing Robert Johnson, but experts were skeptical about the authenticity of the image.

The American manufacturer of acoustic guitars , the Gibson Guitar Corporation , released a signature guitar in 2010 in honor of Robert Johnson , the Robert Johnson L-1 , a body shape that the artist always preferred during his lifetime.

The Rolling Stone listed Johnson 23rd of the 100 best songwriters and 71st of the 100 best guitarists of all time .

Recordings

  • The Complete Recordings (1990, Sony / Legacy 46222 2 CDs) (complete work edition including all alternative versions )

Movies & TV shows

  • Crossroads - Pact with the Devil , 1986
  • The Search for Robert Johnson , 1992
  • Can't You Hear the Wind Howl? The Life and Music of Robert Johnson , 1997
  • Hellhounds On My Trail: The Afterlife of Robert Johnson , 2000; Director: Robert Mugge
  • Supernatural (TV series): Crossroad Blues (Season 2, Episode 8) , 2006
  • Timeless (series TV): The King of the Delta Blues (Season 2, Episode 6), 2018

See also

literature

  • Bruce M. Conforth, Gale Dean Wardlow: Up jumped the devil: the real life of Robert Johnson , Chicago, Illinois: Chicago Review Press, [2019], ISBN 978-1-64160-094-1
  • Alan Greenberg, Stanley Crouch, Martin Scorsese: Love in Vain: A Vision of Robert Johnson ; Cambridge, Mass .: Da Capo Press, 2008, ISBN 0-306-80557-X
  • Peter Guralnick : Robert Johnson, Crossroads ; St. Andrä-Wierter: Hannibal, 1995, ISBN 3-85445-105-9
  • Peter Guralnick: Searching for Robert Johnson ; New York: Plume, 1998, ISBN 0-452-27949-6
  • Werner Gissing: Mississippi Delta Blues. Forms and texts by Robert Johnson (1911–1938) ; Graz: Academic Printing and Publishing Establishment, 1986, ISBN 3-201-01314-5
  • Stephen LaVere: Booklet accompanying Complete Recordings box set , Sony Music Entertainment, 1990
  • Barry Lee Pearson, Bill McCulloch: Robert Johnson: Lost and Found ; Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2003, ISBN 0-252-02835-X
  • Walter Mosley, Dietlind Kaiser: Mississippi Blues ; Munich: Goldmann, 2000, ISBN 3-442-44546-9
  • Robert Palmer: Deep Blues ; New York: Penguin Books, 1995, ISBN 0-14-006223-8
  • Robert Santelli: The Big Book Of Blues - A Biographical Encyclopedia ; New York: Penguin Books, 1993, ISBN 0-14-015939-8 , pp. 219-221
  • Patricia R. Schroeder: Robert Johnson, Mythmaking, and Contemporary American Culture ; Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2004, ISBN 0-252-02915-1
  • Elijah Wald: Escaping the Delta: Robert Johnson and the Invention of the Blues ; New York: Amistad, 2004, ISBN 0-06-052423-5
  • Robert Wolf: Hellhound on My Trail : The Life of Robert Johnson, Bluesman Extraordinaire ; Creative Co, 2004, ISBN 1-56846-146-1
  • Mezzo (d. I. Pascal Mesenburg), Jean-Michel Dupont: Love in Vain - Robert Johnson 1911-1938 ; Grenoble: Glénat 2014. Biography as a graphic novel (French). ISBN 978-2-344-00339-8

Web links

Commons : Robert Johnson  - Collection of Images, Videos and Audio Files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ whosampled.com
  2. ↑ Booklet of The Complete Recordings by Robert Johnson
  3. ^ Rollingstone.com
  4. ^ Rollingstone.com
  5. ^ The Associated Press : Claud Johnson, Son of Blues Singer, Dies at 83. In: The New York Times , July 1, 2015 (accessed July 2, 2015).
  6. ^ Claud L. Johnson (December 16, 1931 - June 30, 2015) In: Robert Johnson Blues Foundation, July 1, 2015 (English, accessed July 12, 2015).
  7. ^ Elijah Wald: Escaping the Delta: Robert Johnson and the Invention of the Blues . Amistad, 2004, ISBN 0-06-052423-5 : “As far as the evolution of black music goes, Robert Johnson was an extremely minor figure, and very little that happened in the decades following his death would have been affected if he had never played a note. "
  8. ^ Robert Santelli: The Big Book of Blues , p. 219
  9. ↑ Tony Burke: Last Fair Deal Gone Down . In: Blues & Rhythm: The Gospel Truth , No. 117, 1997, p. 9
  10. ↑ The Robert Johnson L-1 Signature. ( Memento of the original from September 23, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. gibson.com; Retrieved May 11, 2012 @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www2.gibson.com
  11. ↑ The 100 Greatest Songwriters of All Time. Rolling Stone , August 2015, accessed August 7, 2017 .
  12. ↑ 100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time. Rolling Stone , December 18, 2015, accessed August 7, 2017 .
  13. ↑ imdb.com: The King of the Delta Blues
personal data
SURNAME Johnson, Robert
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Johnson, Robert Leroy (full name); Dodds, Robert Leroy
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American blues musician
DATE OF BIRTH May 8, 1911
PLACE OF BIRTH Hazlehurst , Mississippi
DATE OF DEATH August 16, 1938
Place of death Greenwood , Mississippi