Brakeman's Blues

Where I'm from, the name “Jimmie Rodgers” is a name that's heard frequently. I live about thirty minutes from Meridian, MS, where Rodgers was born. There's a music festival named after him that's a big part of the East Central MS region and has been for many years. There's a museum dedicated to him and his music, as well as some of his family who helped him along the way. There are roads named after him in the Meridian area (I was involved in the field work leading up to the Jimmie Rodgers Parkway during my working days), and in the city's Highland Park, there's a monument dedicated to him that's been there many years.

All that being said, I really didn't pay much attention to the music of Jimmie Rodgers during my youth or for most of my adulthood. I attended the Jimmie Rodgers Festival several times, including this past year when they presented a couple of shows at the Mississippi Arts + Entertainment Experience (details below) in Meridian, but his music, and his legacy in a variety of musical genres, really didn't click with me until the last couple of years.

Rodgers monument - Highland Park, Meridian, MS

Jimmie Rodgers (1897-1933) is recognized as the “Father of Country Music,” and is in the Country Music Hall of Fame and the Songwriters Hall of Fame.  However, did you know that he is also in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as an early influence? Not only that, but he is also in the BLUES Hall of Fame, having been inducted in 2013. I guess that was really when I started paying attention. I'd heard bits and pieces of his music over the years, but really sort of disregarded it.  I wasn't a big fan of modern country music, so even going to the Jimmie Rodgers Festival, there were only a few of the artists that I really liked.

Over the years, though, I've heard lots of blues artists talk about growing up listening to the Grand Ol' Opry on the radio....country music and gospel music (on the radio or at church) really being the only music they had access to for a long time, so it only made sense that their own music would be influenced somewhat by the music they heard on the radio.

Then I started digging deeper into the Pre-War music of the Mississippi Delta. I discovered that some of the blues artists of the area played with Rodgers, either on stage or as co-workers on the railroad. A lot of the Pre-War artists that I began to listen to....Houston Stackhouse, Robert Nighthawk (then Robert Lee McCoy), Hammie Nixon, Frank Stokes, Rubin Lacy, Ishmon Bracey, the Mississippi Sheiks, and most notably, Tommy Johnson knew, influenced, were influenced, and even played with him . Just about every blues performer from Mississippi was influenced either by his recordings or his performances.....Mississippi John Hurt has some Rodgers influence in his playing (check out "Let The Mermaids Flirt With Me") and Howlin' Wolf claimed that his howl was influenced by Rodgers's yodel.....and Rodgers even recorded with black blues musicians like Louis Armstrong, St. Louis guitarist Clifford Gibson, and the Louisville Jug Band.

Jimmie Rodgers Museum in Meridian, MS

During my recent visit to the Mississippi Music Museum, I noticed a display dedicated to Rodgers, which sort of rekindled my interest in him and his music. A couple of months later, I had a doctor visit in Meridian and the Jimmie Rodgers Museum is located a couple of blocks away, so I decided to stop by and check it out. It's a nice little museum with a lot of Rodgers memorabilia....some of his clothes, a few guitars and a piano, plus other items donated from his family. It's a good 45 – 60 minute tour and the museum has free admission (donations are welcome).

On his Facebook page, Peter Guralnick had recently mentioned a new book about Rodgers, a biographical novel written by musician Paul Burch titled Meridian Rising that sounded interesting. The museum had this book for sale, so I picked up a copy.  It's an imagined autobiography of Rodgers (Burch also recorded a fascinating album dedicated to Rodgers with the same  title in 2016) that incorporates several blues artists and movers and shakers of the time within it's pages, including Charley Patton, H.C. Spier, Rallph Peer, Sam Chatmon, and even a young Howlin' Wolf (listed here as "Chester").  It's a thoroughly enjoyable book, especially if you're familiar with Rodgers, his music, or the blues....actually, it's enjoyable even if you're not familiar.

It would appear that people are starting to remember and appreciate Rodger's contributions to not just country music, but just about every other popular genre as well, and he gave and received a lot of influence to the blues that I never really knew about.

Keep in mind that when Rodgers started playing music, there was NO style of music called Country.....or Blues. Back in those days, genres were not as big a deal as they are today, where even blues gets compartmentalized into ever smaller sub-genres.  Traveling musicians in Rodgers' era, black and white, had to be able to play a pretty diverse repertoire to satisfy whatever audiences were listening, black and white. 

I've always thought it was ridiculous to have SO many different genres of music. When I was growing up in the 70's, you actually had radio stations that played MULTIPLE musical genres over their air waves and, lo and behold, we all managed to survive this. Even today, my playlist on my mp3 player in my car includes blues, jazz, gospel, country, rock, pop, reggae, Cajun/zydeco, soul, R&B, and even world music.  Clinging to one genre will certainly deprive music lovers of a lot of great music.

Working on the railroad, Rodgers crossed paths with a lot of different people, black and white, and he also absorbed their influences in his music.  His singing style replicated a lot of blues singers and his songwriting also focused on subjects that rang true with anyone who listened to the blues, so his music appealed to both white and black listeners at the time.  He recorded 13 "Blue Yodels" during his career, which served as an influence for how blues songs would be structured in future recordings, so whether white country music fans were listening to Rodgers, they were also hearing the blues.

There are a lot of Jimmie Rodgers recordings out there that collect his work, but I was interested in finding one that provided a good sampling of his more blues-related material to see if I could pick up what influenced a lot of these older blues artists and also what he might have picked up from those older blues artists, maybe some who never had the opportunity to record.

Happily, I found just the recording via the UK record label Catfish.  2001's Brakeman's Blues captures 24 of Rodgers' blues songs (about 40 of his 110+ recordings are considered blues), and all 13 of his "Blue Yodels."  Listening to these tracks, you can't help but notice the similarities in song structure, lyrical content, and vocal delivery.  It also shows how vital the blues were in the formation of early country music and much of that is due to Jimmie Rodgers.

All 13 of the "Blue Yodel" songs are worth hearing, but here are three noteworthy examples that can be linked to the blues genre directly.  The first is, of course, "Blue Yodel No. 1 (T for Texas)," a number that has been covered in multiple genres.  Another one is 1930's "Blue Yodel No. 9 (Standing On The Corner)," which features Louis Armstrong on trumpet and Armstrong's wife Lil Hardin on piano, and his last one recorded just a couple of days before his death, "Blue Yodel No. 13 (The Women Made A Fool Out Of Me)."

Rodgers also recorded "Let Me Be Your Sidetrack" in 1931 with St. Louis blues guitarist Clifford Gibson, but his label didn't release it at the time because they feared backlash with Rodgers recording with a black musician (Armstrong and his wife were not credited on "Blue Yodel No. 9") and had him re-record it performing solo.  Here is the unreleased version (listed as Take 2), with Gibson officially listed as guitarist.  

Other standout Rodgers' blues tracks include "In The Jailhouse Now," "My Good Gal's Gone Blues" (with the Louisville Jug Band), "Pistol Packing Papa," and "TB Blues."  Rodgers' lyrics are pretty raw and direct, compared to the standard fare of the day, but there's also some good humor in his words as well.

I spent most of my life more or less disregarding the music of Jimmie Rodgers.  Little did I know how much of an influence he was not just to country music, but eventually rock n' roll and, yes, the blues.  If you are a blues fan, especially of the older pre-war blues recordings, take a little time and give Rodgers' recordings a listen, especially the "Blue Yodels," and you'll discover that the connection between blues and country music is a pretty close one.