Vicksburg Heritage League: Vicksburg in the News

By Walt Grayson
walt@wlbt.net

People are happy to be singing the blues again. Live music was becoming a thing of the past. Until now. Every 2nd and 4th Tuesday the bands play it like there's no tomorrow in Vicksburg.

The Central Mississippi Blues Society sponsors it. And it's a place you can go and I can go and get happy hearing the blues.

Just after dark, the cars start claiming the precious parking places at L.D.'s Kitchen by the river front, just across from the Murals in downtown Vicksburg. People are coming here to hear live blues. The free crawfish buffet at intermission might be a draw, too. But it's the music that's the pied piper. Live blues in clubs and juke joints was once as common as cotton in Mississippi, it was everywhere. Now, there’s a revival of live music going on in Vicksburg .

"Live entertainment was kind of dying out. We are trying to bring it back and give people the feel of real good live entertainment “said Dennis Fountain. And it’s working.

Dennis Fountain is a member of the Central Mississippi Blues Society. He'll be singing tonight. So will Abdul Rasheed. He's the talent coordinator for the Society and says although blues was born in the Delta, it has lots of cousins. And the Society plays them all.

Malcolm Shepherd is the president of the organization. There is almost a missionary thrust to reviving these live performances. "Our goals are to promote the blues, to provide education on the blues, and to promote live music and to treat the blues as a performing art and a literary art and an educational tool."

I love King Edward. I could listen to him play and watch his face and expressions all night. It was quite a show. And the only way you didn't have a good time is if you weren't here.

Shepherd said, "Everybody around the world knows where the blues started, and that's my home state, Mississippi."

So the blues is back in town. And that makes everybody happy. Every 2^nd and 4th Tuesday at L.D's in Vicksburg.

Legendary Mississippi Musician, BO DIDDLEY, the originator of the hambone beat, an influence on generations of bands and music, has passed, June 2, 2008.

Bo Diddley was born in Mississippi and raised in Chicago, where he was exposed to music and the blues. After studying violin and trombone, he took up the electric guitar. Diddley's flamboyance, square (often homemade) guitars and distinctive backbeat (sometimes described as "shave-and-a-hair-cut") earned him a record contract with Chess Records, and in 1955 he had his first hit with the two-sided "Bo Diddley/I'm A Man." Although he had several hits in the late 1950s and early 1960s, and appeared on TV with Dick Clark and Ed Sullivan, Diddley's aggressive beat, suggestive lyrics and raw performances ended up making him more influential than rich and famous. Still, he continued performing into the 21st century, and was recognized as an influence on artists ranging from Buddy Holly to The Rolling Stones. He was inducted into the Rock 'n Roll Hall of Fame in 1987.

He was born Ellas Bates but later took the last name of Gussie McDaniel, a cousin who helped raise him... The exact origin of his stage name is unknown; some sources say he picked it up while boxing as a young man, others that it came from a one-string instrument called a diddley bow... "Who Do You Love" (written by Diddley and later covered by George Thorogood) and the Who song "Magic Bus" are two songs with the distinctive Bo Diddley beat.

Lucille Ridges, founder of the Vicksburg Blues Society, is moving to Denver and handing the reins of the growing group over to Shirley Waring.

"I'm really counting on Shirley to take it to the next level," said Ridges, who created the VBS in 2002 and has since served as acting president. "The society is primed to do some great things for the blues and for Vicksburg, and I believe Shirley will be able to make them happen as president."

A farewell party and performance will take place at LD's Kitchen Tuesday night, during which Ridges said she will play alongside the The Blue Monday Band, a group of musicians presented by the Central Mississippi Blues Society at LD's every other Tuesday. More