The story of the birth of American music starts not in New Orleans, where this journey begins, but in West Africa. Men and women from Ghana, Senegal and as far south as Namibia were captured, enslaved and transported to the United States where many were put to work on Southern plantations.
Against this backdrop of forced labor and opression, slaves found in music temporary escape and a chance to express hope for something better. With most instruments banned, music could be made only with the voice, hands and feet. That music, at first a fusion of the musical traditions of different African tribes and, eventually, a mix of African and New World influences, formed the first tentative notes of what would become jazz in New Orleans and blues in the Mississippi Delta. Jazz and blues went on to underpin the subsequent development of almost all popular music and have played a key role in the cultural and social emancipation of African-Americans.
The voyage from West Africa to New Orleans was, however, just the start of a journey which took jazz and blues around the world. At the end of the bitter Civil War, Southern slaves were freed yet a system of perpetual debt and unfair legislation tied blacks to plantations for many years to come. Slowly, however, the lure of jobs and rights in America’s northern cities, most notably Chicago, lured Southern workers north along the ‘Blues Highway’. The growing mechanization of the cotton industry prompted yet more to travel as jobs in the South were lost.
A steady stream of north-trekking families grew into the ‘Great Migration’ which saw hundreds of thousands of black Americans abandon the South during the first half of the twentieth century. By 1943, when Muddy Waters bought his railroad ticket out of Clarksdale, Mississippi, the exodus was reaching its peak.
As these itinerant musicians and families traveled, so they took music with them. Early jazz musicians from New Orleans were among the first to migrate. In the Bronzeville ghetto of Chicago, jazz gave voice to a whole people. Mississippi Delta bluesmen roamed north along the Blues Highway, developing a taste for music in every town and city along the way. Memphis, St Louis, Davenport and, finally, Chicago all began to hear the intoxicating rhythms of jazz and blues. That music met other influences and continued to develop. In Memphis, Delta blues, country music from nearby Nashville and Southern gospel music fused to create rock & roll. In Chicago, blues developed into a more refined and urbanized sound and was amplified for the first time to make itself heard in noisy South Side clubs.
The Blues Highway: New Orleans to Chicago traces the development of one people’s culture expressed through music and tied, as it is, to one very specific geographic region. That region is the narrow stretch from New Orleans to Chicago as defined by the Mississippi River, Highway 61 and the railroad track.
How to use this book
The Blues Highway: New Orleans to Chicago is a music and travel guide. You’ll find detailed and specific information on the music’s history, landmarks, venues and artists. But you’ll also find detailed information on every aspect of planning and enjoying a successful trip including where to stay, where to eat and even what to see beyond points of musical interest.
Almost all information in this book is found within the relevant sections of the main route guide. So, for example, if you want to read about the roots of zydeco music, you’ll need to look in the Lafayette section since that’s where zydeco music is played. The planning details in the front section of this book and the ‘Who’s who of Blues Highway music’ in the appendix are the only information sections not contained within the main route guide. There is, of course, a comprehensive index in the back to help you.
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