The Roots Of The Blues: An African Search (Da Capo Paperback)

Arts & Photography

Charters, Samuel

Music

Da Capo Press

The Legacy Of The Blues

From the field cries and work chants of Southern Negroes emerged a rich and vital music called the country blues, an intensely personal expression of the pains and pleasures of black life. This music--recorded during the twenties by men like Blind Lemon Jefferson, Big Bill Broonzy, and Robert Johnson--had all but disappeared from memory until the folk music revival of the late 1950's created a new and appreciable audience for the country blues.On of the pioneering studies of this unjustly-neglected music was Sam Charter's The Country Blues. In it, Charters recreates the special world of the country bluesman--that lone black performer accompanying himself on the acoustic guitar, his music a rich reflection of his own emotional life.Virtually rewriting the history of the blues, Charters reconstructs its evolution and dissemination, from the first tentative soundings on the Mississippi Delta through the emergence, with Elvis Presley, of rock and roll. His carefully-researched biographies of near-legendary performers like Lonnie Johnson, Blind Boy Fuller, and Tampa Red--coupled with his perceptive discussions of their recordings--pay tribute to a kind of artistry that will never be seen or heard again. And his portraits of the still-strumming Sonny Terry, Brownie McGhee, Muddy Waters, and Lightnin' Hopkins--point up the undying strength and vitality of the country blues.

The Country Blues

Blues is a language—one which has evolved its own rules and which is the sole property of a culture always forced to the periphery of white society. As such it is a political language. Whether it is passed as a legacy from African village to Mississippi farm, or from farm to Chicago ghetto, or from ghetto to Paris cafe, it is part of a larger oral heritage that is an expression of black America. Makeshift instruments, runaway slaves, railroads, prisons, empty rooms, work gangs, blindness, and pain have all been involved in the passing of this legacy, which has moved from hand to hand like a bottle of whiskey among friends and which now, for whatever reasons, seems faced with extinction. As Lightnin' Hopkins says: "I see a few young musicians coming along. But it's not many. It's not many at all, and the few that is—I'll tell you, you know what I mean, they don't have it. They just don't feel it. . . . I never had that trouble. I had the one thing you need to be a blues singer. I was born with the blues."With an awareness of the urgency involved, and with considerable devotion, Samuel Charters has chosen twelve major bluesmen, each whom represents a major facet of the blues, and has written about them. Rather than adopt the voyeuristic tone of the academician, he has used the direct visceral images that have always composed the blues. Also included are interviews, photographs, lyrics, and separate chapters on the black experience in America, and the evolution of the blues language from its African origins. Samuel Charters has renewed contact with the greatness of the blues legacy—from the haunting lyric songs of the bluesmen like Robert Pete Williams and Lightnin' Hopkins to the fiercely joyous shouts of Champion Jack Depree, Memphis Slim, and Mighty Joe Young.

The Legacy Of The Blues: Art And Lives Of Twelve Great Bluesmen (Da Capo Paperback)

Biographies & Memoirs

Arts & Literature

Da Capo

The Blues Makers is Samuel Charters's monumental study of the blues, its makers, and the environment from which they merged. IT was originally published in two separate volumes, The Bluesmen and Sweet as the Showers of Rain, and for a long time languished out of print. Now, with the addition of a new preface and a new chapter on Robert Johnson which reconsiders his life and art based n recently uncovered information, The Blues Makers takes its rightful place as one of the greatest blues books of all time.Samuel Charters has long been considered a leading authority on the blues, and here he explores the personal, social, and musical backgrounds of the great blues makers. Charters proceeds from Mississippi, through Alabama and Texas, Memphis and Atlanta, to the Atlantic Coast and the Carolinas, stopping on the way to examine the music and lives of native blues makers such as Skip James, Furry Lewis, Sleepy John Estes, Robert Johnson, Blind Lemon Jefferson, Memphis Minnie, Willie McTell, Tommy Johnson, Ishman Bracey, Son House, The Memphis Jug Band, Charley Patton, and many others. In a style remarkable for both its clarity and its beauty, Charters analyzes these men and their work, using musical and textual examples and extraordinary documentary photographs. The result is simply one of the most remarkable books ever written on the blues.

The Blues Makers

"I went to Africa to find the roots of the blues." So Samuel Charters begins the extraordinary story of his research. But what began as a study of how the blues was handed down from African slaves to musicians of today via the slave ships, became something much more complex. For in Africa Samuel Charters discovered a music which was not just a part of the past but a very vital living part of African culture. The Roots of the Blues not only reveals Charters's remarkable talent in discussing African folk music and its relationship with American blues; it demonstrates his power as a descriptive and narrative writer. Using extensive quotations of song lyrics and some remarkable photographs of the musicians, Charters has created a unique contribution to our understanding of both African and American cultures and their music.

Uniquely emphasizing how writers of fiction, poetry, and drama talk about what they do, this introduction to literature lets the words of writers guide students in their exploration of the many ways to read, think, and write about literature.

Literature and Its Writers: An Introduction to Fiction, Poetry, and Drama

Literature & Fiction

Charters, Ann

History & Criticism

St Martins Pr

Uniquely emphasizing how writers of fiction, poetry, and drama talk about what they do, this introduction to literature lets the words of writers guide students in their exploration of the many ways to read, think, and write about literature.

Literary

Bedford/St.Martin's

Literature and Its Writers : An Introduction to Fiction, Poetry, and Drama

VERY GOOD CONDITION. 2004 3rd Ed. TEXT is clean and without marks or highlighting BINDING is tight and square COVER has almost no edge wear and about 1/2 ' wide small corner curls on front, on about the first 120 pgs (of 1721 pgs). prompt shipping, good service, careful packing. free Delivery Confirmation.

Literature and Its Writers: A Compact Introduction to Fiction, Poetry, and Drama

Leaders & Notable People

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Books by Charters, Samuel

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Charters, Samuel. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

The Roots Of The Blues: An African Search (Da Capo Paperback)

The Legacy Of The Blues

The Country Blues

The Legacy Of The Blues: Art And Lives Of Twelve Great Bluesmen (Da Capo Paperback)

The Blues Makers

The Roots Of The Blues: An African Search (Da Capo Paperback)

Literature and Its Writers: An Introduction to Fiction, Poetry, and Drama

Literature and Its Writers: An Introduction to Fiction, Poetry, and Drama

Literature and Its Writers : An Introduction to Fiction, Poetry, and Drama

Literature and Its Writers: A Compact Introduction to Fiction, Poetry, and Drama