Furry Lewis: 1893 - 1981

A songster, blues musician, and consummate entertainer, Furry Lewis was a true original. Acknowledged as a master of slide and finger-picking guitar styles as well as a witty personality and raconteur of the blues’ gestating heyday, his music stemmed from ragtime, Delta blues, and the flavorful sounds of hometown Memphis jug bands. Lyrically, Lewis served up vivid images of social issues and folklore, laced with humor that still have staying power. Furry Lewis was one of the few blues artists who remained just as dazzling a performer in his eighties as in his Beale Street youth.

Walter “Furry” Lewis was born to sharecropper parents on March 6, 1893 in Greenwood, Mississippi. His father left the family before he was born. The rest of the family relocated to Memphis when Walter was six years old. By fifth grade he had given up school to help support the family income. His first guitar was fashioned from a 2 x 4, a cigar box and some screen door wires twisted around bent nails. From this homespun model he taught himself the basics.

Memphis was also home to the renowned musician W.C. Handy, who must have spotted the young boy’s promising talent and bought him a genuine Martin guitar to sustain his dedication. As a teenager Lewis was eager to get out and perform so he hit the road hoboing and playing for tips. In 1916, while jumping a freight train to save money, his foot got caught and his leg was severed.

Sporting an artificial leg and realizing his itinerant musician days were over, Lewis returned to Memphis and began playing on street corners and in local clubs. He hooked up with fellow Memphis players like Jim Jackson, Will Shade of the Memphis Jug Band, and Gus Cannon‘s Jug Stompers. It was the golden age of Beale Street, a mecca for music clubs, gambling houses, saloons, and free-flowing liquor. It became Lewis‘s stomping grounds and schooling. Memphis being a river city, the junction between Tennessee, Mississippi, and Arkansas attracted the roustabouts off riverboats and all the wide open spending that came with them.

Lewis also joined traveling medicine shows, helping to attract crowds while the snake oil salesman delivered his pitch. For Furry it became an all-consuming course in how to entertain. In addition to telling jokes and doing sketches he developed a variety of guitar skills, adding bottleneck style by sliding a knife blade over his strings, finger-picking, flat-picking, or playing on his lap Hawaiian style. Even flashy showmanship like playing behind his head. He added a variety of accompaniment techniques to suit a particular vocal need and learned to project his voice to the back of the house without a mike. While the pitchman sold liniments and elixirs, Furry sold the blues.

Lewis’s recording career began with two trips to Chicago to record for the Vocalion label. These sessions produced both solo sides and some with second guitar and mandolin. He would eventually record a total of 23 songs for the Vocalion and Victor labels between 1927 and 1930 including definitive versions of “Stack-O-Lee,” “Kassie Jones,” and “John Henry.” His own compositions like “Judge Harsh Blues” and “I Will Turn Your Money Green” were well-crafted, with lyrics that could be both humorous (“Been down so long, it looks like up to me.”) and dark ("I believe I'll buy me a graveyard of my own/I'm gonna kill everybody that ever done wrong."). The latter used to great effect by psychobilly blues singer Jeffrey Lee Pierce in the early 80s.

Unfortunately these sides sold poorly and with the Depression’s dent in the record industry Furry Lewis faded into obscurity, working as a street sweeper for the Memphis Sanitation Department for a living. However, Lewis enjoyed a resurgence late in life. His rediscovery in 1959 by blues historian and record producer Sam Charters proved that he hadn’t lost any of his musical talents and led to more recognition than he’d ever imagined.

With Charters at the helm he recorded two albums in 1961, his rich baritone and brilliant guitar work fully intact. Lewis moved into the spotlight of festivals and concerts during the 60s and was immensely popular as a colorful character of a bygone era as much as his proficiency at the blues. In the early 70s he toured with rock acts like Leon Russell, The Rolling Stones, and the Alabama State Troupers. Furry Lewis remained musically active and essential until his death in 1981.

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