When the major record labels, like Columbia and Victor, figured out there was money to be made by selling blues, jazz, gospel, and down home country music, sometime in the mid to late 1920s, they started sending out small armies of field recording units to cities like Atlanta, Dallas, New Orleans, San Antonio, and Memphis, to see what talent they could find. In the Bluff City, a place that has always been blessed with a rich musical tapestry, field recording units first arrived in 1927, with annual follow-ups taking place every year. But with the advent of the Great Depression, 1930 was something of a "last hurrah" — with visits by Brunswick/Vocalion in February, and by Victor in May and November of that year. Sadly, it would be more than eight years before another record company would send a field unit to Memphis, which happened late in June 1939, when Vocalion set up shop for two weeks. Recruiting more than a dozen artists, they waxed almost 170 titles over a two week period — only taking time off for Sunday, July 2nd and July 9th, when no recordings took place at all. With the exception of Little Buddy Doyle, who made three titles on Saturday, July 1st, most of the first week was devoted to country and western. The Alley Boys of Abbeville — named after their hometown in Louisiana — kicked things off on Saturday, June 30th, cutting some 16 sides. Hank Penny and Roy Acuff were in the studio two days later, cutting almost three dozen titles over a four day period, with The Andrew Brothers and Slim Smith dominating the proceedings on Friday, July 7th. It was back over to the blues for Saturday, July 8th, when Charlie Burse cut ten sides, with the Swift Jewel Cowboys taking over for Monday and Tuesday, July 10th and 11th. Wednesday, July 12th was another bluesy day, with Blind Boy Fuller, Bull City Red (aka "Brother" George Washington) and Sonny Jones waxing a total of 18 sides. After Gene Steele (6 titles) and the Swift Jewel Cowboys cut a few more sides, for the rest of the trip, it was blues all the way. Bull City Red, Jimmy DeBerry, and Sonny Jones all cut titles on Thursday, July 13th, with recordings by Jack Kelly and Little Buddy Doyle commencing the next day, Friday the 14th. Finally, Charlie Burse returned on Saturday, July 15th. After cutting an additional ten titles, the engineers at Vocalion called it quits. Over the two week period, they'd cut a total of 168 sides on more than a dozen artists. Years later, the son of one of the recording engineers said that the events of July 1939 were (we can only hopefully assume) fondly remembered — through a haze of marijuana smoke — perhaps the major contributing factor to the largely unknown identities of the accompanying musicians on the blues sessions (which, if it ever was known, has now been lost to the sands of time). For the city of Memphis, when Vocalion wrapped things up and left town, it marked the end of an era. No further recording activity would take place in the Bluff City until 1950 — when a man by the name of Sam Phillips set up shop just a few blocks east of downtown, at 706 Union Avenue. But as they say, we’ll have to leave that for another time. A most special thanks to Howard Rye, Chris Smith, and Tony Russell for their inestimable help and research assistance with this episode. Pictured: One of the top sellers on Vocalion at the time, Blind Boy Fuller. This episode is available commercial free and in its original full-fidelity high quality audio exclusively to our subscribers at Bandcamp. Your annual subscription of $27 a year will go directly to support this radio show, and you’ll gain INSTANT DOWNLOAD ACCESS to this and more than 120 other episodes from our extensive archive as well. More info is at http://bluesunlimited.bandcamp.com/subscribe Don't forget to install the PodOmatic Podcast Player app for iOS so you can listen to Sleepy Boy Hawkins wherever you go! Details at http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/podomatic/id648258566?mt=8
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