MATCHBOX BLUESMASTER SERIES –
SOME FULL REVIEWS OF SET 9
LONDON JAZZ NEWS SET 9 REVIEW
Containing music originally released in the 1970s as a joint venture between Flyright and Saydisc Records, these six CDs comprise field recordings made between 1934 and 1943 by various collectors for the Library of Congress. The fragility of the resultant pressings – they were made on portable 78rpm lacquer disc-cutting machines – means that their transfer to CD as part of Nimbus Records’ Matchbox series is as timely as it is valuable.
Disc 1 features singers/guitarists Lucious Curtis and Willie Ford (plus one track by George Boldwin), recorded by John A. and Ruby Lomaxin 1940 on a visit to Natchez. The town’s Black population (more than a majority at that time) was in deep mourning after a disastrous dancehall fire, but the Lomaxes managed to obtain the help of a parking-lot attendant, who directed them to some “real guitar pickers” in the shape of Curtis and Ford. Their songs are a lively mixture of traditional fare (the affecting “Time is Gittin’ Hard”) and originals (Ford’s excellent “Santa ‘Field’ Blues” and “Sto’ Gallery Blues”; Curtis’s “Lonesome Highway Blues” and “Rubber Ball Blues” – all powerfully emotional performances backed by skilfully blended guitar accompaniment). Lyrics include some memorable lines – “White folks sittin’ in the parlor/Eatin’ that cake and cream”, contrasted with Black families “squabblin’ over turnip greens” – but whatever they’re singing, Curtis and Ford are consistently adept and committed, thoroughly justifying John Lomax’s subsequent comment: “We got some good blues at Natchez”.
Disc 2 contains sixteen tracks recorded by John Work and Willis James, performed by artists featured at the annual Fort Valley State College Folk Festival in Georgia. Although both secular and spiritual music made up said festival, this disc confines itself to the former. The most memorable cuts are those by the only singer to have gone on to a commercial career: Buster Brown. His is a unique approach, his passionate vocals and harmonica decorated with spontaneous whoops and cries. Also utterly distinctive is Gus Gibson, his voice a powerful growl, which blends with his slide guitar to produce a beguiling, slightly eerie sound, all the more poignant for being recorded in the last year of his life. Other artists include Charles Ellis, a rare pianist among all the guitarists; Buster “Buzz” Ezell, who sets a variety of songs on topical subjects to a ringingly propulsive guitar; James Sneed, whose lively vocals and washboard are fetchingly set against the guitars of festival favourites J. F. Duffy and Alvin Sanders; and Allison Mathis, a fierce-voiced singer whose version of “John Henry” is supported by the equally obscure harmonica player Jessie Stroller, whose solo rendition of “When Saints Come to Town” brings this standout selection, annotated by the doyen of living blues writers, Tony Russell, to an appropriately vigorous and unfussily virtuosic end.
In 1935, the celebrated writer Zora Neale Hurston introduced Alan Lomax to a man she considered a fine guitarist, Gabriel Brown, who hailed from her home town, Eatonville, Florida. On the eighteen tracks that constitute Disc 3, Brown plays slide guitar with great dexterity and considerable power, often backed by fellow guitarist Rochelle French. Brown is also an acceptable vocalist, and he delivers the lyrics to such staples as “John Henry” and “Motherless Child” – the blues, not the spiritual, later popularised in an expanded version by Steve Miller – with informal grace. His “Education Blues” (“All my education didn’t mean a thing to me, When I met a good-looking woman, that was the end of me”) is a particular highlight of a compelling set, so it is a shame that the disc’s recording quality (marred by surface noise and abrupt endings) doesn’t do him full justice. Brown later moved to New York, when Hurston featured him in her light opera Polk County, and he made more recordings before drowning in a boating accident in his early sixties.
After this visit to Eatonville, Hurston, Lomax and Elizabeth Barnicle moved on to Belle Glade in the Everglades, meeting a fine jook band there: Booker T. Sapps and Roger Matthews (harmonica players) and – on the evidence of the cuts on this CD – one of the greatest slide guitarists of his time, Willy Flowers. They start with solo harmonica visits to contemporary staples for the instrument, “The Train” and “The Fox and Hounds”, but then move on to blues songs, most memorably “Alabama Blues” and “The Weeping Worry Blues”, both utilising the familiar “Rollin’ and Tumblin’” motif, and taken at breathtaking speed by the driving guitar of Flowers. The vocals, both here and elsewhere on this session, are somewhat reedy, even perfunctory, but the lyrics are clearer than on many comparable recordings; those wishing to explore the further reaches of bawdiness (“The Bud”, featured here and on Disc 3) should consult Bluegrass Messengers. The rest of the session features more staple fare: “Frankie and Albert”, “John Henry” etc. are given thorough workouts by this enjoyably informal but consistently virtuosic trio. Both this and the previous disc are annotated by Bruce Bastin. One caveat: as on Disc 3, the recording quality here is distinctly variable.
The Lomaxes are also responsible for gathering the music on Disc 5, played by inmates of various Texas penitentiaries. As on Discs 3 and 4, poor sound quality and premature endings militate against unalloyed enjoyment of the fare on offer here, but fortunately the best tracks, performed by a genuine though cruelly undersung star, Smith Casey – or possibly Casey Smith; his name is uncertain, are complete and relatively clear of surface noise: “ Shorty George”, “Santa Fe Blues” and “Hesitating Blues” are minor masterpieces, featuring plaintive, sweet moaning vocals against faultlessly picked, propulsive guitar. “Shorty George”, in particular, is highly affecting courtesy of Casey’s long-held notes (which bring the late great Tim Buckley to mind) and persuasively emotional delivery. On the evidence of these tracks, Casey is a superb (lost) talent, who could have been a true blues great had he been extensively (and properly) recorded. Among other tracks are material by Ace Johnson (harmonica features), the wavery-voiced Wallace Chains and guitarist Sylvester Jones, and one song from a female inmate of Goree State Farm, the strong-voiced Hattie Ellis.
The Lomaxes’ shortcomings as recording engineers are again evident on Disc 6, which is disfigured by a number of abruptly truncated takes. The title cut, however, Pete Harris’s “Jack O’ Diamonds”, is complete, and features twice. Harris is the only non-convict on the CD, and his repertoire (not exclusively blues, but also made up of cowboy ballads and popular songs) is representative, as liner note writer Bob Groom points out, of his time. His voice has a keening edge to it, and his slide guitar playing (best represented on “Blind Lemon’s Song”) is particularly effective. Other artists featured include the somewhat frail-voiced Tricky Sam, and Augustus “Track Horse” Haggerty(accompanied by an admirably sure-footed guitarist, Jack Johnson), plus a single track from Little Brother.
What was said (by John Work) about the the Fort Valley State College Folk Festival (Disc 2) could equally be said of the ongoing Matchbox series: “By bringing such inimitable music as ‘Gus’ Gibson, ‘Buzz’ Ezell, and Samuel Jackson make to the attention of America, and in the same action proving to these musicians that their appreciative audience extends far beyond their church or corner storefront where they previously sang and played, this festival stimulates and preserves something extremely valuable in our American life.”
(Chris Parker)
JACK O’ DIAMONDS: Library Of Congress Field Recordings 1934-1943
Matchbox Blues Master Series Set 9 - MSESET9
Six albums originally issued in 1973 (Discs 1 & 2); 1974 (Discs 3 & 4) and 1976 (Discs 5 & 6) in a joint agreement between Flyright and Saydisc in 'the Library Of Congress series'. Missing are two Library of Congress releases issued solely by Flyright (but with Flyright-Matchbox label design) - 'Red River Runs', and 'Jerry's Saloon Blues· which complete the series.
All the tracks were dubbed from original recordings cut onto acetate discs between 1934 and 1943 by John A. Lomax, Ruth Terril Lomax, Zora Neale Hurston, John Wesley Work and others using portable 78rpm lacquer disc cutting equipment. The discs were stored at the Library Of Congress. Thirty years after recording some of the aluminium and glass-based discs had deteriorated.
Some had faults that could not be corrected, (at the time); some of the recordings start with the openings missing or end abruptly - but as field recordings - they were never meant to be commercially available, they are historical artefacts designed to capture music played by African Americans in a variety of locations and therefore are of significant importance to the history of blues.
Most of the artists included never got another opportunity to record - with the notable exceptions of Gabriel Brown who recorded commercially in the 1940s and '50s and Buster Brown who enjoyed a world wide hit with 'Fannie Mae' on Fire in 1959.
Some of the artists, notably on discs 5 and 6 were prisoners who provided source material for John Lomax and others including his son Alan. (Father and son began together recording songs in prisons from 1933.)
Space does not permit an album by album analysis - but almost fifty years since they were originally reissued on vinyl albums it is great to rediscover some great performances. One such Is Lucious Curtis on disc one. Curtis is supported by Willie Ford on guitar who also gets an outing himself and supports George Baldwin. John Lomax announces that the recordings were made in Natchez on Saturday 19th October 1940.
Lomax found Curtis and Ford via a hotel car park attendant who told Lomax if he let him drive his car he would take him to "some real guitar pickers". He was proved right. Curtis in particular is a fine performer and having played 'Crawling King Snake' once - he refused to record it to protect his rights stating "I think I could sell it to NBC".
Lomax recalled that Curtis refused to play 'Crawling Blacksnake Blues' (sic) as he had been 'gypped' by somebody who stole one of his songs. Sleeve-note writer (and overall series producer with Bruce Bastin) John Cowley speculated in his original 1973 note that Curtis (called 'Carter' by Lomax) could be 'Leroy Carter' who recorded with Harry Chatman in Jackson in 1935 and that if he did record with Bo Carter (as Curtis had said he had) it would have been at Carter's sole New York session for Okeh in June 1935.
Fort Valley is situated twenty miles from Macon in Georgia and hosted a folk music festival which attracted a range of artists including some of those included on disc two - notably (according to Tony Russell's original sleeve-note) Buzz (or Bus) Ezell (who growls his way the two partner 'Roosevelt And Hitler'), the Smith Band (Blind Billy Smith's String And Washboard Band') and Gus Gibson who plays wonderful slide on 'Railroad Song'.
Buster Brown who played the 1943 festival in Fort Valley intrigued the audience by turning up in a "white duck suit" while playing and singing at the same time. His 'War Song' is about the raging second world war played "somewhat in the manner of Sonny Boy Williamson" according to Tony Russell.
Allison Mathis and his harp player Jesse Stroller are wonderful and Russell describes them as being categorised as 'great unknowns' also Sonny Chestain.
Gabriel Brown plays solo and is also accompanied by Rochelle French on disc three. Brown's repertoire is described by Bruce Bastin as "largely unrestricted" and plays the traditional 'Casey Jones' and 'John Henry' and excels on 'Education Blues· (based on Leroy Carr's 'Cruel Woman Blues') and 'Talking In Sebastopol' (sic) on which Brown plays with a knife. Brown went on to record for Gennett; Joe Davis' labels including Beacon/Jay Dee, Coral and MGM in the 1940s and '50s (at the time Brown recorded for Gennett it too was a Joe Davis label).
Bruce Bastin penned the notes to disc four which features harmonica players Booker T. Sapps and Roger Matthews and slide guitar player Willy Flowers ("one of the finest small jook bands ever" says Bruce) who supported each other throughout on recordings made in Belle Glade, Florida in 1935. The song 'Po Laz'us’ is a penitentiary work song, and was also known as 'Muley On The Mountain' with a reference to two mules Mike and Jerry who were also referred to by The Blues Boys (Alec Seward and Louis Hayes) on their 1940s outing on Tu-Blue Records 'Been Plowing Blues’.
Disc five with notes by John Cowley takes us to Texas and introduced the blues world to Ace Johnson, Smith Casey, Hattie Ellis and others who were incarcerated in Goree Farm and Clemens. Cowley's notes refer to the system providing labour to farms as ditch diggers and hauling dirt. Lomax described the convicts as "the boys". Johnson and Casey were two who had performed previously on a radio show featuring convicts from Huntsville called 'Behind The Walls'.
According to 'The Blues Come To Texas: Paul Oliver and Mack McCormick's Unfinished Book'; Smith Casey was in prison in Huntsville after he killed one of Lightnin' Hopkins brothers - Abbie. Casey and Hopkins had been playing together for nine months when they had an altercation which ended in Casey shooting Hopkins dead from sixteen feet. Lightnin's comments about the shooting are contained in the book in detail, but Lightnin' is clear what should have happened to Casey - "That bandy leg bastard shoulda been hung".
Many of the performances start and finish part way through possibly as Lomax was economising on acetate discs John Cowley speculates.
Pete Harris, who Bob Groom describes in the notes to disc six as an "excellent songster' performed blues, ballads, spirituals, cowboy songs and reels and according to Lomax hailed from Richmond, Texas and had worked all his life on the John M. Moore ranch. In 'The Blues Come To Texas: Paul Oliver and Mack McCormick's Unfinished Book' Harris is described as "one of the of the last generation of songsters - it is for his knife-playing on the guitar that he is well-known in the Richmond area". The above book has much more to say about Harris.
The 'Jack O' Diamonds' refers to the card game. Monte and Harris play different verses to the versions recorded by Blind Lemon Jefferson and Sippie Wallace. Tricky Sam was also a convict who Groom describes as "one of the finest songsters at Huntsville in 1934". Another inmate of Huntsville who was recorded was Augusta 'Track Horse’ Hagerty who was born in Louisiana in 1907 and was imprisoned aged 27 according to 'Texas State Library and Archives Commission; Convict Record Ledger'.
The booklet notes to discs four and five have been truncated for space considerations as the full notes appear in a separate leaflet published as a facsimile on matchboxbluesmaster.co.uk as does Bruce Bastin's 'A Tribute To Zora Neale Hurston'.
A small proportion of these recordings appeared in Alan Lomax's 'Deep River Of Song' series on Rounder, though the context is entirely different.
Some wonderful and historic music featuring some raw blues field recordings from the era means this is worth checking out. Thanks to John Cowley for updated information. Tony Burke (Blues & Rhythm)
Matchbox Bluesmaster Series Set 9 – Jack of Diamonds
Saydisc Records
6 CDs of 14, 16, 18, 12, 19 and 22 tracks respectively
This is Set 9 of the old Matchbox Bluesmaster Series. These six CDs (taken from 6 LPs) of the Library of Congress Series were originally released during the 1970s as part of a joint venture between Flyright Records and Saydisc Records. The recordings were made in the field between 1934 and 1943 on portable 78rpm lacquer disc cutting machines and then sat for about 30 years in the Library of Congress before being issued on LP in the 1970s. Many of the fragile records deteriorated and the music recorded on those discs is an attempt to preserve that music. They are preserving the history of the blues for posterity. Some of the performances are marvelous and come from unknown and previously unrecorded artists; some these musicians were in state penitentiary farms; those are captured on discs 5 and 6.
Disc 1 is Mississippi River Blues, recorded in Natchez. Artists here are Lucious Curtis (guitar), Willie Ford (guitar), John Lomax (narration) and George Boldwin. There are lots of great fingerpicking blues on this disc and it exemplifies Delta blues of the era.
Disc number 2 is Fort Valley Bluesand was done in Georgia. Allison Mathis, Jessie Stroller (harmonica), Buster "Buzz" Ezell, Buster Brown, Gus Gibson, Charles Ellis, Sonny Chestain, James Sneed, J.F. Duffy (guitar), and Alvin Sanders (guitar) appear on this CD. The sound here is more of the Piedmont style of blues with a distinct folky feel. We get some piano and harp added here and there, too, and the tempos are generally a little more upbeat.
The third CD is Out in the Cold Again, recorded in Florida as was the next CD. Gabriel Brown (guitar), Rochelle French (guitar), and John French are captured here. The style is a little different than the Piedmont, with perhaps some stylistic resemblance to Delta blues mixed in.
Volume 4 is Boot That Thing. The musicians on this volume are Booker T. Sapps, Roger Matthews, and Willy Flowers. More Florida Blues are presented here. Lots of hot harp work here, and much closer to the folky Piedmont style than the prior disc. Hot tempos and more danceable tunes appear here.
The fifth Volume is Two White Horses Standin’ In Line and it was recorded in Texas. Here we have Ace Johnson, L.W. Gooden (guitar), Jesse Lockett, Smith Casey, Roger Gill, Wallace Chains, Sylvester Jones (guitar), Richard L. Lewis, Wilbert Gilliam (guitar), Hattie Ellis, and "Cowboy" Jack Ramsey (guitar). The Texas style of blues is quite evident here, with a little swing, harp and guitar done at times vibrantly. There are some tunes that hearken to work songs, too, similar to what Leadbelly did.
The sixth CD is Jack O’ Diamonds. Also recorded in Texas, this volume is Pete Harris, Tricky Sam, Augustus "Track Horse" Haggerty, Jack Johnson, Little Brother, A. Haggerty and John Lomax doing some narration. There is more upbeat and interesting Texas blues here, especially the latter half of the disc.
With now nine releases, there are 54 CDs in the Matchbox Bluesmaster Series that recapture the blues and roots music from their earliest recordings. Saydisc and the folks at Bluesmaster have created a great archival set of music for fans and collectors to assemble and listen to!
Steve Jones (Blues Blast Magazine)
Blues Blast Magazine Senior writer Steve Jones is president of the Crossroads Blues Society and is a long standing blues lover. He is a retired Navy commander who served his entire career in nuclear submarines. In addition to working in his civilian career since 1996, he writes for and publishes the bi-monthly newsletter for Crossroads, chairs their music festival and works with their Blues In The Schools program. He resides in Byron, IL.
JACK O’DIAMONDS: MATCHBOX BLUESMASTER SERIES SET 9
Matchbox MSESET9, 6 CDs, approx 4 hours 40 minutes
If the word quaint comes to mind, it's about not about the music in this collection. It's about the liner notes.
They're reproduced faithfully from the original LPs issued in the 1970s. Each one is scholarly and meticulous, documenting the recordings and the relative fame or notoriety of the musicians. They're useful as an archival record, but somehow dissatisfying as an accompaniment to the performances.
It's a curse that has dogged the blues since it became a study of folklorists in the 1920s. People approached the works of these early artists with the same hushed reverence you would bring to a Bach manuscript.
Blessed with a post rock-and-roll mindset, and a much more enlightened understanding of black history, we can take the recordings for what they are: killer, killer blues and folk performances, hammered out in the moment by unschooled musicians who gave full rein to their raw virtuosity.
This is the ninth of the superb reissues of the Matchbox Bluesmaster Series from Saydisc. It's a labour of love for series producer Gef Lucena and he's given the world's blues fans a priceless gift.
In this six-CD set we wander from Mississippi to Georgia, Texas and Florida and meet blues singers, songsters and folk singers of every kind and ability. Our guides are the folklorists working for the US Library of Congress, including John, Ruth and Alan Lomax and Zora Neale Hurston. Theirs was a worthy mission: to preserve the black culture that was fast being absorbed into modern America. In doing so, they managed to create a body of work that took on a life of its own.
These performances might well have gathered dust in a corner of the library had not white collectors 'discovered' the blues and turned it into a study of near-cult status. Well-intentioned and sincere as they were, the purist attitudes they adopted often obscured the real value of the music. The only thing to do is to listen.
There are 101 tracks in this set and a conventional review is meaningless. Each one stands on its own merits. But until you have heard Buster 'Buzz' Ezell crashing through a mind-bending, gut-kicking rendition of “Salt Water Blues”, you cannot conceive how utterly compelling these recordings are. And its impact is only increased because the recording cuts out, leaving us in a void of visceral excitement.
Booker T. Sapps, Buster Brown, Rochelle French, Hattie Ellis; their immortality is well-earned and a privilege for those of us who can connect with them across the decades, thanks to Gef Lucena and those earnest folklorists. As usual for the Matchbox Bluesmaster series, Jack O’Diamonds is an essential addition to any sensible collection.
STUART MAXWELL, Jazz Rag
RnR review Jan 2023
Matchbox Bluesmasters Series
Set 9 -Jack O' Diamonds: Library
Of Congress Field Recordings
The subtitle of this six-CD boxed set is self-explanatory. The 101 tracks were recorded at locations across the American South - Florida, Georgia, Mississippi and Texas by mostly local musicians, tracked down mainly by Alan Lomax, though the Georgia recordings were made by folklorist John Work and the singer Willie Lawrence James. These latter were captured at Fort Valley State College folk Festival, and feature a wide variety of African-American folk styles, though the focus of most of the sets here is on blues and ballads.
Although most performers were little known, the exception is singer and harmonica player Buster Brown, who had a Top Forty hit with 'Fannie Mae' in 1960. Writer and researcher Zora Neale Hurston was with Lomax and Elizabeth Barnicle in 1935; in her home town of Eatonville, Florida, she introduced them to Gabriel Brown, described by Lomax as the finest guitarist he had heard. Hurston may also have encouraged Brown to make commercial recordings in New York in the 40s.
All the recordings here were released on LPs in the 70s, and the original notes are still informative. Leaflet inserts were also included in those releases, and these can be found on the website, with additional information. If all this sounds rather dry, the music is anything but: blues and folk songs, often within clear regional styles, and played by musicians valued within their local communities.
Norman Darwen
JAZZ JOURNAL Dec 2022
Matchbox Bluesmaster Series – Set 9
The distinguished blues chronicler Paul Oliver once wrote that “the story of the blues is a story of minor singers rather than major ones, of men with small circles of acquaintances, limited aspirations and humble talents” (Conversations With The Blues, Cassell & Co. 1967).
For innumerable singers and players this description accurately summed up their lives and careers, such as they were. Precious few gained any recognition beyond their home areas or, even if they were recorded, outside of the narrow “race records” market. That market was evidently fairly lucrative as some record companies were keen to record singers and instrumentalists in, more or less, their home environments, sometimes literally in the fields and sometimes in state prisons. Most then sank back into obscurity, rewarded with modest cash payments if they were lucky or, in some cases, a bottle of bourbon or cola.
Even someone as important as Son House (who influenced Robert Johnson who in turn influenced Elmore James and Muddy Waters who then influenced pretty much everyone else who ever attempted to play the blues) disappeared from public view after being recorded for the Library of Congress in 1930, 1941 and 1942. He only achieved the recognition he deserved after he was rediscovered in the mid-1960s.
Most of the people featured on this giant set, designated as Jack O’Diamonds and subtitled Library Of Congress Field Recordings 1934-1943, are considerably more unrecognised, even by the average blues fan which, in my view anyway, makes this sort of compilation all the more valuable and fascinating.
There are 101 tracks across six CDs here (mirroring six albums which were originally available as six separate LPs on the Flyright-Matchbox label in the 70s) and so you’ll have to forgive me for not discussing the contents in detail, let alone setting out a full list of tunes and performers. Broadly, though, the CDs focus as follows:
CD1, Mississippi River Blues: material recorded in Natchez on 19 October 1940, mainly featuring Lucious Curtis and Willie Ford.
CD2, Fort Valley Blues: recorded in southern Georgia during the early 40s and featuring the likes of Allison Mathis, Buster Brown and Jessie Stroller. If the names aren’t overly familiar, several of the song titles will be, including Boll Weevil, Milk Cow Blues and John Henry (plus, of course, here as everywhere, tunes and lyrics that crop up under names different from those we know). Less familiar will be Buzz Ezell’s Roosevelt And Hitler – one to set alongside Willie Johnson’s Stalin Wasn’t Stallin’, memorably recorded by the Golden Gate Quartet and Robert Wyatt. But I digress:
CD3, Out In The Cold Again: recorded in Florida in June 1935.
CD4, Boot That Thing: also recorded in Florida in the summer of 1935, it kicks off with spectacular harmonica features by Booker T. Sapps and Roger Matthews, doing versions of The Train and The Fox And Hounds, followed by some tracks where they are joined by guitarist and vocalist Willy (aka Jesse) Flowers.
CD5, Two White Horses Standin’ In Line: recorded in Texas in 1939 and mainly spotlighting Smith Casey, who sings a version of the song that gives the set its name. Vocalist and harp-player Ace Johnson and guitarist L.W. Gooden offer Mama Don’t ’Low which was irritatingly ubiquitous in the heyday of skiffle and trad and which they sensibly curtail after a minute.
CD6, Jack O’Diamonds: the song itself is sung, in two takes, by Pete Harris, who features on most of the tracks here. These were recorded in Texas.
The Library of Congress was, rightly, concerned to preserve aural (and oral) evidence of the whole range of black musical traditions, not just the blues, so other forms are showcased on some tracks. Pretty much all the performances are of academic interest, and the majority of them are a pleasure to listen to, albeit perhaps not all 101 in one sitting. The Library of Congress recordists, including the legendary John Avery Lomax and Ruth Terrill Lomax, perhaps took greater care over sound quality than did the commercial scouts as they were preserving for posterity rather than seeking immediate commercial success. Nonetheless, the modern ear needs to make allowances; the music makes the effort worthwhile.
Blues In Britain (Feb 2023)
Matchbox Bluesmaster Series Vol. 9:
Library of Congress Field Recordings 1934-1943
Matchbox!Saydisc MSESET9 ( 6 CD box set)
Set nine in this historic series of blues recordings released on CD for the first time is an unmissable collection that will open your ears to music you've almost certainly never had the chance to hear before.
Originally released on vinyl in 1973, Mississippi River Blues covers 1940 field recordings from Natchez, Mississippi, fourteen tracks of which feature Lucious Curtis on vocals and guitar aided by Willie Ford. All were recorded on the same day straight onto 12" aluminium acetates at 78 rpm by John and Ruth Lomax.
Fort Valley Bluesfeatures recordings made between 1941 and 1943 in Georgia and features some songs that are a little better known, such as 'Milk Cow Blues', 'John Henry' and 'Bottle Up And Go' but the artists may be far less familiar; that's a shame, because in folk like Allison Mathis, Buster 'Buzz' Ezell on guitars, Gus Gibson on harmonica and James Sneed on washboard these are first class recordings. Sonny Chestain's vocals and guitar on 'Po Boy A Long Way From Home' is a stand-out track.
Out In The Cold Againtakes us to Florida, maybe not a place readily associated with the blues but these field recordings were made wherever the music was being played. It seemed wherever blues was being played Lomax was there to set up sessions. These tracks are mainly by Gabriel Brown and features songs still being performed today, including 'John Henry', 'Casey Jones', 'Sail On Little Girl Sail On', 'Motherless Child' and 'Po Boy A Long Way From Home' among others. Gabriel Brown was an accomplished guitarist and solid vocalist but his ace was Rochelle French who laid down some strong rhythm guitar which brought out something special. The fourteen tracks offer a great introduction to them.
Boot That Thing contains yet more field recordings from Florida recorded in 1935, but are by a different group of musicians. From the harmonica of Booker T. Sapps, Roger Matthews with his harmonica and vocal effects and Willie Flowers, some of these songs are still around as well, 'The Train' and 'Levee Camp Holler' to name just two. Sapps' harp dominates 'The Train' with those train rail sounds, but in 'Weeping Willow Blues' his harp playing is absolutely wonderful. This is, again, a very fine set of recordings to finally have.
Volume 5 is the wonderfully titled Two White Horses Standin' In Line, field recordings from Texas in 1939. Key among the artists is Smith Casey, either leading on vocals and guitar or just playing behind Roger Gill. These recordings were, again, made by the Lomaxs in May of '39.
There's more from Texas on Jack O'Diamonds, but these are much earlier recordings from 1934 and contains more songs that might be familiar. Here we have one of the finest bluesmen of the time in Pete Harris from Richmond Texas, only thirty three years old at the time, the son of a pure African who spent all his life as a worker on the ranch of John M Moore, never able to read or write, but these few recordings leave you in no doubt he could play the blues pretty well.
Pete Clack
LIVING BLUES (USA) review March 2023
Jack O' Diamonds -Library of Congress Field Recordings 1934-1943
Matchbox - MSESET9
This six-CD set reissues the contents of six LPs released between 1973 and 1976 on the UK-based Flyright-Matchbox label, along with their original liner notes. It's 101 tracks, four hours and 25 minutes of music, most of it blues related. These voices from the vaunted Golden Age of field recordings were captured by recordists who became legends themselves: John and Alan Lomax, Zora Neale Hurston, and John Wesley Work, who all worked to “stimulate and preserve something extremely valuable in our American life".
The recordings reflect the preservationist's urge to document vestiges of dying traditions ("the living past") balanced by an acceptance of a then broadly popular and relatively new idiom, blues. "We got some good blues at Natchez," John Lomax wrote in a letter to son Alan of the recordings heard on Mississippi
River Blues: 1940 Field Recordings from Natchez, Mississippi (Library of Congress Series: Volume One). He and wife Ruby made the 14 recordings heard there on a single day, October 19, 1940. The star of the session is guitarist/singer Lucious Curtis, described by Lomax as "a honky tonk, guitar picking Negro, living on a precarious income from pickups at dance halls. His ‘complementer' [second guitarist] Willie Ford has a regular job at a saw mill."
The Curtis-Ford team gave Lomax some top-drawer duets: High Lonesome Hill, their longest (4:31) and hottest duo outing, takes the phrasing and rhythm from Tommy Johnson's Canned Heat Blues to a snappier, more danceable level. Curtis' solo Train Blues churns with the locomotive drive of Robert Petway’s Catfish Blues. and he offers some lyrical surprises in his unique version of Stagolee. "Stagolee, he told the Devil, 'C'mon, let's have some fun / You get your pitchfork, gonna get my 44."'
Curtis is leader on eight songs and one guitar solo (Guitar Picking Song). Willie Ford offers four vocals, Santa Field Blues being the most striking, praised by annotator John H. Cowley as "haunting and beautiful." Ford shouts his song as if it were a field holler, and, though its lyrics are in part about a train, his guitar's loping rhythm reflects a culture still grounded in the canter of the horse.
We move next to Fort Valley, Georgia, once home to a college-based springtime folk music festival that supplied the nine acts heard on Fort Valley Blues: Library of Congress Field Recordings from Georgia (Library of
Congress Series, Vol. 2). Its 16 tracks come from recordings made by John Wesley Work in 1941 and Willis Laurence James and Lewis Wade Jones in 1943 and opens with a bang: Allison Mathis' voice and slide guitar on Mama
You Goin' to Quit Me as Good as I Been to You, a 1:35 eruption hurled with an energy later associated with primal rock 'n' roll, here stripped to its atomic level. Annotator Tony Russell hails Mathis as "a great unknown." Singer/ harmonica player Buster Brown, later to gain fame with the hit Fannie Mae, sings a Sonny Boy I–influenced War Song, and Buster "Buzz" Ezell's Roosevelt and Hitler are both striking reflections of a then-raging World War that impacted Americans acres and oceans distant from any frontlines.
Gus Gibson may have recorded in Georgia, but his Milk Cow Blues (no relation to the Kokomo Arnold classic) sounds like the work of a Mississippian: it's phrased like Charley Patton’s Pony Blues kicked up to a jauntier pace. More distinctly southeastern in flavor is singer/washboard player James Sneed's Southern Rag, a snappy workout set to a tune familiar from the Gary Davis version of Candy Man. And the piano makes a rare appearance among these field recordings as Charles Ellis tickles the ivories whilst praising My Big Fat Hipted Mama.
Out in the Cold Again: Field Recordings from Florida (Library of Congress Series: Vol. 3) finds recordists Zora Neale Hurston, Alan Lomax, and Elizabeth Barnicle in Hurston's hometown of Eatonville, Florida, where, Bruce Bastin writes, she introduced Lomax to "the finest guitarist he had heard," Gabriel Brown. A skilled slide guitarist in open tunings, Brown was equally adept at standard tuning forays like Out in the Cold Again,an off-kilter ragtime-pop outing on which Rochelle French sang and played second guitar. The recordists dismissed it in 1935 as "jazz ... recorded to please the musicians." They were eager to collect traditional material, and Brown and company did not disappoint them: there's John Henry, Po' Boy, Long Way from Home, Careless Love, Franky and Albert (sung by John French, his sole recording), Tone the Bell Easy, and a fine Motherless Child with crying slide guitar a la Blind Willie Johnson. But it's Brown's less conventional efforts that now seem most noteworthy. The standout oddity is an original waltz-time piece Brown called A Dream of Mine, a stab at a lap-style Hawaiian guitar solo. No one would call this a great example of the genre, but it's a wonderful snapshot of a self-taught musician exploring his range, reaching beyond the boundaries his recordists would have liked to impose on him.
The Lomax-Hurston-Barnicle team then decamped to Belle Glade in the Everglades, where they made the dozen recordings on Boot That Thing: Field Recordings from Florida (Library of Congress Series: Vol. 4).
The set opens with harmonica whiz Booker T. Sapps giving the recordists instructions:
"Don't turn it on, now, till I get right, now. I'm gon' give my signal for you." He does this again later in the session, proving he was not the least intimidated by the recording team. In fact, Sapps and the other members of his trio, singer-guitarist Willy Flowers and harmonica ace Roger Matthews, were forces of nature,"one of the finest small jook bands ever," in the estimation of annotator Bruce Bastin. Matthews’ The Fox and Hounds is a fine harp workout punctuated by "whoopin’ “ of the sort generally associated with Sonny Terry, heard on several tracks here. Flowers plays fine slide guitar on the two-part Alabama Blues, and when the two harps and guitar erupt in a unison spasm, it's like the Dust My Broom lick on steroids. The interplay between the harps of Sapps and Matthews is particularly engaging, and it's just a damn shame the recording quality isn't better.
John Lomax would never find another Lead Belly, but not for wont of trying. In
the spring of 1939. he and his wife Ruth made a talent search through the Lone Star State's prison farms, the source for Two White Horses Standin' in Line: 1939 Field Recordings from Texas (Library of Congress Series: Vol. 5). Surprises here include the sole female voice on this collection (Hattie Ellis, Goree Farm, Desert Blues) and the honeyed crooner voice of Richard L. Lewis (Long Freight Train Blues). But 11 of the 19 tracks are vocals and guitar by Huntsville inmate Smith Casey, who field recording expert Stephen Wade calls "a rich-voiced, soulful Paul Robeson of a singer." His Shorty George was the inspiration for Dave Van Ronk's He Was a Friend of Mine. Two White Horses Standin' in Line may have been Casey's tour de force, but the Vestapoltuned slide guitar showpiece East Texas Rag is outstanding, and the haunting Mournful Blues, with its subtle vocal/slide guitar interplay, is most memorable of all.
The set closes with earlier Lomax Lone Star State recordings, Jack O' Diamonds:
1934 Field Recordings from Texas (Library of Congress Series: Vol. 6). The title song appears twice by Richmond's Pete Harris, a guitar-playing songster with a wide-ranging repertoire that included cowboy songs (The Buffalo Skinners), square dance calls, and blues. Huntsville inmate Tricky Sam confounds any stereotypes of Texas guitar style by playing in the manner of Blind Blake on excellent renditions of Stavin' Chain and the murder ballad Ella Speed. Overall. this is one of the most satisfying of the six sessions here, though there's no shortage of rough-cut gems throughout.
Mark Humphrey
Blues From The Avon Delta - The Matchbox Blues Story Mark Jones The Record Press In 1967 the Bristol based Saydisc label released its first country blues record, a 7" EP by the local trio, Anderson Jones Jackson. By 1968 it was helping three other blues labels, Sunflower, Kokomo and Highway 51 get to market. Today the company, having released well over a hundred blues LPs in its first twenty years, has been re-releasing some great country blues recordings and has now become epicentre of the U.K.'s DIY blues record label industry. The book covers this wonderfully creative period of blues in Britain with some familiar names like Jo Ann Kelly, Dave Peabody, Mike Cooper, Ian Anderson and Dave Kelly who, alongside some lesser known ones, brought the blues to the U.K. in those early years - a small record label making ends meet on a limited budget, including visits to a local photo booth to take passport photos for its record sleeves. A Research Fellow at University College Dublin, Mark Jones's book chronicles the history of the Saydisc label and its series of 1920s and 1930s blues music CDs, itemising who did what and when, through the manufacturing process, the artists, the tracks and the sleeves. This is a hugely informative book that's been made possible with the help and input of the people who were there. Pete Clack
BLUES & RHYTHM July 2021
BLUES FROM THE AVON DELTA: The Matchbox Blues Story
Mark Jones
The Record Press; ISBN 978 1 909953 76 5; £19.99
Thoroughly researched, nicely written, profusely illustrated and well
presented on quality glossy paper this, as well as providing a very useful
discographical reference, is a lot of nostalgic fun, even for those of us
who weren't around in the time and place it records. It effectively draws
together the separate but linked stories of the folk/blues scene of the
Bristol area in the 1960s with the history of Saydisc Records. Saydisc is
best known to blues fans both for issues of its own and for the fact that
it was producing UK releases of LPs on the Roots label, from Austria. If
you've ever wondered why its catalogue also seemed to feature rather
a lot of albums of recordings of mechanical music, the answer is here.
The Bristol folk/blues scene is more of a specific, localised interest, but
the author makes a reasonable case for it having wider historical
relevance: ' ... outside London it was Britain's most important centre for
homegrown country blues ... (with) the first dedicated country blues club
In the country.'
Quite a lot of the content is discographical - each relevant Saydisc and
related album is illustrated, with release details, track listing and a short
passage describing the content and its background, sometimes with
quotes from reviews etc. Saydisc's own Matchbox label released several
valuable reissue collections and anthologies, including sets by Blind Boy
Fuller and the first ever full LP releases by Peetie Wheatstraw and
Kokomo Arnold. They provided printing and pressing for Pete Moody's
Sunflower label (see B&R 321 ), as well as the Highway 51 and Kokomo
series. Most substantially, they provided UK release for Roots and
related labels from Austria thus, as is set out in detail here, saving UK
consumers import tax and postage costs amounting to no less than the
pre-decimal equivalent of 57.5p. (If this doesn't seem like a big deal, I
can testify that in 1969, you could get sloppy drunk for that, and still get
the bus home).
Partnership with Flyright produced the early volumes of the Library of
Congress series edited by John Cowley (later ones were produced by
Flyright alone)- truly wonderful albums that I still listen to with enormous
pleasure. Saydisc also had a partnership with the short-lived US label
A.hura Mazda, giving UK release for their great Scott Dunbar and Robert
Pete Williams albums (and who knew that Ahura Mazda reciprocated
with a US release for 'The Golden Age of Mechanical Music'?). In due
course, it would be the Matchbox Bluesmaster imprint that would kick off
the unstoppable 'complete chronological' boom, eventually culminating
In the Document 5000 series.
In parallel with all this activity in getting original, mostly pre-war blues
recordings into the hands of avid fans, Saydisc were also providing
outlets for the rather different kinds of blues-based recordinos made bv
FRoots editor, Dave Peabody, Al Jones and others, first under a
Saydisc imprint, then on Matchbox, then through a partnership
arrangement, on Village Thing. A good account of the background to all
this local activity is given, well-illustrated with photos, labels, posters,
family trees and other ephemera, a story that well deserves to be told.
In A4 format, the whole thing is a pleasure to look at and to read.
Ray Templeton
JAZZ JOURNAL Sept 2021
BLUES FROM THE AVON DELTA: The Matchbox Blues Story
Mark Jones
The Record Press; ISBN 978 1 909953 76 5; £19.99
The story of the Bristol-based Saydisc label and its invaluable contribution to the promotion and preservation of country blues
There are ordinary books for collectors and there are extraordinary books for collectors. This book surely fits the latter category. This book traces in minute detail the birth of the Bristol-based Saydisc label and its subsequent role in the development of home-grown British country blues.
In 1967, Saydisc released its first country blues record, a seven-inch LP by local trio Ian Anderson, Alun Jones and Elliot Jackson. By 1986, it was helping three “pop-up” DIY blues labels – Sunflower, Kokomo and Highway 51 – to get to market. In 1968, Saydisc created the well-known and much respected Matchbox label with the objective of releasing material by contemporary British country blues artists as well as LPs of classic pre-war US country blues.
By 1968 the UK blues boom was in full swing, albeit with more attention given by the major labels to electric blues bands. In July 1968, Matchbox released the country blues album Blues Like Showers Of Rain to positive critical acclaim. It featured a collection of British artists including Dave Kelly, Mike Cooper Ian Anderson, Jo-Ann Kelly among others. John Peel played it on his Night Ride radio show and several of the artists showcased were subsequently invited to record BBC sessions.
The British blues phenomenon did eventually run out of steam and Matchbox folded in 1977. Thankfully, it returned in 1982 to concentrate on classic pre-WWII US blues and created the well-received Bluesmaster Series – which is still going strong today. This undertaking resulted in the release of 38 LPs and two double-LP sets. Many of these releases were transcribed from rare 78s (as frequently no better original source existed) or previously unreleased US Library of Congress recordings.
All in all, it is thought that Saydisc released over 100 blues albums between 1967 and 1987, as well as promoting home grown country-blues talent. In short it kickstarted the late 1960s country blues boom and made Bristol the epicentre of the UK’s DIY blues record label industry. No small achievement for a label that most music fans have never heard of and a fascinating story that continues today with digital reissues of the entire Bluesmaster Series of LPs.
This fascinating history of Saydisc is written and catalogued by music historian Mark Jones and a fine job he does. It is part book, part catalogue, part scrapbook and part memorabilia. The book contains information on every Saydisc-related blues record ever released (including track and artist listings) and images of all Saydisc’s blues record sleeves (including the Sunflower, Kokomo, Highway 51 and Ahura Mazda labels). There are also memorabilia from private collections and active input from those who were there.
The amount of detail is simply phenomenal. The book will appeal to all those with an active interest in the history of the British blues movement as well as those who lived and went to blues and folk clubs in the Bristol area at a time when it was probably the most important centre for homegrown country blues outside London.
It will also appeal strongly to those with musical interests on the other side of the Atlantic. Without the Matchbox label (and especially the Bluesmaster Series) many pre-war US country blues and gospel artists would simply have faded into obscurity. We would never have heard of blues musicians such Peg Leg Howell, St. Louise Bessie, Little Brother Montgomery and Blind Willie Davis. Nor would vast quantities of music from better-known artists such Blind Lemon Jefferson, Blind Willie McTell, Skip James, Big Bill Broonzy and Memphis Minnie be available commercially.
In many cases it has simply been a case of an artist or a piece of music surviving obscurity by a record collector having the last surviving 78 record from which Matchbox have revived a copy. The hard work involved in sourcing, compiling and cataloguing these blues collections is never fully appreciated and this book shines a light on one small company that does it so well. It is a remarkable story and one that deserves to be told. (IAN LOMAX)
Blues from the Avon Delta: The Matchbox Blues Story by Mark Jones (The Record Press, 120pp., £19.99), an exhaustive survey of “how Blueswailin’ Bristol kick-started Britain’s late 1960s’ country blues boom and became the epicentre of the UK’s DIY blues record label industry”. A labour of love, this painstakingly researched work, as well as providing a history of the 1960s British blues boom, lists all Saydisc (and related companies’) releases (complete with sleeve images). Blind Boy Fuller and Kokomo Arnold jostle with Jo-Ann and Dave Kelly, Peetie Wheatstraw and Furry Lewis with Mike Cooper and Ian Anderson – the result is truly an aficionado’s dream.
Jefferson Blues Magazine (Sweden): The Swedish Blues Society
BLUES FROM THE AVON DELTA - The Matchbox Blues Story: Mark Jones
The Record Press, 2021: ISBN 978-1-909953-76-5
There aren't many of us. But we exist. We who are morbidly interested in discographies, listings, matrix numbers and alternative takes. And this 114-page paperback in A4 format is an excellent example of what we like. This is the story of the blues part of Saydisc Records. Author Mark Jones has written another book about the label, “The Saydisc & Village Thing Discography”. But here the focus is on the blues of this company that was a leader in the English blues releases of the late 1960s. Over 100 LPs were issued between 1967 and 1987. Perhaps not impressive if you're used to Ace, Charly or Jasmine, but Saydisc was the pioneer who started it all.
The company was based in Bristol (upon Avon), home of some of the earliest clubs dedicated to folk music/blues. This gave birth to interest and Saydic's first staggering step was as publisher of folk music. But soon the company became an outlet for early reissue companies such as Sunflower, Kokomo and Highway 51. Today, these names say nothing, but at the time it was records that caused wet dreams after seeing their ads in magazines like Blues Unlimited and Blues World. At the time, LP´s was regarded as luxury goods and taxed, but if it stayed below 100 copies, the tax was avoided. Therefore, only 99 ex were pressed, which meant that you did not have to pay "VAT" on them. Which makes them highly valued collectibles 50 years later. Saydisc pressed the records and printed labels and covers. Some copies of Sunflower's "The Chicago Housebands" were sold to such illustrious clients as John Peel and Billy Boy Arnold. This was 1968.
In the same year, the label Matchbox was started, where newly recorded British country blues were combined with reissues of American ones. The LP "Blues Like Showers of Rain" featured the likes of Jo Ann Kelly, her brother Dave (later in The Blues Band) and Mike Cooper. John Peel played it on his radio show and the album inspired a generation of young British musicians.
Matchbox also pressed the Austrian company Roots editions for the UK market. When that deal ended, there were a lot of records pressed that lacked cover. I remember a train ride to London in the 70's when these were sold out in neutral unprinted cardboard covers for 50 p/piece. And the pound was seven crowns. Guess if the backpack was filled? The label Matchbox ceased in 1977 but resurfaced in 1982 with its Bluesmaster series, 36 LPs in all. They are now in 2021 reissued as six-CD sets.
For me, perhaps the most interesting releases were the Flyright-Matchbox Library of Congress Series. Six LPs of unreleased LoC material in collaboration with Flyright. Two more LPs came under Flyright's direction alone. A real music treasure, available nowhere else.
Well, there is as much as you could wish for to tell about Saydisc, and Mark Jones does. Extremely interesting if you are morbidly interested in a breakthrough of a company's publications. But it probably assumes that you know how the music sounds, here it is mainly about number series, design, number of pressed ex and so on. And pictures of all editions. Like I said, invaluable information.
Finally, the LPs that were published as complements to some of the books in Studio Vistas Blues Paperback's series, as well as the two double LPs that were published for Paul Oliver's book "Songsters And Saints", are also discussed.
It should also be said in this context that there were other companies that were there alongside Saydisc, but which for various reasons did not survive that long. For the poor sound quality so infamous reissue company Python disappeared. While Blue Horizon, which began back in 1965 with single editions, reached success with Fleetwood Mac. But it was Saydisc that made an effort worthy of hero status in reissues. Max W Sievert