Born in Hazlehurst, Mississippi, in 1911, Robert Johnson has been said to be one of the most influential blues artists of all time. It is easy to understand why, seeing as he was one of the first to create modern blues by linking the country blues of the fields to the city blues. Unable to work in the fields during the Depression, Johnson set out with his guitar to find his life as a musician. He started out performing in the Mississippi and Arkansas Deltas at small-time clubs, and then partnered up with Johnny Shines to perform in St. Louis, Detroit, and Chicago. These sessions were recorded in three days, spread out over November 1936 and two days in June 1937. He recorded only 29 songs in his career, but they are considered to be worth their weight in gold as far as influence is concerned. Eric Clapton, Keith Richards and Jeff Beck all see him as one of the greatest performers of all time and started playing because of the type of music he created. He died, however, from a poisoning by a jealous husband, August 16, 1938. He was the first Early Influence to be inducted into the Rock Hall of Fame, in 1986.
Born in 1891, Jelly Roll Morton can be credited for weaving together blues, ragtime, stomp and european influences into the modern sound of jazz. As talented a compser and bandleader as he was a pianist, Morton spread his influence far and wide. His most prolific work was in the twenties, when he toured with Jelly Roll Morton's Red Hot Peppers. Like Johnson, he brought the life and energy of his New Orleans background, complete with its harmony-based music, and fused it with the virtuostic soloing that had taken Chicago by storm. He work is best reflected in a series of small-band recordings done by RCA Victor, where he worked with such legends as Kid Ory, Johnny Dodds and Baby Dodds. His festive stomps and blues were some of the arliest foundations of rock and roll. He was inducted in to the RHoF in 1998, but wasn't around to see it, having died some 57 years ago.
Lead Belly, or Huddie Ledbetter, was another performer who never got to see his greatest dreams achieved, having died before a broder public knowledge of his work came into focus. His life was certainly not an easy one, as he went in and out of jail, only to find a poverty stricken existence waiting for him on the outside. He was born sometime around 1885 in Louisiana, and set of to find himself (with a guitar) at the age of sixteen. He studied under Blind Lemon Jefferson, and soon mastered the blues, country songs, spitruals, prison songs, and folk ballads, to name a few. He had a quick temper, though, and was charged with murder in 1917, and attempted murder in 1930. He was released because of his playing abilities, the second time largely due to John and Alan Lomax, who were recording southern musicians when they first heard him. He then moved to New York, where he took a shine to the folk songs from that area and period. He worked in the day as a chauffeur for Alan Lomax, and at night as a perfomer. Like his good friend Woody Guthrie, he took part in political rallies and performed for labour unions in his later years. He died in 1949, six months before a white group, the Weavers, covered one of his songs, "Goodnight, Irene" and made it a hit. He was inducted to the RHoF in 1988.
