John Lee Curtis "Sonny Boy" Williamson (March 30, 1914 – June 1, 1948) was an American blues harmonica player and singer who wrote songs. He is often called the first person to make the blues harmonica a main instrument in music. He played on many recordings by blues artists before World War II. Under his own name, he was one of the most recorded blues musicians in the 1930s and 1940s. He worked closely with Chicago producer Lester Melrose and Bluebird Records. His popular songs, either written by him or adapted from others, include "Good Morning, School Girl," "Sugar Mama," "Early in the Morning," and "Stop Breaking Down."

Williamson's way of playing the harmonica greatly influenced musicians who came after him. Later in his career, he helped train many new blues musicians who moved to Chicago, including Muddy Waters. To take advantage of Williamson's fame, Aleck "Rice" Miller began recording and performing as Sonny Boy Williamson in the early 1940s. Later, to tell the two apart, John Lee Williamson was called Sonny Boy Williamson I or "the original Sonny Boy."

Biography and career

Williamson was born in Madison County, Tennessee, near Jackson, in 1914. His earliest recordings were in the country blues style, but he quickly showed talent for using the harmonica as a main instrument in blues music. He was the first to make the harmonica popular in an urban blues setting. He is often called "the father of modern blues harp." As a teenager, he joined Yank Rachell and Sleepy John Estes, performing with them in Tennessee and Arkansas. In 1934, he moved to Chicago.

Williamson first recorded in 1937 for Bluebird Records. His first recording, "Good Morning, School Girl," became a well-known song. He was widely popular among Black audiences in the southern United States and in Midwestern cities like Detroit and Chicago. For the next decade, his name was closely linked to the blues harmonica. Other famous recordings include "Sugar Mama," "Shake the Boogie," "Better Cut That Out," "Sloppy Drunk," "Early in the Morning," "Stop Breaking Down," and "Hoodoo Hoodoo" (also called "Hoodoo Man Blues"). In 1947, "Shake the Boogie" reached number 4 on Billboard's Race Records chart. Williamson's style influenced many blues harmonica players, including Billy Boy Arnold, Junior Wells, Sonny Terry, Little Walter, and Snooky Pryor. He was the most well-known and influential blues harmonica player of his time. His music also inspired many other musicians, such as Muddy Waters (who played guitar with Williamson in the 1940s) and Jimmy Rogers (who first recorded as a harmonica player in 1946, imitating Williamson's style). These and other artists, both blues and rock, later helped make his songs famous through their own recordings.

Throughout his career, Williamson recorded frequently as a bandleader and as a supporting musician, mostly for Bluebird Records. Before Bluebird moved to Chicago, where it later became part of RCA Records, many early recordings took place at the Leland Tower, a hotel in Aurora, Illinois. The Sky Club, a nightclub on the top floor of the Leland Tower, was used for live radio broadcasts of big bands and also served as a recording studio for Williamson's early sessions and those of other Bluebird artists.

Death and legacy

Williamson's last recording session happened in Chicago in December 1947, where he played with Big Joe Williams. On June 1, 1948, Williamson was killed during a robbery that occurred on Chicago's South Side. He was walking home from a performance at the Plantation Club, located at 31st Street and Giles Avenue, a bar that was only a short walk from his home at 3226 S. Giles. It is said that his last words were "Lord have mercy." The person who killed him was never found.

Williamson is buried at the old location of the Blairs Chapel Church, southwest of Jackson, Tennessee. In 1991, a red granite marker was bought by fans and family to mark his burial site. A Tennessee historical marker, also placed in 1991, shows where he was born and explains his influence on blues music.

Name issues

John Lee Williamson's influence has been less well known since the war because another musician, Rice Miller, became more famous by using the same name. Recordings made by Williamson between 1937 and his death in 1948, and later recordings by Rice Miller, were all released under the name "Sonny Boy Williamson." It is believed that Miller used this name to trick people (and his first record label) into thinking he was the original Sonny Boy Williamson. To avoid confusion, many scholars and writers later referred to John Lee Williamson as Sonny Boy Williamson I and Rice Miller as Sonny Boy Williamson II.

Adding to the confusion, around 1940, a jazz pianist and singer named Enoch Williams recorded for Decca Records using the name "Sonny Boy Williams." Later, in 1947, he performed as "Sunny Boy" with a group called the Sunny Boy Trio.

In 2017, singer-songwriter Randy Newman included a song about Rice Miller using Williamson's name on his album Dark Matter. The song, titled "Sonny Boy," imagines Williamson meeting Miller in a concert hall and confronting him for impersonating him (though the two musicians never actually met). In the song, Williamson leaves the hall in anger and is later shot. He expresses sadness about being "the only bluesman in heaven" because he died before having the chance to make mistakes. He also feels upset that Miller gained fame using his name, though he notes that Miller eventually traveled to England to teach others about the blues, which ultimately led to Miller's death.

Discography

§ Credited to Louis Prima and His Orchestra / Sonny Boy Williamson

Sonny Boy Williamson's recordings were released on 78 rpm records by Bluebird Records, which was owned by RCA Victor Records. After Bluebird Records stopped operating, RCA Victor continued to release his recordings. Over time, RCA Victor published several collections of Williamson's music, including:

• Big Bill & Sonny Boy (Side 2 only) (RCA, 1964)
• The Original Sonny Boy Williamson (Blues Classics, 1965)
• Bluebird Blues (RCA, 1970)
• Rare Sonny Boy (1937–1947) (RCA, 1988)
• RCA Blues & Heritage Series: The Bluebird Recordings, 1937–1938 (RCA, 1997)
• RCA Blues & Heritage Series: The Bluebird Recordings, 1938 (RCA, 1997)
• When The Sun Goes Down: The Secret History of Rock & Roll, Vol. 8: Bluebird Blues (RCA Victor, 2003)

Other specialty labels, such as JSP Records, Saga, Indigo, Snapper, and others, also released collections of his work. In 1991, Document Records published Williamson's Complete Recorded Works In Chronological Order as five CDs.