King of the Delta Blues: The Life and Music of Charlie Patton [Paperback]

Stephen Calt (Author)

Product Details

• Paperback: 341 pages
• Publisher: Rock Chapel Pr (June 1988)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0961861002
• ISBN-13: 978-0961861001
• Product Dimensions: 9.5 x 5.7 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #585,115 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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12 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Great research by Wardlow marred by Calt's poor presentation, December 25, 1996

By A Customer

This review is from: King of the Delta Blues: The Life and Music of Charlie Patton (Paperback)

This book is fairly essential to those interested in the music of Patton and his contemporaries, as it is based on the comprehensive research on the subject by Gayle Dean Wardlow, research which is largely unavailable elsewhere. Unfortunately, Calt's presentation of this information is poor at best, and downright malicious at times. His writing is typically peppered with ad homien attacks at his subjects, and this book is no exception. The book is also in desperate need of thorough editing... one sometimes wonders how it got published at all.

9 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Jaundiced but interesting, August 4, 1999

By A Customer

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: King of the Delta Blues: The Life and Music of Charlie Patton (Paperback)

Calt denigrates almost every other bluesman of that time and place--except, perhaps, Robert Johnson. Still, the book contains invaluable information about an elusive subject. Anyone who admires Patton's work and is interested in the period should be able to tolerate Calt's excesses. His bile is put to better use in his bio of Skip James--whom Calt knew personally. That very quirky (and sometimes fascinating) book becomes as much a study of the author as of his subject. And they deserved each other.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Extremely informative...but read between the lines, July 14, 2006

By 

S. Lutes - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: King of the Delta Blues: The Life and Music of Charlie Patton (Paperback)

Calt and Wardlow detract from an otherwise spellbinding read with over-the-top invective and demeaning comments about Patton's blues playing contemporaries and rival blues scholars. I see their attack on Evan's work is perpetuated by a reviewer of this book. Oh well, it says more about them than it does about their subject matter. Never mind, it's very much worth reading anyway. Patton is, along with Robert L. Johnson, and perhaps Skip James, an absolute one-of-a-kind musical genius and personality who could be copied but never surpassed at his own game.


This book will be expensive now, but it's well worth the investment for those with an interest in Charlie Patton, his life and times, and the music that he and his peers produced during the first decades of the 20th century. Be sure and balance it against the work of others (I would suggest Evan's "Big Road Blues, which I find a bit arid and pointy-headed, too)) just to get other views and to better appreciate the needless bile Calt and Wardlow let spill in pursuing their personal musical jihad.