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Delta Blues: The Life and Times of the Mississippi Masters Who Revolutionized American Music | 
| Author: Ted Gioia
Publisher: W. W. Norton
Category: Book
List Price: $27.95
Buy New: $18.45
You Save: $9.50 (34%)
Rating:  5 reviews
Sales Rank: 14138
Media: Hardcover
Pages: 448
Number Of Items: 1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.8
Dimensions (in): 9.2 x 6 x 1.5
ISBN: 0393062589
Dewey Decimal Number: 781.643097624
EAN: 9780393062588
ASIN: 0393062589
Publication Date: October 20, 2008
Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours
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| Editorial Reviews:
Product Description
The definitive account of how the rough sounds of the Mississippi Delta changed the course of American popular music.
The blues grew out of the plantations and prisons, the swampy marshes and fertile cotton fields of the Mississippi Delta. With original research and keen insights, Ted Gioia—the author of a landmark study of West Coast jazz and the critically acclaimed The History of Jazz—brings to life the stirring music of the Delta, evoking the legendary figures who shaped its sound and ethos: Robert Johnson, Charley Patton, Muddy Waters, John Lee Hooker, Howlin' Wolf, B. B. King, and others. Tracing the history of the Delta blues from the field hollers and plantation music of the nineteenth century to the exploits of modern-day musicians in the Delta tradition, Delta Blues tells the full story of this timeless and unforgettable music. No cultural force boasts such humble origins or such world-conquering reverberations. In this evocative rags-to-riches tale, Gioia shows how the sounds of the Delta altered the course of popular music in America and in the world beyond. 38 illustrations.
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| Customer Reviews:
 The Delta Blues come alive here January 1, 2009
Steven A. Peterson (Hershey, PA (Born in Kewanee, IL))
3 out of 3 found this review helpful
This is a wonderful work for those interested in the blues--and more specifically, the Delta blues. First thing to know: I used to think that the Delta blues came from the delta of the Mississippi River as it flowed into the Gulf of Mexico. Boy, was my geography wrong! The delta referred to is the land between and around the confluence of the Yazoo and Mississippi Rivers. And what blues players emerged from this poor, difficult country. To name some of them is to name some of the best known blues players of all time--Charley Patton, Son House, Mississippi John Hurt, Robert Johnson, Tommy Johnson, Howlin' Wolf, Muddy Waters, and B. B. King.
The book begins by examining the various ideas as to how the blues developed. The introductory sections also discuss how African-American music came to gain acceptance by the larger society (minstrel shows, for example). But the heart of the book is the exploration of the variety of blues singers and musicians. One problem to recognize at the outset is that very little is known about many of the earlier musicians, including people as important to the blues as Son House and Charley Patton. One aspect of the book that was compelling to me is the detective work by Ted Gioia, the author, to provide as much decent information as possible about the biographies of the men and women in the book. He tries to make sense out of sketchy information and earlier biographical sketches of the blues players.
The subsequent discussion considers the "Mississippi masters," one by one. Some are rather brief, given the paucity of information, of talents such as Louise Johnson or Willie Brown. Other are more detailed, where mode detailed and credible information is available. We read of Son House's battle between religion and music; we learn of the travails of Robert Johnson; the Odyssey of Muddy Waters from the Delta to Chicago.
The book concludes by examining how some of the old blues players were rediscovered in the 1960s and actually experienced career success in a way not possible earlier, such as Mississippi John Hurt or Son House or Bukka White. We also read of the possibility of a rebirth of talent in the Delta, with speculation about the future of the blues there. Once can quibble about stretching what we know of these old musicians based on limited evidence, but--all in all--this is a terrific addition to the literature on the blues and should be welcome to those interested in this genre.
Review of Delta Blues December 17, 2008
windsorsdad (Columbus, GA)
Excellent book. It gives a lot of good information about the formatino of the blues, from the turn of the century to its migration north to Chicago. there are a significant number of the lesser known blues singers that laid the foundation for the blues and rock and roll that we listen to today.
Blues Passion December 11, 2008
Robin Friedman (Washington, D.C. United States)
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
For many years, the blues of the Mississippi Delta were all but forgotten. With the combination of cross over or urbanized performances and scholarly interest, the blues have experienced a resurgence. Ted Gioia's new book "Delta Blues: the Life and Times of the Mississippi Masters who Revolutionized American Music" (2008) is the most recent work which carefully studies the Delta blues tradition Gioia is a performer and a scholar who began with an interest in jazz. As a young jazz musician, Gioia tells the reader that he thought that he understood the nature of the blues in terms of harmony, rhythm, and chord patterns. Only as a result of maturity and years of close study did he become aware of the "deeper essence" of the music (page ix). Gioia writes:
"I found myself listening to the same blues music I had heard in my youth with much different ears, and certainly no longer with the glib assurance that I had plumbed its depths. On the contrary, the music now seemed multilayered, otherworldly, elusive. I sensed a richness to these songs, especially the older blues from the Delta tradition, that I had missed before." (p. x)
Throughout the book, Gioia writes about the history of the Delta blues, the performers, and the music with passion and knowledge.
The history of the Delta blues can be divided into two large parts. The first is the traditional blues, performed by artists on the farms, plantations, prisons, juke joints, streets, railroad stations of the Delta itself. Generally traditional blues were performed by one person or sometimes two persons, singing and accompanying himself on guitar or harmonica. This type of traditional blues generally ended with Muddy Waters's recordings on the Stovall Plantation in Mississippi for Alan Lomax and the Library of Congress in 1943.
The second period of the Delta blues began when blues musicians migrated from the Delta and moved to Chicago or other cities. When they did so, they generally electrified their guitars and began performing in bands rather than as individuals. Their music became influenced by other musical styles and by commercial considerations. It led to rock and roll and then in turn became heavily influenced by rock. Here again Muddy Waters is the prototypical figure with his move to Chicago shortly after his sessions with Lomax.
In his book, Gioia discusses thoroughly both these forms of the Delta blues and he shows their relationship. But his heart clearly is with the early blues masters. This early music is wild, raw and primitive. In its anguish, simplicity, repeated guitar patterns, and harmonic quirkiness, it brought something to music that was not found elsewhere, either in the classics or in other forms of popular music. The Delta blues was music of outcasts and loners, of untutored musicians who lacking musical training struggled to express what was in them. The bluesmen lived undisciplined lives filled with wandering, alcohol, violence, prisons and Parchman Farm, and lost love. These passions they expressed through music.
Most importantly, many bluesmen were conflicted between what they perceived as their rootless, sinful life in the blues and the force of religion. The Delta blues show a distinctively metaphysical, personal cast. The tension between the life of a vagrant musician and a life devoted to God pervades the music of Son House, Tommy Johnson, Robert Johnson and others. Gioia is at his best when he describes this tension and gives it central place in his treatment of the Delta blues. He describes as well the origins of the music, its recording history, and the biographies of its practitioners. He analyzes the music in a way that lay readers may follow easily. In addition to the musicians that have now become well-known, Gioia describes obscure figures such as blueswomen Geeshie Wiley and the rare Delta woman blues pianist Louise Johnson.
Gioia offers as well a sympathetic portrayal of the Delta blues beginning in the 1940s with its urbanization and increased sophistication. His portrayals of Muddy Waters and Howlin' Wolf, and their relationship with Leonard Chess and Chess records in Chicago were brought home in the recent movie "Cadillac Records" which I found captured the spirit of this urban transformation of the Delta Blues. Besides Waters and Wolf, Gioia devotes extensive attention to the long careers of John Lee Hooker and B.B. King. Gioia's treatment of King is particularly detailed as he portrays King's early days in the Delta, his blues scholarship and knowledge, and the many transformations in his music and in its reception over the years.
Writing of the early Delta blues in particular, Gioia states "This is strange, wonderful music no less peculiar for having achieved lasting appeal and commercial success" (p.5). Gioia's in-depth treatment of traditional Delta blues has inspired me to revisit this great American music. The book includes an excellent bibliography and a list of 100 Delta blues songs for listening and study.
Robin Friedman
 A great book about......... December 2, 2008
Charles Wilder (Dover, NH United States)
5 out of 7 found this review helpful
the Delta Blues from early times to the present. This has to be a very frustrating subject to research and write about. The documentation is so very sketchy. The author is to be commended as well as the other researchers and writers he quotes. This is one of those wonderful books you run into every now and then that is serious but readable. No small thing! If you are at all interested in the Delta Blues you'll enjoy this book! To echo a previous reviewer, this book is appropiate for the beginner to the versed.
DELTA BLUES December 1, 2008
Stuart Jefferson (San Diego,Ca)
4 out of 6 found this review helpful
Hardcover,400 pages not including notes or index. There are 16 pages of black and white photos. There are also pencil sketches of some of the more important blues artists(Tommy Johnson,Muddy Waters, Robert Johnson,John Lee Hooker,and others)dealt with in the book. There is a list of 100 songs by various artists,which give the listener a very brief look into the various styles of blues mentioned in the text,with a few outside of the "delta" blues area. This is a good starting point for someone new to the blues,however,complete albums or compilations still give greater insight and enjoyment for most anyone who's interested in this area of music. The title might give the impression of a dry,intellectual treatise on the subject-"the blues". Nothing could be further from the truth. Blues music and it's practitioners,from the country blues singer to the more modern electric city blues artists,is very visceral. In this great book Gioia(author of THE HISTORY OF JAZZ) treats the blues as something alive and moving. His examination covers approximately 100 years of this wonderful music. Using various sources(archival,first-person interviews,etc.) as his starting point Gioia weaves a picture of the growth of blues music(and it's musicians) which is very readable,informative,and sometimes gives new insight,that's a bit different from other books of this type. Gioia not only writes about some of the important blues artists,and relatively unknown people such as Geeshie Wiley(sometimes spelled Geechie,whose music is really good if you can find it) but also the people in the background who,for better or worse,helped define blues music into what we know today. For someone new to this area of music,this is a good place to start. For others more knowledgeable,it's still a good addition to your library. The author besides being very knowledgeable,has a real feel for what he writes about. This is a good book on the blues-pick it up.
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