Mississippi Hill Country Blues Blog
Hill Country Blues is a style of blues that has a broad definition in the world of Mississippi blues. My friend Jack Austin and I have spent some time trying to come up with a working definition by interviewing the practitioners and analyzing performances by the same. Surprisingly enough there has been very little written on the subject since 1967. So, we’ve traveled down south, drank the Kool-Aid (Moonshine that is), and took in the environment to the point where it all makes sense…at least to us. Especially when there’s BBQ, good music, and cool people involved.
The region we are talking about in Mississippi (MS) is a stretch of farm country between Holly Springs and Oxford. This is just a little south of the Tennessee boarder. We are talking about a place that despite the history of Civil Rights violations and mechanical farming practices evolving, people that lived there didn’t take part in the Great Migration like the number of people from the Delta. And as we know, the Delta Blues are what found it’s way to Chicago and it created a whole recording industry that probably is what most people think of when they think about the blues. It’s much deeper than Muddy Waters. One beautiful April day I stood in the field where the Hill Country Picnic takes place every June, breathed in the air, and took in the scenery where I got it immediately. People didn’t leave because the Hill Country is a beautiful place. It’s isolated from the bigger cities like Memphis and Clarksdale. It was easier to just do your own thing without any interference from the Crackers and Peckerwoods. Take a drive down Highway 7 sometime. You’ll see what I mean.
In its petri dish of isolation, the Hill Country music and culture was able to maintain some of its original characteristics without any influence from the recording industry. For example: some of the original characteristics of the blues were stripped down to a twelve-bar form for it to be packaged and sold on record. I’ve had the privilege in my life to play with some of the original Delta musicians. I thought I knew what the blues were before I met and played with David “Honyboy” Edwards in his apartment on the South Side of Chicago. The forms and chord changes don’t come up as expected. There was more of an emphasis on supporting the lyrical drama and changing to emphasize the intent. Honyboy would kind of grin at my struggles to keep up. It made me question why I went for a degree in Jazz Studies, which spent a lot of time explaining the proper way to improvise on blues changes. So by studying the history of the music I found out that when a musician came up from the Delta to Chicago the record producers tried to take this raw form of the blues and clean it up, even to the point of changing some of the lyrics to make it more palatable to a record buying public. Or, it could have been a misunderstanding of the music itself. Musicians like Big Bill Broonzy, Lovie Austin, Tiny Parham, and many more would help newly transplants from the south “clean up their act” for “The Man”. Thus, taking away a lot of the beauty of the blues and its poetry. Even more reason to check out the Hill Country Way.
The question at this point would be: “What makes up the characteristics of Hill Country Blues besides the region it is named for”? Let’s start with its origins which can be traced back to West Africa through the slave trade.
If you want to hear the whole story set to music look up the band Afrissippi. They are a current musical group from the Oxford area who blend North Mississippi Hill Country Blues with traditional West African Griot music. Griots are the keepers of the history, the poets, and the musicians who make sure the culture is never forgotten in West Africa. They are traditionally nomadic. A good number of the enslaved people in the North MS Hill Country were from a tribe called the Fulani people. Afrissippi’s lead vocalist and song writer, Guelel Kumba, is Senegalese and comes from the Fulani Griot tradition. In the song he wrote, “Njulli/Fulani Journey”, he tells the story of how the music came to the Hill Country narrated by John Sinclair.
The song starts out as a traditional sounding West African song sang in its native tongue. Like one of the main ingredients in Hill Country Blues, this is a one chord vamp that is more rhythmic and hypnotic like most traditional West African Music. One thing I love about this type of music is that the drums not only lay down the beat but enhance the melody by adding to it. Almost as if they were playing a melody of their own but also adding to the conversation. The instrumentation of Afrissippi blends modern instruments with traditional African instruments. Hence the name, Afrissippi.
In the song Njulli/Fulani Journey John Sinclair takes you through the history of the tribe that dates back about 6000 years. They were a tribe of nomadic herds people who started out in Egypt. They traveled with their cattle in search of grass and water south down the African continent for hundreds of years. They were in the desert when it was still green. When the water dried up there, they moved farther south and west, ending up in West Africa. This is where most slaves were from who were sold to American plantation owners. And for hundreds of years, they held on to their traditions, their stories, and music. This was despite the sad reality of Colonialism and the American Slave trade. There’s a reason to celebrate that these traditions found their way to the North Mississippi Hill Country. That’s some strong stuff Man! Over the years they may have different names for the same people, but the ancestors are still in the mix. Afrissippi has brought this celebration full circle.
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