Language of the Blues - Edmonton Blues Society

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The wardens at country prison farms were also Son House was
sentenced to hard labor on Parchman Farm, a.k.a. Mississippi State Penitentiary, for
shooting and killing a man at a house party, allegedly in self-defense. He did two years
before a judge in Clarksdale re-opened the case and had him released, on the condition
his name up and down
Songs:
- Son House (Eddie James House, Jr.)
- Big Bill Broonzy (Willie Lee Conley Broonzy)
- Robert Johnson
- Blind Lemon Jefferson (Lemon Jefferson)
C A T
suspect this use of cat stems from the Wolof word for singer, katt.
At least seventy percent of the Africans brought to the Americas as slaves came from two
major ethnic groups: the Mande from West Africa and the Bantu from Central Africa. 93
The Mande civilization was centered in the Senegambia region of West Africa and
included the Wolof, Bambara, Mandingo, Fula, and Serer tribes.
The Wolof are known for their celebrated griots, a hereditary caste of singers who keep
the oral history of the tribes in song, much like the bards of Europe did for the courts to
which they were attached. The Wolof word for griot is katt, which came to refer to any
highly accomplished musician. 94
In addition, the Wolof suffix -kat is agentive, meaning that it indicates a person. If you
add kat after an adjective, you create a compound word. For example: The Wolof
adjective hipi describes someone who is sh
hipi-kat
95
C.C. RID E R (see also Easy rider and Rider)
question remains: Who was C.C. Rider?
Civil War, C.C. stood for Calvary Corporal. Riding is probably the most common
54