Othar Turner and The Rising Star Fife and Drum Band

Brooklyn Slim and Willie "Big Eyes" Smith

Junior Kimbrough, Lil' Dave Thompson & R L Burnside in the Green Room

R.L. Burnside was born in 1926 in Harmontown, Mississippi . He lived most of his life in Holly Springs doing farm work and began playing guitar in the 1950’s at local juke joints and parties. He appeared in the documentary “Deep Blues” and according to his Fat Possum Record Label, “He was the last genuine performer of raw Mississippi Hill County sound.”

Big Jack Johnson was born in Lambert, Mississippi in 1940 and was considered one of the best blues guitarists to come out of Clarksdale. His nickname, “The Oil Man,” refers to his day job as an oil truck driver. In 1962 Jack teamed up with Frank Frost and Sam Carr and the trio recorded and performed for years. Jack sang about worldly troubles but also about hope and redemption.

Othar Turner was born in 1907 and grew up plowing fields and chopping cotton. He taught himself how to make and play a fife when he was a teenager. He played at social gatherings with his Rising Star Fife and Drum Band and was the oldest African American fife player in America.

Brooklyn Slim (Paul Osher) was the first white musician to play with Muddy Waters. He learned guitar and piano while watching and listening to the greats of the blues- Otis Span, Pinetop Perkins, Sammy Lawhorn and Luther “Snake” Johnson.

Steve Guyger grew up in Philadelphia and after hearing blues recordings with harp player John Gunning, became hooked for life. He learned special techniques on the harmonica from Big Walter Horton and the Chicago style of playing from Frankie Padini.

Bob Gaddy was born in West Virginia in 1924, the son of a coal miner. He started playing piano in church when he was a young boy. Later, the blues became his style while serving in World War 11. He became prominent in the New York blues scene.

David “Junior” Kimbrough was born in Hudsonville, Mississippi in 1930. He reinvented the blues with his different approach he called cottonpatch blues, “capturing a late night feeling, a floating, dreamy quality of that last stretch until dawn.” (Delta Blues) He opened his juke joint in Chulahoma, Mississippi near Holly Springs in 1992.

Buddy Guy began playing in around Baton Rouge in the early 1950’s. In 1967 he became one of the most acclaimed new breed of blues guitarists. “It’s the blues that keep you young. When you stretch that string, you’re stretchin’ your life.”- Guitar Legends Magazine 1994

Willie “Big Eyes” Smith was born in Helena. Arkansas in 1936. He played drums with Muddy Waters for fifteen years where his traditional “shuffle” style was regarded as the heart and soul of Chicago Blues. Smith cofounded The Legendary Blues Band with Pinetop Perkins, Louis Meyers, Calvin Jones and Jerry Portnoy.

Hubert Sumlin was born in Greenwood, Mississippi in 1931. He moved to Chicago to play with Howlin’ Wolf and was best known for his "wrenched, shattering bursts of notes, sudden cliff-hanger silences and daring rhythmic suspensions." He was inducted into the Blues Foundation Hall of Fame in 2008.

“Lil” Dave Thompson was born in Hinds County, Mississippi in 1969. At the age of fourteen he formed The Delta Blues Band and went on to play with Delta legend Roosevelt ‘Booba” Barnes. Dave played every juke joint in Mississippi blending his contemporary guitar sound with that of the Delta.

Al Green was born to a sharecropper family who raised cotton. He formed the gospel quartet, The Green Brothers, at the age of nine. When he was sixteen he formed a rhythm and blues band, Al Green and his Creations.

Frank Frost was born in Auvergne, Arkansas around 1936 or 1938. He began playing piano for his church, then guitar. Touring with Sonny Boy Williamson 11 he learned how to play the harmonica. He move to the Mississippi Delta around 1960 and joined Big Jack Johnson’s group. In the 1970’s his trio, The Jelly Roll Kings, was rediscovered by blues enthusiast Michael Frank.

Pinetop Perkins (Joe Willie Perkins) was born in Belzoni, Mississippi in 1913. He was a barrelhouse blues pianist from before his teens. In 1969 he replaced Otis Spann in the Muddy Waters Band and was voted the Best Paino Player at the 1988 W C Handy Awards

Born Michael John Robillard on October 4, 1948, in Woonsocket, R.I., Duke has carved out one of blues' most illustrious legacies, while also trodding some lofty related territories as a guitarist, vocalist, songwriter, bandleader, studio sideman, producer, label operator and educator. After showing an early affinity for music and guitar, he founded Roomful Of Blues with pianist Al Copley in Westerly, R.I., in 1967. By adding horns, Roomful announced itself emphatically as the prototypical jump blues band, and became a New England legend and a fixture beyond, as did Duke himself.

-from Duke Robillard’s website

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