In Jefferson recorded his last sides for the Paramount at the Gennett label in Richmond, Indiana. In December , Jefferson died of a heart attack and exposure on a Chicago street, reportedly after his chauffeur abandoned him and his automobile during a snow storm.
His body was brought back to Texas and interned in the Negro burying ground of Wortham cemetery. For decades, while Jefferson's unmarked and weed-ridden gravesite existed in small country cemetery, enthusiasts around the world formed societies and publications in his honor.
In October the Texas State Historical Society placed a plaque marking the resting place of one of America's most enduring folk music legends. Jefferson is considered a musical idol by musicians such as B. King, and his recordings continue to awe listeners. In the New Grove, Bitish music writer Paul Oliver described Jefferson's enduring vocal sound: "His voice was high, piercing the traffic noise, but could also have a low, moaning quality extended by 'bending' the notes on his guitar to produce crying sounds or imitative passages on the strings.
Apart from his stunning and inventive guitar work, Jefferson authored many songs that found their way into the repertoires of musicians from John Lee Hooker to Bob Dylan. Began playing guitar at functions around Wortham, TX; worked in East Dallas, Silver City, and Galveston, TX, ; performed on streets of Dallas, ; traveled extensively from until early s; recorded for Paramount label in Chicago ; in mid- s, performed at Booker T.
Washington Theatre in St. Albums Blind Lemon Jefferson, Milestone. King of the Country Blues, Yazoo. Compilations The Story of the Blues, Columbia, Blues Masters Vol. Sources Charters, Samuel B. Norton, Cancel or. His performances had a direct influence upon such legendary Texas musicians as Lightnin' Hopkins , T-Bone Walker , and Leadbelly , while his recordings helped bring his influence to an even larger audience.
In the decades since, Jefferson 's songs have been covered by countless musicians including Bob Dylan , John Hammond, Jr. The late '50s and early '60s brought the reissue of some of Jefferson 's recordings on the Riverside and Milestone labels, sparking a renewal of widespread public interest in the bluesman. As a result, Blind Lemon Jefferson Clubs were opened in California and New York during the '60s, and the rock band Jefferson Airplane reputedly chose their name after the great bluesman.
A good single album compiling selections of Jefferson 's music remains the Yazoo label's appropriately titled King of the Country Blues , which was eventually remastered for CD release. For completists, the Document label has since issued his entire recorded works in a four-volume CD series. AllMusic relies heavily on JavaScript.
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Little is known about Jefferson's early life. Both Thomas and Alexander traveled around East Texas and performed a variety of blues and dance tunes. Clearly, Jefferson was an heir to the blues songster tradition, though the specifics of his musical training are vague. Legends of his prowess as a bluesman abound among the musicians who heard him, and sightings of Jefferson in different places around the country are plentiful.
By his teens, he began spending time in Dallas. About he started performing in the Deep Ellum and Central Track areas of Dallas, where he met Huddie Ledbetter , better known as Lead Belly, one of the most legendary musical figures to travel and live in Texas.
In interviews he gave in the s, Lead Belly gave various dates for his initial meeting with Jefferson, sometimes placing it as early as But he mentioned most consistently, and that seems plausible. Jefferson would then have been eighteen or nineteen years old.
The two became musical partners in Dallas and the outlying areas of East Texas. Lead Belly learned much about the blues from Blind Lemon, and he had plenty to contribute as a musician and a showman.
Though Jefferson was known to perform almost daily at the corner of Elm Street and Central Avenue in Dallas, there is no evidence that he ever lived in the city. The census shows him living in Freestone County with an older half-brother, Nit C. Banks, and his family. Jefferson's occupation is listed as "musician" and his employer as "general public. They married in , the year that Ransom's son by a previous marriage, Theaul Howard, died.
Howard's son, also named Theaul, remained in the area and retired in nearby Ferris, Texas. In Jefferson was discovered by a Paramount recording scout and taken to Chicago to make records.
Though he was not the first folk or "country" blues singer—guitarist, or the first to make commercial recordings, Jefferson was the first to attain a national audience.
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