Latest Living Blues features Jimi “Primetime” Smith

Living Blues #282 features Chicago bluesman Jimi “Primetime” Smith. His first gig at age 13 was backing his mother, Chicago drummer Johnnie Mae Dunson’s, friend Jimmy Reed at the 1973 Ann Arbor Blues & Jazz Festival. Smith’s journey in the blues has certainly been atypical. Now, at age 63, he has absorbed all of the masters of his past and is his own blues man. Newcomer Stephen Hull is a Wisconsin-based guitarist and is another of the rising young blues players looking into the deep past of the blues while striking out on his own forward-looking path.

Writer, photographer, musicologist, historian, and producer Samuel Charters’ career was instrumental to our understanding of blues, jazz, and world music. We take a deep look at Charters’ remarkably broad career and influence.

This issue’s Let It Roll focuses on Chris Strachwitz’s 1960 field recordings of Mance Lipscomb that were the impetus for launching the classic Arhoolie Records. Lipscomb’s music predated the blues. Born in 1895 he was a classic songster who could play anything.

All of this plus the latest in Blues News, Breaking Out with Gervis Myles, LB Talks To Breezy Rodio, and over 55 record reviews.

Digital and print subscriptions to Living Blues start at just $18.