ROBERT JOHNSON

1911-1938

The legend of Robert Leroy Johnson is one of the great stories of the blues‚ if not music generally. Johnson was an adequate harmonica player but longed to play guitar as the guitarists always got the girls. So during an interval during a gig at a juke joint he picked up a guitar and tried to play. He was so appalling he was chased from the stage. He disappeared and returned a few months later a superb guitarist who only had to hear any tune once and could reproduce it. His amazing new found talent was attributed to his meeting the devil at midnight at the crossroads where he sold his soul for his musical ability. Eric Clapton claims he cannot play Johnson who simultaneously plays bass‚ rhythm and lead while singing.

Johnson recorded 41 sides (29 songs with several alternative takes) in two sessions; itself unusual as most artists in those days recorded only 2-4 sides in any given session. A lot of his songs concern Satan - 'Me and the Devil' ‚'Hellhound on my Trail'‚ 'If I had possession over Judgment Day' Etc. He was poisoned by the jealous lover of a girl he was flirting with at a juke joint in Greenwood. A line in one of his songs says 'You can bury my body down by the highway side‚ so my evil spirit can easily take a greyhound bus and ride.' True to form he is buried close to the road in a graveyard near Greenwood.

Ink