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Legends of Music Lonnie Johnson The man who pioneered guitar solos Lonnie Johnson (left) playing in Chicago, 1941 O ne of my all time guitar favorites is American Blues guitarist/vocalist, Lonnie Johnson. He had a great voice, and in my opinion, one of the best in the blues genre. He played exacty the right amount of notes to enhance his songs too. He wasn't a speed - freak, playing at breakneck pace, up and down the neck, he made the notes count, much the same as Eric Clapton does. If you listen to his classic song "Another Night to Cry" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n8fyb9v pIc0 you will hear what I mean. In this YouTube clip, he is introduced by the legendary harmonica player, Sonny Boy Williamson. Lonnie is playing a single pick up Kay style leader. Many of the electric bluesmen played Kay's, as they were inexpensive at the time, much like the acoustic Stellas that dominated the scene before electric guitars were introduced.Lonnie up until then, played an acoustic and here's an earlier, solo acoustic rendition of "Too late to Cry". which is similar in style to the first song. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xDRg3X MfU94&feature=related Here too, Lonnie demonstrates an equal proficiency in both genres. You will also notice that both versions sound full within themselves, which is the mark of a true artiste. 20 Lonnie Johnson was born in New Orleans in 1899 and he was fortunate to be born into a family of musicians. He learned guit ar and violin in his father's group by his late teens and in 1917, he toured the UK with a revue show. Upon his return to the States, he learned that all of his family, except for his brother James, had died in the 1918 flu pandemic. This was the last great 'wipe out' virus, also called Spanish Flu, to hit the world as a global pandemic. Estimates put the death toll somewhere between 50 and 100 million people worldwide. Strangely however, it hit mainly young, healthy adults, as opposed to the normal flu, which hit s the very young and elderly the most. After this family tragedy, Lonnie had a number of jobs, working on Riverboats and in a duo with his brother. Like many bluesmen, Lonnie entered a contest which he duly won in S t.Louis and the prize was a record deal with Okeh records This was an independent label who signed blues artistes for their 'Race Recording" arm, which proved extremely successful. They had a policy of recording acts live, known at the time as 'remote' or 'location' recording, and they would send out mobile recording units to places like St. Louis, Atlanta, New Orleans, San Antonio, and other places where artistes plied their trade, outside of the major cities of New York and Chicago, where such artistes would not have been heard. Okeh signed Johnson as a Blues artiste, this was a tag he was never comfortable with, as he saw himself in a wider musical vein. He said "I guess I would have done anything to get recorded - it just happened to be a blues contest, so I sang the blues." I often wonder why the music industry proper, has always chosen to put artistes into 'boxes'. The same with the media as a whole. It puts constraints on artistic freedom as many musicians and songwriters, write and play across a whole range of styles. We actually live in a world of 'boxes' as such constraints suit the marketing morons who constantly bombard us with products they want us to buy and via such marketing ploys, seek to entice us into their sticky fly paper world. It wasn't just about blues for Lonnie, he recorded in 1927 with jazz great Louis Armstrong and a year later, he recorded with Duke Ellington. He is widely accredited with pioneering the guitar solo on the 1927 track "6/88 Glide" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_pV9nO6r YN4 You can hear this solo lies more in the jazz vein than blues and contains note clarity, melody and improvisation, that in terms of records at the time, was indeed a pioneering fact. Lonnie in the early days, played quite a few tunes using a 12 string guit ar and influenced other greats like Charlie Christian and French guitarist, Django Reinhardt. He MUSIC MAKER
also teamed up with jazz guitarist Eddie Lang and history recalls that they were the first black and white musicians to record together, but because of the intense feeling and hatred, towards mixing races, in whatever form in White America back then. Eddie used a stage name of Blind Willie Dunn to mask his race and skin colour. Thankfully, this fascist attitude has long since receded in the population as a whole, although there are still some areas of the States that one would certainly hover a question mark over. Musicians and music have always led the way in building bridges between peoples and nations and long may they continue. Even way back in history, you can view from this picture of a Christian musician, having a jam session on lutes or Ouds, with a Muslim musician. It's a shame that all politicians aren't musicians as they may find far more common ground in solving the world's problems than they currently do. MUSIC MAKER I gather by now you have realised that Lonnie was into improvisation, more than the formatted blues structure. He was leaning more towards jazz, yet with root s in blues, which I think came more from his songs than his instrumentals. His vocal style was more sophisticated than most blues singers, as you can tell by his smooth delivery. Put the two together in juxtaposition with the times in which he plied his trade, and you have one of the main pioneers of the cross over blues/jazz genre, and certainly the most influential guitarist of his generation and beyond. Like all African Americans, he wrote about the social conditions that he lived and grew up in, and the subtle sentiment s of love relationships. He recorded many songs and instrumentals with Okeh and played with many other artistes during his fruitful career. In the late 1930's, he switched labels and signed to Decca Records. He used an electric guit ar for the first time on a session with Joshua Altheimer in 1939. With the end of WW11 in 1945, the guitar scene became more electric and Lonnie moved into this genre with ease and played more in the Rhythm and Blues style with a group of other notable musicians. In the late 40's he had a huge hit with a song called "Tomorrow Night" and although he didn't write the song, he put his own interpret ation to it and it topped the Billboard "Race Records" chart for 7 weeks. Race Records was the 'box' that the record companies and media put music by African Americans into and thankfully, that racist philosophy has long since been confined to the more shameful part of musical history. He toured the UK in the 50's and my old legendary bandleader paid tribute to him by changing his name from Tony to Lonnie. I am referring to the man who started the British pop music industry rolling, Lonnie Donegan, whom I had the pleasure of playing with in the early 70's. As with all top musicians over time, Lonnie Johnson's popularity waned and he took a job as a hotel janitor. He was again re-discovered and signed a deal with Prestige Records. He continued recording and touring into the late 60's until he was hit by a car whilst walking in Toronto, Canada. He suffered serious injuries and never fully recovered from these. He died in 1970 and was inducted into the Louisiana Blues Hall of Fame in 1997. In my opinion, he should have been honoured with every accolade possible for the massive contribution he gave to guitar playing. A true legend if ever there was one. Paul Brett 21
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