Music...

I am much a frustrated musician...  so that makes me sexually frustrated... musically frustrated... I'm sure there are a host of others that are just eluding me right now... 

It's difficult to live in the Mississippi Delta and NOT feel the music from this area...  Robert Johnson... Muddy Waters... Howling Wolf... and many many many many others...  its insane to think of the professional musicians that I have met just from being from this area...

I remember when the British Invasion happened... after the introduction of the BeaTles to the United States... we had bands like The Rolling Stones (name from a Muddy Water's song), The Animals, The Yardbirds, and many many others that were citing the Mississippi Delta as the source of their musical inspiration...




I remember the first time I ever heard "Crossroads" by Cream... listening to Jack Bruce singing about "going down to Rosedale..."  and thinking... "Damn... how'd they know about Rosedale?!?!?!"  Of course, I wasn't aware enough to realize that "Crossroads" was their cover of an old Robert Johnson song...  

And of course, "Crossroads" refers to the intersection of Highways 61 & 49... supposedly the sight where Robert Johnson sold his soul to the devil for guitar playing skills... Story has it that Robert Johnson was booed out of a juke joint because he was so bad... a few weeks later he played again and everyone was in awe of how much he had improved... and the story was born...

 "Highway 61" has always been referred to as the Blues Highway, because that was the path that many of the old bluesmen took in order to get away from menial cotton-picking jobs, and having a real attempt at making some serious money in the clubs in Memphis, St. Louis, and Chicago...  The Memphis Blues does differ from the St. Louis Blues as they do from the Chicago Blues... different influences...


When I would read about my favorite guitarists, among them Eric Clapton and Jimi Hendrix, they would always cite Buddy Guy as their main influence...  Buddy Guy has to be the least known best guitar player I've ever heard and had the honor to see perform...


Whenever friends and I get together.. jams sessions invariably break out... and one of the songs we love playing the most is an old B. B. King song...  this one... if you have about nine minutes.. watch this video...




It's BB King and Gary Moore playing together... Gary Moore was the guitarist for 'Thin Lizzy'...


B.B. was born and raised just a few miles over that-a-way... (points that-a-way)... 


Music has become such a large part of my life... if I weren't a frustrated college professor, I would probably be a REALLY frustrated working musician...