Robert Johnson:  1911 - 1938

Robert Johnson’s impassioned world of hellhounds, crossroads, and deals with the devil are forever imprinted on the history of the blues.  His mysterious legend and brilliant musical legacy have led to immeasurable influence and inspiration, making him one of the most important blues artists of all time. Only twenty nine of his country blues songs were recorded, yet each intimate and highly ornamented track consolidates his musical genius. Johnson’s style has had wide-ranging impact on everyone from Muddy Waters and Elmore James to Bob Dylan and Eric Clapton.

What separated Johnson from the rest of the itinerant blues artists of his day was the incredible command of all musical facets. His guitar work was stunning; a facile, talking guitar style which cunningly echoed his vocals. Long spidery fingers plucked those rich, far away notes and bottom string walking bass riffs. He sang in an aching falsetto awash in pathos. And his songwriting, though distilled from a tradition of already established blues motifs, captured the essence of the blues so coherently. Every note was perfectly placed, every metaphor brilliantly balanced, wrapped in the struggle of good vs. evil.

Robert Johnson was the illegitimate son of Julia Dodds and a farm worker named Noah Johnson, born May 8, 1911 in Hazelhurst, Mississippi. At three years old he was sent to live with Julia’s husband, Charles Spencer in Memphis. The boy was a disobedient handful and eventually returned to his mother‘s care in the cotton plantations near Robinsonville, Mississippi. He went by the names Spencer and Dodds until learning of his real father’s name and changed to Johnson.

Teenage Robert’s first self-taught musical instrument was the harmonica, but he yearned to play the guitar. Seasoned bluesmen Son House, Charley Patton, and Willie Brown played local Delta picnics and parties and young Johnson absorbed whatever pointers he could, though he was usually mocked by the older men. In the juke joints of the local lumber yards and road gangs Johnson latched onto a teacher and mentor named Ike Zinnerman. For several years he hung out with the unrecorded bluesman learning all he could about the blues and playing guitar.

Johnson married in 1930 and when his wife died during a childbirth he remarried in 1931. He was a relentless wanderer of the Delta and spent little time at home, resolved to becoming a blues musician. Son House recalled that he and Willie Brown met up with Johnson again in about 1933. When they heard him play guitar the two men were slack-jawed with disbelief. His mastery of the instrument in such a short span was staggering. In those days, the acquisition of incredible skill or luck was usually identified with making a deal with the Devil at a crossroads at midnight. In southern black culture the church condemned all secular music as an association with the devil. Robert and other blues musicians figured prominently in this myth. Only a superstitious explanation could explain such runaway talent.

Roaming the Delta as an itinerant bluesman fed Johnson’s restless nature and his reputation. He caught freight trains anywhere on a whim and was known to travel as far away as St. Louis, Chicago, Detroit, New York, and Canada. Two trips to Texas landed him recording sessions. The first in a San Antonio hotel room in November 1936 produced sixteen sides (plus eight alt. tracks.) The second and last in a Dallas warehouse in June 1937 where the remaining thirteen classics were cut (plus six alt. tracks.)

Johnson met his unfortunate end in a Greenwood, Mississippi juke joint one hot August night in 1938. Johnson’s jug of whiskey was poisoned after the proprietor had learned of an affair with his wife. He was only twenty seven years old. A few months later famed record producer John Hammond tried in earnest to recruit Johnson for his Carnegie Hall Spirituals to Swing concert only to learn that he was too late. Another case of what might have been. By Tim Kirker

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