Edward James "Son" House Jr. (March 21, 1902 – October 19, 1988) was an American Delta blues singer and guitarist. He was known for his emotional singing and slide guitar style.

After working as a preacher and avoiding non-religious music for many years, he began performing blues at age 25. He quickly created a unique style by using the strong rhythm, powerful voice, and deep emotions from his preaching in his new music. His career was briefly interrupted by time spent in Parchman Farm penitentiary. Despite this, he became skilled enough that Charley Patton, a top blues artist in the Mississippi Delta, invited him to perform together and join him for a 1930 recording session for Paramount Records.

These recordings were released at the start of the Great Depression but did not sell well and did not bring him national fame. Locally, House remained popular. In the 1930s, he was the leading musician in Coahoma County, performing with Willie Brown, a colleague of Charley Patton. He influenced musicians such as Robert Johnson and Muddy Waters. In 1941 and 1942, House and his band were recorded by Alan Lomax and John W. Work for the Library of Congress and Fisk University. The next year, he moved from the Delta to Rochester, New York, and stopped performing music.

In 1964, House was rediscovered and encouraged to return to music by people like Alan Wilson, a member of the band Canned Heat. The next year, he released an album called Father of Folk Blues (1965). He relearned his songs and became an entertainer, performing for young audiences at coffeehouses, folk festivals, and concerts during the American folk music revival. He was billed as a "folk blues" singer. He recorded several albums, and some informal concerts were later released as albums. In 2017, his song "Preachin' the Blues" was added to the Blues Hall of Fame.

Biography

Son House was born in a small village called Lyon, north of Clarksdale, Mississippi. He was the second of three brothers and lived in the countryside of the Mississippi Delta until his parents divorced when he was about seven or eight years old. His father, Eddie House Sr., was a musician who played the tuba in a band with his brothers and sometimes played the guitar. He was a member of a church but also drank alcohol. For a time, he left the church because of his drinking, but later stopped drinking and became a church leader. Young Eddie House followed his family’s tradition of being religious and attending church. He also loved music, but only sang and did not play instruments. He disliked the blues because of his religious beliefs.

When House’s parents divorced, his mother moved him to Tallulah, Louisiana, which is across the Mississippi River from Vicksburg, Mississippi. When he was a teenager, they moved to Algiers, New Orleans. Later in life, he said he hated the blues and loved going to church (he called himself "churchy" and "churchified"). At fifteen, while living in Algiers, he began giving religious speeches.

At nineteen, while living in the Delta, he married Carrie Martin, an older woman from New Orleans. This was an important step for House because he married in a church and against his family’s wishes. The couple moved to Centerville, Louisiana, to help manage her father’s farm. After a few years, House felt he was being treated unfairly and left. He later said, "I left her hanging on the gatepost, with her father telling me to come back so we could plow some more." Around the same time, House’s mother died. In later years, he remained angry about his marriage and said of Carrie, "She wasn’t nothin’ but one of them New Orleans whores."

House disliked farming and the many simple or hard jobs he took as a young adult. He moved often, including a time when he went to East Saint Louis to work in a steel plant. The only job he enjoyed was on a Louisiana horse ranch, which later inspired him to wear a cowboy hat during his performances. He found a way to avoid manual labor when, in his early twenties, he had a religious experience ("getting religion") and became a paid pastor in the Baptist Church and later in the Colored Methodist Episcopal Church. However, he struggled with habits that conflicted with his religious calling, such as drinking alcohol and having relationships with women. This led him to leave the church after several years, though he continued to give occasional sermons.

In 1927, at the age of 25, House changed his musical views as quickly and completely as a religious conversion. In a small village south of Clarksdale, he heard one of his drinking friends, either James McCoy or Willie Wilson (his memories were unclear), play bottleneck guitar, a style he had never heard before. He immediately changed his attitude about the blues, bought a guitar from a musician named Frank Hoskins, and within weeks was playing with Hoskins, McCoy, and Wilson. Two songs he learned from McCoy later became some of his most famous, "My Black Mama" and "Preachin' the Blues." Another influence was Rube Lacey, a well-known performer who recorded for Columbia Records in 1927 (no songs were released) and for Paramount Records in 1928 (two songs were released). In a short time, with only these four musicians as models, House developed a professional blues style based on his religious singing and simple bottleneck guitar playing.

Around 1927 or 1928, House was playing in a small bar when a man started shooting, wounding House in the leg. House is said to have shot the man dead. He received a 15-year prison sentence at the Mississippi State Pen

Honors

In 2007, House received a sign on the Mississippi Blues Trail in Tunica, Mississippi. In 2017, his song "Preachin' the Blues" was added to the Blues Hall of Fame.

Discography

Recorded in August 1930, in Grafton, Wisconsin, for Paramount Records

• "Walking Blues" (not released until 1985)
• "My Black Mama – Part I"
• "My Black Mama – Part II"
• "Preachin' the Blues – Part I"
• "Preachin' the Blues – Part II"
• "Dry Spell Blues – Part I"
• "Dry Spell Blues – Part II"
• "Clarksdale Moan" (not released until 2006)
• "Mississippi County Farm Blues" (not released until 2006)

Recordings for the Library of Congress and Fisk University

Recorded August 1941, at Clack Store, Lake Cormorant, Mississippi. Some recordings include sounds of trains in the background because the store (which had electricity needed for recording) was near a train line between Lake Cormorant and Robinsonville.

• "Levee Camp Blues," with Willie Brown, Fiddlin' Joe Martin, Leroy Williams
• "Government Fleet Blues," with Brown, Martin, Williams
• "Walking Blues," with Brown, Martin, Williams
• "Shetland Pony Blues," with Brown
• "Fo' Clock Blues," with Brown, Martin
• "Camp Hollers," with Brown, Martin, Williams
• "Delta Blues," with Williams

Recorded July 17, 1942, Robinsonville, Mississippi

• "Special Rider Blues" [test]
• "Special Rider Blues"
• "Low Down Dirty Dog Blues"
• "Depot Blues"
• "Key of Minor" (Interviews: Demonstration of concert guitar tuning)
• "American Defense"
• "Am I Right or Wrong"
• "Walking Blues"
• "County Farm Blues"
• "The Pony Blues"
• "The Jinx Blues (No. 1)"
• "The Jinx Blues (No. 2)"

The music from both sessions and most of the recorded interviews have been released again on records and CDs.

• "The Pony Blues" / "The Jinx Blues", Part 1 (1967)
• "Make Me a Pallet on the Floor" (Willie Brown) / "Shetland Pony Blues" (1967)
• "Death Letter" (1965)

This list is not complete. For more information, see the external links provided.

• The Complete Library of Congress Sessions (1964), Travelin' Man CD 02
• Blues from the Mississippi Delta, with J. D. Short (1964), Folkways Records
• The Legendary Son House: Father of Folk Blues (1965), Columbia 2417
• In Concert (Oberlin College, 1965), Stack-O-Hits 9004
• Delta Blues (1941–1942), Smithsonian 31028
• Son House & Blind Lemon Jefferson (1926–1941), Biograph 12040
• The Real Delta Blues (1964–1965 recordings), Blue Goose Records 2016
• Son House & the Great Delta Blues Singers, with Willie Brown and others, Document CD 5002
• Son House at Home: Complete 1969, Document 5148
• Son House (Library of Congress), Folk Lyric 9002
• John the Revelator, Liberty 83391
• American Folk Blues Festival '67 (1 cut), Optimism CD 2070
• Son House (1965–1969), Private Record PR 1
• Son House – Vol. 2 (1964–1974), Private Record PR 2 (1987)
• Father of the Delta Blues: The Complete 1965 Sessions, Sony/Legacy CD 48867
• Living Legends (1 cut, 1966), Verve/Folkways 3010
• Real Blues (1 cut, University of Chicago, 1964), Takoma 7081
• John the Revelator: The 1970 London Sessions, Sequel CD 207
• Son House (1964–1970), Document (limited edition of 20 copies)
• Great Bluesmen/Newport, (2 cuts, 1965), Vanguard CD 77/78
• Blues with a Feeling (3 cuts, 1965), Vanguard CD 77005
• Masters of the Country Blues, House and Bukka White, Yazoo Video 500
• Delta Blues and Spirituals (1995)
• In Concert (Live) (1996)
• "Live" at Gaslight Cafe, N.Y.C., January 3, 1965 (2000)
• New York Central Live (2003)
• Delta Blues (1941–1942) (2003), Biograph CD 118
• Classic Blues from Smithsonian Folkways (2003), Smithsonian Folkways 40134
• Classic Blues from Smithsonian Folkways, vol. 2 (2003), Smithsonian Folkways 40148
• The Very Best of Son House: Heroes of the Blues (2003), Shout! Factory 30251
• Proper Introduction to Son House (2004), Proper