Customer Reviews

Memphis Blues: Birthplace Of A Music Tradition (TN) (Images of America)

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I was very much looking forward to reading this book as my MemphisHistory web site has an expanding section on the Memphis blues. First of all it is important to know that this is a thin book filled mostly with photos, which is fine I suppose.

Many of the photos I had not seen before, which is good. What became absolutely bizarre is that by page 36 the author was up to the birth of WDIA. The Memphis blues were at their most important from 1900 to the late 1920s. After that, economics drove blues acts from the delta to Chicago with a brief stop in Memphis at most.

The author goes on to praise and give space to bands such as "Moloch" a white, critic's darling band of the 60's. While there are multiple pictures of white pop artist Jim Dickinson there are no pictures of Memphis Minnie or Frank Stokes. Further there seems to be a lack of knowledge of who was who in the early blues scene.

After covering WDIA the author divides the rest of the book between Sun Records, Stax and the Blues Awards hosted annually in Memphis. In that way he is able to integrate two pictures of Kenny Wayne Shepard and one of ZZ Topp without any of Sleepy John Estes or Frank Stokes.

Memphis has a great musical heritage covering multiple genres. The blues heritage we had ended fairly early in the 20th century, but I thought that was what this book would be about. Ultimately it appears that the author used the book to sneak in pictures of his friends and acquaintances.

Local, current DJ "Tater Red" is shown in two photos, but there is no photo of Walter Horton... I think you get the idea.