by Frank Matheis 2020
The title of this article “Fresh Faces” leads to the expectation of young newcomers, previously unknown or unseen. That’s true to a point, but it belies the fact that some of these musicians have paid their dues for decades. These players are skilled and virtuosic, yet relatively unheralded in comparison to their male counterparts. “Fresh Faces,” in the context of this article, refers to musicians who deserve greater respect, recognition and awareness. Yet, these women are not unsung or obscure. They all have achieved critical acclaim, have a loyal following and garner passionate reception from their fans. It’s just that they deserve more of it, simply because they are so great. If they are “Fresh Faces” to you, mission accomplished. Let me turn you on to some fine musicians you ought to know.
Let’s face it. Women in acoustic roots & blues are a minority in a field vastly dominated by men. That was true historically and it remains such today. Even the women who were musical maestros and paramount contributors to the genre are often not given the full credit they deserve. Perhaps it is in part because the audience, the players and the associated music business are predominately white men.
First, a little history. In 1974, this writer was shocked to hear the superlative acoustic blues singer Bonnie Raitt. At the time, there were hardly any living, popular, famous women blues singers in the acoustic realm. Janis Joplin, who died in 1970, was the most famous in the blues genre, but her bands pushed her style heavily into blues rock, and that was a long way removed from the authentic blues of Bonnie Raitt. Bonnie was the real deal, playing true blues that featured Chicago blues harmonica ace Junior Wells in her self-titled 1971 debut album on Warner Brothers., when she resurrected songs by Sippie Wallace. Her 1972 follow up album Give It Up was another masterpiece of equal fervor. As an unscientific, personal sociological observation, at the time, in college, Bonnie was relegated as “chick music” – a peculiar designation that was not intended as a compliment. Women were interested in the music by other women, but too often men were not with it. Even famous folk singer/songwriters, like Joni Mitchell, Joan Baez or Carol King, were the staple in most women’s record collections, but far less so with men.
It’s not as if there were not amazing women in the blues all along. Starting with the 1960s folk revival, a group of young, talented women emerged, reviving the old blues of precursors from decades earlier, like Bessie Smith, Mamie Smith, Ma Rainey, Lucille Bogan, Memphis Minnie, Sippie Wallace and many more. There were African American women during that period actively singing the acoustic blues, bringing out new songs in the context of genuine acoustic blues. Elizabeth Cotten recorded for Folkways in the late 1950s and early ‘60s. The lovely Piedmont picker Etta Baker, from North Carolina, was active since the 1950s but not widely circulated until much later. Odetta was popular in the folk revival. Jessie Mae Hemphill was truly a great guitar player from North Mississippi, who emerged in the 1980s. Algia Mae Hinton was another of the authentic blues players, and like Jesse Mae Hemphill she was never fully awarded the fame and respect he deserved. Amazing players like Cora Fluker, Flora Molton, Precious Bryant, and many others actively performed but never achieved the acclaim that should have been awarded to them. By 1975, Bonnie’s compatriot Rory Block emerged out of the New York’s Greenwich Village folk-revival scene and Maria Muldaur had started recording for Reprise in 1973. During that same period, the electric blues women were still making a name for themselves. Koko Taylor was recording for Chess Records in Chicago. Big Mama Thornton had recorded for Arhoolie, Mercury, Backbeat and Vanguard. Sister Rosetta Tharpe had just died in 1973. Big Maybelle and Etta James also had a major impact.
Jump ahead to modern day. Women are still a minority when it comes to acoustic roots blues, but there are a few who have attained international success and fame and established themselves as the primary proponents of the acoustic blues genre. Wonderful instrumentalists and singers like Mary Flower, Eleanor Ellis, Del Rey, Lauren Sheehan, and harmonica player Annie Raines, have paid their dues for decades and are widely recognized as acoustic blues trailblazers. Yet, there are some male performers of equal, and yes, sometimes even of lesser skill, who have achieved far greater fame and commercial success. The dreaded “chick music” factor, perhaps? Nothing against the men, but sometimes one could cringe when you see a mediocre player rise to stardom, while the superior women, many of whom are all around better instrumentally, as singers and songwriters, remain more obscure. If one generalizes, there is merit to the hypothesis that the women tend to have a gentler, lighter, more refined approach to their guitar playing, often with sophisticated finger picking and tasteful eloquence. Generally, on the acoustic blues scene they are not so focused on hard guitar attacks, long noodling guitar prowess solos, loud playing or show-off egotism.
Here are ten wonderful musicians and ensembles, some of the best on the scene today, in no particular order:
My Native Daughters: Rhiannon Giddens, Leyla McCalla, Amythyst Kiah, Allison Russell
Take them as individual performers or as the super-ensemble My Native Daughters, these talented women are among the leading voices of a new folk-revival of African American string music. They are at once emancipatory, revolutionary, genre-bending, free, yet, as traditional as it gets. Don’t expect them to meet some sort of litmus test or limitation as to what or how they play. Since they perform an amalgam of African American roots music, that includes pre-blues, folk songs, children’s songs, gospel and spirituals, even some Caribbean influences (Leyla McCalla has Haitian roots and often sings in French Creole) and world music, they are musically diverse and unbridled. They are perhaps more likely to appeal to folk audiences with their fiddles, accordions, banjos than to hard core blues purists who impose tight boundaries and fences around what they consider blues. In fact, the African American musical experience covers hundreds of years prior to the birth of the blues. These women are not going to follow, they are going to lead. They perform originals with poignant, incisive lyrics, superb instrumentation and beautiful harmonies. Their thematic often directly confronts the cataclysmic savagery of slavery and Jim Crow. So, when people decry “this is not blues,” take the example of Rhiannon Giddens. While she certainly does not follow narrow country blues confines, when a young, vibrant African American woman mournfully sings about the slavery experience, as she did in her 2017 album Freedom Highway, Nonesuch, how can it not be blues? Freedom Highway makes unequivocally clear that Giddens is truly one of the significant, most musically and lyrically impressive young musicians of our time. She sings about the pang of separation of a slave woman from her baby, the Civil Rights struggle as in Birmingham Sunday, and more. She says about the work, “Know thy history. Let it horrify you; let it inspire you. Let it show you how the future can look, for nothing in this world has not come around before. These songs are based on slave narratives from the 1800s, African American experiences of the last century, and the Civil Rights movement of the 1960s. Voices demanding to be heard, to impart the hard-earned wisdom of a tangled, difficult, complicated history; we just try to open the door and let them through.”
Erin Harpe
Erin Harpe is from Annapolis, Maryland, and now makes her home in Boston. Erin Harpe’s musical heritage is essentially Piedmont fingerpicking blues, a musical form that has surrounded her for her entire life. Erin Harpe was exposed to the blues from childhood on, and she mingled in the epicenter of the Washington, D.C. roots blues scene in and around Archie’s Barbershop. She the daughter of the famed musician and old-time guitar expert, Neil Harpe in Annapolis. Neil is well known in the blues community for his vintage guitar instrument business and he was himself an integral part of the Maryland and D.C. blues scene, as a friend of the Archie Edwards barbershop cadre and the D.C. Blues Society. He was friends with all the players of that core, including Archie Edwards, John Cephas, Phil Wiggins, John Jackson and Eleanor Ellis. Young Erin grew up in the music world her father exposed her to, the blues all around her, and she particularly looked up to Eleanor Ellis, who is today one of the foremost women practitioners of the acoustic Piedmont blues. Erin emerged as one of the finest pickers in the genre.
Valerie Turner
Valerie Turner, a favorite former student of John Cephas, is perhaps the gentlest of the acoustic guitar players, the antithesis of almost every blues stereotype. Think heir to the legacy of Etta Baker or Elizabeth Cotten—but “city folk” with a college degree from a top tier university. Valerie is from the unlikely blues milieu of Queens, New York, and she proudly stands for one thing: the old-fashioned, acoustic Piedmont blues. Together with her husband Benedict Turner, their duo is aptly named Piedmont Bluz. Hear this duo’s unique approach to the historical repertoire of the region, and it becomes evident that Valerie Turner is one of this important folk blues sub-genre’s most eloquent proponents. Her fingerpicking is simply exquisite. She explained, “I simply think of myself as a musician who cares about the Piedmont blues music very much and I want to see it grow and to be preserved. Our mission is to help keep this music going and to not let it die out.”
Albanie Faletta
An exquisite and fierce roots, blues, jazz, ragtime and swing guitarist extraordinaire, and a superb singer, one of the main ascending women in the blues today. She is passionate, exciting and virtuosic, simply thrilling. These descriptions all fit, and she represents an amalgam that connects all together, and she can play it all with finesse and verve, from deep acoustic roots blues to Django Reinhardt Gypsy swing. The virtuosic chanteuse from Monroe in North Louisiana now makes her home in Flatbush, Brooklyn, by way of New Orleans. Her family is Cajun and the other half Sicilian. When she lets loose on her custom-made Ben Bonham resonator guitar eyes light up with delight. “My whole philosophy about music comes down to connections and inter-connectedness of people and musical styles.”
Libby Rae Watson
There is a marvelous blues woman in Pascagoula, Mississippi, down on the Gulf Coast. She is mostly known around the New Orleans to Memphis corridor, a real native Mississippian. There is something really special here, a love – a passion for the music, a finesse. Songster Libby Rae Watson has a certain musical innocence, yet a raw sultriness and an inner beauty that comes through in the music and a reverence for those who inspired her. She is also a fine songwriter.Libby Rae Watson is a remarkable singer and guitarist, a superb fingerpicker and slide player. Guitar fans will be impressed by her skillWhen you hear her sing with a strong, assertive and confident voice you look up. There is something here from a deeper well. Libby Rae Watson’s naturally beautiful voice and virtuosity, but even then, her sultry, sensual singing rises to that level. Her covers of Ida Cox, Memphis Minnie and Sam Chatmon will astonish and make you want for more and clarify that she is one of the best and finest of our contemporary blues women.
Tanja Wirz
Way over in Rüti, Switzerland, the most unlikely place for a fiery blues woman, Tanja Wirz represents the universality of music and the power of the acoustic blues. She is truly one of the best in Europe, a superb guitarist and singer, a musical preservationist who passionately digs into the broad spectrum of blues, jazz, ragtime and swing. Tanja Wirz is a direct throwback to the great women of the golden era of jazz and blues. Besides her musical endeavors she is a professional freelance journalist. By now she is predominately a full-time musician of considerable artistry. Tanja Wirz is stunning, and she can swing, and how! She’s plays exuberantly, unbridled and brash on guitar and stand-up bass. She and her regular duo partner, the equally talented guitarist Rainer Wöffler, are the wild and crazy Red Hot Serenaders, and they often perform with a complete 1920s jazzy horn section to complete the early 20th century sound, as if you were sitting in some New Orleans speakeasy.
Larkin Poe
One of the major breakout artists and most exciting acts in the acoustic blues today is the sister duo Larkin Poe, Rebecca and Megan Lovell who now reside in Nashville, Tennessee. Larkin Poe is the name of their great-great-great-great-grandfather, and they wanted a band name that had some family connections with the sisters. Larkin Poe was actually a cousin of Edgar Allen Poe. They achieved a great deal attention through YouTube and they are by now international touring stars, playing an amalgam of American roots music. While their latest albums have also showcased their original, roots-rock side, they are deeply grounded in the acoustic blues, performing both originals songs and a range of covers. Larkin Poe are refreshingly energetic, musically passionate and equally articulate. Beyond their considerable musical prowess, they are two sharp, powerful young women who know where they are headed. Great things will come from them as their stars ascend. Rebecca predominantly covers the acoustic and the electric guitars. They both play organ and synthesizers and bass. Megan is the lap steel player, which is really one of the biggest defining angles of their sound. They hold down on quite a few instruments but in a live show Megan is playing the lap steel and Rebecca switches around on a multitude of guitars.
Donna Herula
The Windy City of Chicago is known mostly for its world-renowned Chicago Blues style, but it’s not a heavy acoustic scene. There are nonetheless a few fine acoustic blues musicians in Chicago, including the brilliant bard Donna Herula. The singer/songwriter and fingerstyle and slide guitarist has paid her dues and she is a swift player at that. Mostly she leans to Delta Blues but she also masters the intricate Piedmont style fingerpicking with alternating bass. By now, Donna Herula has made a notable name for herself. She played as far away as South Africa and she was a guitar teacher at the prestigious Old Town School of Folk Music. She was inducted into the Chicago Blues Hall of Fame and played at the Chicago Blues Festival, but the best is yet to come as her music career is in ascent. Donna Herula: “I’m in Chicago – everybody around me plays Chicago blues. I play a lot of Delta blues and country blues… I just fell in love with slide. I’m very much hooked into the emotions of a song. I guess that’s what I really liked about Son House, is that it was his guitar playing, it was the lyrics. You have to play the truth.”
Heidi Holton
Down in the North Carolina countryside, the young, indefatigable blues woman Heidi Holton keeps the acoustic roots traditions going. Originally from Gainesville, Florida, she grew up in Murphy, in the Blue Ridge Mountains, where she still resides. The songwriter and guitarist sings acoustic and old blues, with elements of folk and America. She is a protégée of Rory Block, who produced two albums for her, and she was heavily influenced by Jorma Kaukonen. Her original compositions are exceptionally expressive– intimate, compelling and insightful, American roots music at its finest. “I’m writing from a perspective of a woman in 2020,” she explained. She can hold her own on fingerpicking and slide guitar and she sings with gusto, a committed purveyor of both the traditional blues and her own refreshingly original compositions. The affable Holton packs more than a punch of charisma and charm. When she takes the stage, and puts it all on the line, they will want to see power and grace. She will stun an audience into silence with her captivating musicianship. She’s got the chops, and she has something to say. She is powerfully expressive and deserving of wider recognition.
Elsie Franklin
One very exciting and fine up-and-coming performer is a young woman over in York, England. She is just 22 years old, a delightful and rising talent. In many ways, she has a great future in acoustic blues. She’s still playing relatively locally and small time, but we predict that won’t last long. This bard is going places soon. She is still relatively unknown but globally visible by the homemade videos she posted on YouTube of her singing. She showcases the intricate and lovely fingerpicking style in the Piedmont tradition, with alternating bass and exquisite lead lines interplaying. Coupled with her sweet voice and evident love for the genre, it’s immediately impressive that she is outright superb and exciting. Elsie Franklin: “I’ve been playing pretty much all my life. My dad Alvin Franklin is a professional blues guitarist who occasionally toured and recorded with Del Rey, so I grew up with blues, either the type of music he plays or listens to. I just love it. I think [acoustic blues] is one of the most fun and raw kinds of music there is…For my guitar style, my primary inspiration is Memphis Minnie and Del Rey in particular.” Keep your ears on this young chanteuse.
