Extraordinarily Wild and Unaccountable : Charters Double Bill

 

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"Any musician who accompanied himself was construed as a country blues singer.So it was that Sam Charters' Country Blues (1959) devoted most of its pages to artists like Broonzy (a fixture of Chicago blues),Lonnie Johnson (a St. Louis bluesman),and Leroy Carr (an Indianapolis musician) [also Blind Lemon, Blind Willie McTell, Robert Johnson, Brownie McGhee, Muddy Waters, Lightnin' Hopkins etc-JQ].Although it was the focal point of his work,Charters made no attempt to explain the characteristics of 'country blues' : he merely brandished the term as a superlative.He concocted a dualism (country/city blues) in much the same way that folklorists would create diametrical opposites of 'folk' and 'pop' music, the one profound, the other shallow. The 'country blues' are described as 'intense', 'intensely personal', 'moving', and 'sensitive', as compared with 'dull, obscene party blues,' or 'thin, suggestive or tasteless blues'. The country blues singer has 'emotional depth' and 'earnest, deep sincerity. 'He is something like a noble musical savage."-Stephen Calt, I'd Rather Be The Devil.

                                        
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