Bluesville Records has announced reissues of two seminal blues records, Lonnie Johnson’s Blues & Ballads and Mississippi John Hurt’s Today!, set to be released on February 28. Both are available for preorder now. Both LPs will feature an all-analog mastering and are pressed on 180-gram vinyl.
Blues & Ballads was originally released in 1960 from guitarist Lonnie Johnson. This marked the musician’s second record for Bluesville, a pivotal album in a career that found him blending R&B, jazz, and blues, as well as creating new guitar techniques.
Born in 1899 in New Orleans, Johnson spent the 1920s and 30s focusing on blues before transitioning more into R&B after World War II. For Blues & Ballads, he teamed with banjo player, bandleader, and fellow guitarist Elmer Snowden to create a peerless sound. The album features the duo alongside bassist Wendell Marshall. The pared back and intimate affair places Johnson’s soulful vocals front and center. His St. Louis upbringing is referenced on one of the album’s most-streamed tracks, “St. Louis Blues,” an ecstatic, genre-hopping demonstration of Johnson’s gifts.
Today! combines the classic blues sound with a bit of the Americana style that was hugely popular in the 1960s. Hurt’s vocals are gentle and personal, as is his finger picked guitar that underlies songs like “Pay Day.”
Born to rural Mississippi sharecroppers in 1893, Hurt had a similarly lengthy career to Johnson, but did not find the same level of success until the later years of his life. His laidback style was at odds with some of the more energetic blues music of the 1920s, and Hurt was content to treat music as a hobby. Eventually, however, he found an audience that embraced him with his 1966 album, which was eventually added to the Library Of Congress’ National Recording Registry in 2009. Hurt died in 1966—the same year this record debuted—but his influence was felt during his time and into our modern era.
Order Lonnie Johnson’s Blues & Ballads and Mississippi John Hurt’s Today!.
