Last of the Great Mississippi Delta Bluesmen: Live in Dallas- traditional blues album winner

[rcarlton]

The Blue Shoe Project, a local nonprofit label run by Jeff and Michael Dyson, put out the Grammy's traditional blues album winner: Last of the Great Mississippi Delta Bluesmen: Live in Dallas, featuring Honeyboy Edwards, Pinetop Perkins and the late Henry James Townsend and Robert Lockwood Jr.

The CD can be found here.

[rcarlton]

Went to the pre-Grammy party. Awesome.

CONCERT REVIEW: Blues gala in Grapevine perfect for Dallas tie to Grammy nomination

12:00 AM CST on Sunday, February 10, 2008
By MATT WEITZ / Special Contributor to The Dallas Morning News
guidelive@dallasnews.com

GRAPEVINE – It was a nearly perfect melding of blues' past, present and future at the Palace Theatre Arts Center on Friday night as Blue Shoe Project celebrated the Grammy nomination of its Last of the Great Mississippi Delta Bluesmen: Live in Dallas for best traditional blues album.


RANDY ELI GROTHE/DMN
At 92, Chicago's David 'Honeyboy' Edwards sings the blues at the Palace Theatre Arts Center in Grapevine on Friday night.

The gala's keynote player was Chicago's David "Honeyboy" Edwards, who performed in the 2004 Dallas concert recorded for this album with Joe Wille "Pinetop" Perkins, Henry James Townsend and Robert Lockwood Jr. Of those four elder statesmen of the blues, only Mr. Perkins, 94, and Mr. Edwards, 92, survive.

Blues' present came in performances by Denton's Bone Doggie and the Hickory Street Hellraisers, white boys who did a fairly good job of conducting the blues through their own unique filter, including a sultry version of the pop-rockabilly standard "Stray Cat Strut."

The future hailed from St. Louis in the person of a 17-year-old blues prodigy Marquise Knox, who has been closely associated with Blue Shoe Project, a Colleyville-based nonprofit group that promotes awareness of the blues. Blue Shoe recorded the classic 2004 blues concert at Dallas' Majestic Theatre.

"I'm a bluesman. That's me," Mr. Knox said to the crowd on the show date that was also his birthday. He essayed a group of songs that not only showed off his chops but also revealed a sensitive side, addressing such subjects as the passing of a beloved uncle.

Then it was time for Mr. Edwards, who recently appeared in the Walk Hard mockumentary as Dewey Cox's (John C. Reilly's) first musical muse.

There might be a stitch in his step and rasp to his voice, but Mr. Edwards was completely in control of the stage from the moment he stepped upon it. His guitar was turned up, loud, and his supple slide playing had all the power of another classicist, Blind Willie Johnson. ("Oh, I met him a time or two," Mr. Edwards said earlier of the player whose "Dark Was the Night, Cold Was Ground" was chosen for inclusion on the Voyager deep space probe. "Nice guy, very personable.")

Mr. Edwards played with strength and power throughout the show. He may have stood for the historical part of the evening's equation, but there was no sense of diminished capacity or honorable mention in his performance.

When, at the evening's finale, Mr. Knox and the Hellraisers joined him onstage, it was a near-perfect encapsulation of the past, present and future of an American art form.