Available NOW -- Scheduled for RELEASE fall 2003
Angels on the Backroads Vol. 4
--
Catfish Row to Jackson Square
Volume 4—Catfish Row to Jackson Square
Stepping out of the Delta at Vicksburg
we’re on the last leg of what feels like a musical maelstrom on a
steady march south. It’s a march starting with
“Dudlow Joes” (those are boogie-woogie piano players) in
Vicksburg and on down U.S. Highway 61 with music from the Rabbit Foot
Minstrels, Jimmie Rodgers’ Blue Yodels, jazz of the
‘Prez,’ Little Walter’s “Juke,” the folk
music of Leadbelly and the Cajun National Anthem -- “Jolie
Blonde” (in French of course).
New Orleans “...put it in a pot, stir
it up and serve it hot.” We’ve gathered sights and
sounds from the earliest rhythms of the dance captured by Louis Moreau
Gottschalk in his tune “Bamboula” which Eddie recreates on
the guitar. Then there is the early jazz of Buddy Bolden
performed in New Orleans style on a city sidewalk. We follow
Jelly Roll Morton from his boyhood home on Frenchman Street and allow
his music to give us a listen to the art of this city before there were
recorders to preserve it. We pay our tributes to Spencer
Williams, Sidney Bechet and Louis Armstrong, and we search long and
hard for the incredible jazz and blues guitar of Lonnie Johnson.
In the quiet choir loft in the St. Louis
Cathedral at Jackson Square, just before 2 o’clock in the
afternoon, Eddie offers a “Sweet Hour of Prayer” to honor
and commemorate the efforts of all those angels who have enriched our
world with their passion for life. A lesson to learn, a moment to
reflect, a time to remember... it’s all captured right there in
their music.
RECORDING LOCATIONS
1. Vicksburg Blues - Little
Brother Montgomery - Shade of a tree near Levee Street - Vicksburg
2. New Someday Baby - Sleepy
John Estes - Early 20th Century office of Rabbit Foot Minstrels - Port
Gibson
3. Mississippi River Blues - Jimmie Rodgers-Clifton Avenue overlooking the Mississippi
River in Natchez
4. Prez Returns - Lester
Young - Wilkinson County Museum - Woodville, Mississippi
5. Juke - Little
Walter - Le Theatre des Bon Temps, Performing Arts Center - Marksville,
LA
6. Midnight Special - Huddie
Ledbetter - Louisiana State Penitentiary at Angola, Louisiana
7. Jolie Blonde - Hackberry Ramblers - Old house
place near Sunshine, Louisiana
8. Buddy Bolden's Blues - Buddy Bolden (Jelly Roll Morton) - Perdido Street - New
Orleans/Buddy Bolden's home, 2301 1st Street - New Orleans
10. Wolverine Blues - Jelly Roll Morton - Site of Red Onion (762 S. Rampart St.)
11. Mr. Jelly Lord - Jelly
Roll Morton - Front Porch of Jelly Roll Morton's boyhood home,
Frenchmen Street, New Orleans
12. Mamie's Blues - Mamie
Desdoumes (Jelly Roll Morton) - Duncan Plaza
13. Basin Street Blues - Spencer Williams - Basin Street/St. Augustine Church (St.
Claude & Gov. Nicholls) - New Orleans
14. Hotter Than That - Louis Armstrong's Hot Five - St. Augustine Church
15. Tomorrow Night - Lonnie
Johnson - Pearl Street Studio - Iuka, Mississippi
16. Sweet Hour of Prayer - William B. Bradbury - Choir loft of St. Louis Cathedral - New
Orleans
Baker’s Dozen -- in Louisiana they call it
Lagniappe
If you’ve been tallying up all the songs so
far you’ll see that the promised 61 adds up to be more like 65.
Don’t think of it as two guys who can’t cipher.
Think of it as a little something extra.
Lagniappe!
Follow this link to see and read of our journey.
