Well, here it is, our third and final episode discussing “The Birth of the Blues.” This has been a difficult and convoluted story and it required an awful lot of hard work, but it has also been very rewarding and a lot of fun.

With today’s show, we attempt to bring together the various elements that we discussed in the first two episodes and show how they all began to coalesce, and were eventually popularized. In order for the blues to be spread beyond their original geographic boundaries, it took someone with the foresight to ‘formalize’ this music, put it into written form, and then have it published.

W.C. Handy was in the right place at the right time. His own experience had exposed him to both the rural, countrified folk blues, and also to the formalized nature of European-based musical styles. By applying one to the other, he published a few ‘blues’ compositions that changed music as it had previously been experienced.

Here is a list of the songs covered in today’s program;

Fast Train – John Lee Thomas

Shortnin’/Henduck – Othar Turner & the Rising Star Fife & Drum Band

Coon Ci’nt (Coon Jine) – Sidney Strapling

Savassafool (Sebastapol) – Gus Gibson & Sidney Stripling

Mister Crump – W.C. Handy

Memphis Blues – Lieut. Jim Europe’s 39th Infantry band

Yellow Dog Blues – W.C. Handy

St. Louis Blues – W.C. Handy

St. Louis Blues – Bessie Smith

Long John – Lightning & Group

Long Gone – Louis Armstrong

Beale Street Blues – Nat King Cole

St. Louis Blues – Louis Armstrong