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Date: Mon, 06 Aug 2001 21:11:19 -0400
From: Pat Missin
Subject: Re: prewar texas harp players

Tom wrote (about Freeman Stowers):
>
>He did once record a piece called "Texas Wild Cat Chase" for Gennett, as
>well as an unreleased one called "Texas Wild Cat Hunt." I've never
actually
>heard either of these, but according to Godrich & Dixon (1969 edition)
>these two pieces have no harp at all, but are simply "animal imitations
>without harmonica."

That's true. As well as the cat chase impressions, he also did a glorious
piece called "Sunrise on the Farm", another animal impression piece. You can
hear this, "Texas Wild Cat Chase" and his two solo harp pieces, on Document
DOCD-5106 "Sinners and Saints 1921-1931". His harp playing is pretty good,
but it's kind of hard to dance to his animal impressions. (BTW, the same CD
also has some early gospel harp by Blind Roger Hays.)

>Hmmm... leave it to Gennett; they really had their
>fingers firmly on the pulse of the American Record Buying Public, eh?
>

Actually, I think many of the record companies had no real idea of what
African-American music to put on record back in the early days. Personally
I find this fascinating as many guys made it onto 78s in the early 20s who
would have been laughed out of the studio a few years later, my personal
favorite being a guy called Hezekiah Jenkins. He recorded way back in 1924
and I find his harp playing is quite charming, although in many ways it
really
wasn't very good and was quite outdated even by 1924 standards. I think the
record company soon caught on and he was not allowed to play harp on his
later
recordings!

If you're interested, you can find his complete works on Document (yet
again!)
DOCD-5481 "Blues Obscurities 1923 - 1931" along with much other, ermm,
obscure
blues.

-- Pat.