James Cotton
(born July 1, 1935, Tunica, Mississippi [1]), is an American blues harmonica player, singer, and songwriter who is the bandleader for the James Cotton Blues Band. He also writes songs alone, and his solo career continues to this day. His work includes the following genres: blues, delta blues, harmonica blues, and electric harmonica blues.
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JAMES COTTON TICKETS
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Career
Cotton became interested in
music when he first heard
Sonny Boy Williamson II on the
radio. He left home to find Williamson in
West Helena,
Arkansas. For many years Cotton claimed that he told Williamson that he was an orphan, and that Williamson took him in and raised him; a story he admitted in recent years is not true. Williamson did however mentor Cotton during his early years.
[2] When Williamson left the south to live with his estranged wife in
Milwaukee,
Wisconsin, he left his band in Cotton's hands. Cotton was quoted as saying, "He just gave it to me. But I couldn't hold it together 'cause I was too young and crazy in those days an' everybody in the band was grown men, so much older than me."
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Whilst he played a few
instruments, Cotton is famous for his work on the harmonica.
Cotton began his professional career playing the
blues harp in
Howling Wolf's band in the early 1950s.
He made his first
recordings as a solo artist for the
Sun Records label in
Memphis,
Tennessee in 1953. Cotton began to work with the
Muddy Waters Band around 1955.
He performed
songs such as "
Got My Mojo Working" and "
She's Nineteen Years Old", although he did not appear on the original recordings; long-time Muddy Waters harmonica player
Little Walter was utilized on most of Muddy's recording sessions in the 1950s. Cotton's first recording session with Waters took place in June 1957, and he would alternate with Little Walter on Muddy's recording sessions until the end of the decade, and thereafter until he left to form his own band. In 1965 he formed the Jimmy Cotton Blues Quartet, utilizing
Otis Spann on
piano to record between
gigs with Waters' band. Their performances were captured by
producer Samuel Charters on volume two of the
Vanguard recording
Chicago/The Blues/Today!
. After leaving Muddy's band in 1966, Cotton toured with
Janis Joplin while pursuing a solo career.
He formed the James Cotton Blues Band in 1967. They mainly performed their own arrangements of popular blues and
R&B material from the 1950s and 1960s. Two albums were recorded live in
Montreal that year.
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nightclub in
Toronto
In the 1960s, Cotton formed a blues band in the tradition of Bobby "Blue" Bland. Four tracks that featured the big band horn sound and traditional songs were captured on the album
Two Sides of the Blue
.
In the 1970s, Cotton recorded several albums with
Buddah Records. Cotton played harmonica on Muddy Water's
Grammy Award winning 1977 album
Hard Again
, produced by
Johnny Winter. The James Cotton Blues Band received a Grammy nomination in 1984 for
Live From Chicago: Mr. Superharp Himself!
, and a second for his 1987 release,
Take Me Back
. He finally was awarded a Grammy for
Deep in the Blues
in 1996 for
Best Traditional Blues Album.
[3]
A throat problem left Cotton unable to sing from the mid 1990s onwards, but he continued to tour, utilizing singers or his backing band members as vocalists. Cotton's latest album,
Baby Don't You Tear My Clothes
, was released in 2004.
On March 10, 2008, Cotton and
Ben Harper inducted
Little Walter into the
Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. They performed "
Juke" and "
My Babe" together at the induction ceremony, which was broadcast nationwide on
VH1 Classic.
Musical company
Cotton has worked with a number of
artists, such as:-
- Big Mama Thornton
- Janis Joplin
- Sonny Boy Williamson
- Howlin' Wolf
- Muddy Waters
- Led Zeppelin
- Freddie King
- Steve Miller
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- Santana
- B.B. King
- The Grateful Dead
- Willie "Big Eyes" Smith
- Johnny Winter
- Jimmie Vaughan
- Todd Rundgren
- Taj Mahal
- Paul Butterfield
- Elvin Bishop
- William "Billy Boy" Arnold
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Selected discography
- Chicago/The Blues/Today!
vol. 2
- Take Me Back
- 3 Harp Boogie
- Live from Chicago Mr. Superharp Himself
- High Compression
- 100% Cotton
- Live & On the Move
- Cut You Loose!
- Mighty Long Time
- Fire Down Under the Hill
- Baby, Don't You Tear My Clothes
- Deep in the Blues
- Living the Blues
- 35th Anniversary Jam
- Two Sides of the Blues
See also
References
- Allmusic biography by Bill Dahl
- The Blues - From Robert Johnson to Robert Cray
- Allaboutjazz.com