(Vocals, b. 1935) Singer Koko Taylor (née Cora Walton) earned the title ‘The Queen of Chicago Blues’ due to her no-nonsense, brazen vocal style. She writes much of her own material, songs that resonate with womanly power and assert her claim to blues royalty. Taylor grew up singing gospel in Memphis and switched to the blues after moving ...
Blues-rock guitarist Mick Taylor was born in Hatfield, Hertfordshire in 1949. A guitarist from the age of nine, he was in his teens when he formed a group with some school friends that subsequently evolved into the Gods. Taylor made two singles with the band. When Eric Clapton failed to turn up for a Bluesbreakers gig in Welwyn Garden ...
(Guitar, vocals, 1901–68) Born and raised in Georgia, James Arnold was taught to play guitar by his cousin. He moved to Buffalo, New York in his late teens and to Chicago in 1929. He worked outside music, making bootleg whiskey, but also played occasional jobs. He first recorded for Victor in 1930 as Gitfiddle Jim ...
(Piano, b. 1929) Since the late 1950s, pianist Cecil Taylor has maintained a prime position in the pantheon of free jazz. He was one of the first jazzmen to jettison standard chord changes, fixed rhythms and expected ensemble roles in the interest of musical democracy. Taylor developed his unorthodox style while studying at New England Conservatory. Duke Ellington ...
(Guitar, vocals, 1915–75) Many guitarists might sound as though they have extra fingers, but Theodore ‘Hound Dog’ Taylor, who did not become a full-time musician until he was well past 40, actually had an extra digit on each hand. Producer Bruce Iglauer founded the Alligator label in 1971 expressly to record the guitarist’s energetic, raw ...
(Guitar, banjo, mandolin, harmonica, vocals, b. 1948) Colorado’s Otis Taylor is the most inventive blues songwriter to emerge in recent decades. The Chicago native revives the genre’s role as protest music, often telling stories of lynchings, racial injustice and homelessness. His use of archaic Appalachian banjo tunings, droning progressions and digital delay creates ...
(Guitar, singer-songwriter, b. 1948) Discovered by The Beatles’ Apple label, for whom he recorded his first album in 1968, Taylor moved back to America to seek a cure for heroin addiction. He signed to Warner Bros and unleashed the three-million-selling Sweet Baby James in 1970, featuring the No. 3 single ‘Fire And Rain’. Although his early ...
(Singer-songwriter, b. 1989) Swift is a blonde, photogenic country singer-songwriter who achieved massive crossover success in mainstream America. Her eponymous debut peaked at No. 5 in 2006, and stayed in the Billboard 200 for the rest of the decade, achieving multi-platinum status. Two years later Fearless rocketed straight to No. 1 and included her most successful international ...
One of the young gunslingers who invigorated the blues in the 1960s, Buddy Guy (b. 1936) wowed audiences with high-octane guitar histrionics and energy that were matched by a tortured vocal manner. Guy is a master of dynamics, allowing a song to drift towards oblivion before suddenly bringing it back to a crescendo of intensity. Notable fans have included ...
(Guitar, vocals, b. 1958) Bell grew up among Chicago legends, including his harmonica-playing father Carey Bell. The self-taught guitarist was 17 when he joined Willie Dixon’s band and 19 when he toured with Koko Taylor. He had already built a reputation for wiry, envelope-pushing improvisations when he formed Sons of Blues with Billy Branch in the mid-1970s. ...
(Guitar, 1935–90) Respected sideman Lawhorn began a nine-year stint with Muddy Waters’ band in 1956 after working with harmonica players Sonny Boy Williamson II and Willie Cobbs, among others. Waters fired the Little Rock, Arkansas native in 1973 for excessive drinking. By then his razor-edged tone and imaginative soloing had already left an indelible mark on the blues. ...
(Bass, vocals, songwriter, 1915–92) Willie James Dixon was born in Vicksburg, Mississippi and moved to Chicago at the age of 11. He learned bass and made his recording debut with the Five Breezes in 1940. After the Second World War he formed the Big Three trio, with whom he worked and recorded until 1952. He began ...
Chicago blues is a raw, rough-and-tumble music, defined by slashing, Delta-rooted electric slide guitars, raunchy-toned harmonicas overblown into handheld microphones to the point of distortion, uptempo shuffled rummers, insistently walking bass players and declamatory, soulful vocalists who imbued the tunes with Southern gospel fervour. It became a universally recognized sound by the 1960s, ...
If you look for country music’s Big Bang, there is nothing more momentous than Bristol, 1927. Within four summer days, two stars appeared that would change the cosmology of country – remap the sky. And it all happened in a disused office building in a quiet mountain town perched on the state line between Virginia and Tennessee. Why ...
It was Louis Armstrong (or Leadbelly, depending on whom you believe) who came up with the famous final word on the definition of folk music: ‘It’s ALL folk music … I ain’t never heard no horse sing.…’ The quote has been repeated ad nauseam throughout the years, but it has not prevented strenuous debate about the meaning of ...
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An extensive music information resource, bringing together the talents and expertise of a wide range of editors and musicologists, including Stanley Sadie, Charles Wilson, Paul Du Noyer, Tony Byworth, Bob Allen, Howard Mandel, Cliff Douse, William Schafer, John Wilson...
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Classical, Rock, Blues, Jazz, Country and more. Flame Tree has been making encyclopaedias and guides about music for over 20 years. Now Flame Tree Pro brings together a huge canon of carefully curated information on genres, styles, artists and instruments. It's a perfect tool for study, and entertaining too, a great companion to our music books.
David Bowie
Fantastic new, unofficial biography covers
his life, music, art and movies, with a
sweep of incredible photographs.