The blues will never die. It is one of America's greatest musical treasures. A roots music form that evolved out of African-American work songs, field hollers, spirituals, and country string ballads more than a century ago, the blues is the foundation of American music in the 20th century, including jazz, rhythm and blues, rock and roll, and hip hop.
[Robert Connely Farr on meeting bluesman Jimmy "Duck" Holmes]:
"I just love that man. What he's doing for the blues. He wants to give it away. The blues is alive through his teaching. He'll teach anyone that comes in there that wants to learn. And the only thing he asks that you do, is give it away. You go show somebody else what's goin' on."
I dig his take on Catfish Blues, from the album "Cypress Grove."
Holmes never plays the same song twice — each performance is a snapshot in time. He learned from Henry Stuckey, "the father of the Bentonia blues." The style is passed down from one musician to the next by word on Mississippi porches.
"If you cannot explain something in simple terms, you don't understand it yourself. The ultimate test of your knowledge is your ability to convey it to another." – Richard Feynman
This is, in part, what this project is about. Let's play some blues.
