Description
If ever a title was justified, then ‘Queen of the Country Blues’ is the bare minimum that should be afforded to Memphis Minnie, a lone female voice in the male-dominated country blues scene whose musical legacy is nothing short of remarkable. Minnie transcended both gender and genre and her recording career spanned from the late 1920s heyday of country blues to the cutting-edge Chicago scene of the 1940s & 1950s, where she helped pioneer the roots of electric blues, R&B and rock ‘n’ roll. By the beginning of the 1930s, the Memphis blues had become quite a marketing phenomenon in Chicago, which is where Minnie and Kansas Joe migrated to in 1930 to become a part of the city’s burgeoning music scene. Along with Big Bill Broonzy, whom she reputedly beat in a blues contest, and Tampa Red, Minnie helped the country blues style ease into an urban setting. Minnie’s guitar prowess was formidable, as testified by many a famed bluesman, and she literally “stood out” from other musicians by playing lead guitar while standing, at a time when everyone else played their guitars sitting down. This collection highlights the formative years of Minnie’s career as part of the duo and includes accomplished blues numbers such as ‘Memphis Minnie-Jitis Blues’, probably based on personal experience, as well as ‘Bumble Bee’ their first recorded song and one of Minnie’s most successful of her hundred or so songs that she recorded before retiring in the mid-1950s.
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