Graceland Too was one of those off-the-wall quirky places I had heard of but never been to. I’m not particularly an Elvis Presley fan (although I can respect his talent), and the thought of an old wooden house in Holly Springs, Mississippi full of Elvis memorabilia never appealed to me. Yet, over the last several years, the venue has been the site of several music events, some of them blues-related, so I was not entirely surprised when it was announced as the venue for the Junior Kimbrough Birthday Celebration being organized by one of Junior’s sons, Robert Kimbrough.
However, when I arrived at 4:30 on the Saturday afternoon of the event, things were just getting set up, on what was a very hot day. I decided to walk up to the court square and take photographs. In my memory, Holly Springs is always hot and rather desolate, even on weekends. When I was a very little boy, the square used to be alive with people on a Saturday, but those days were long ago. Now almost everything on the square was closed for the day, except for the new Mexican restaurant in the space where the Rodeo Cafe once was. Coffee in Holly was now a vacant space, and Tyson’s Drugs no longer sold ice cream. The only thing new was a mural celebrating Holly Springs, part of which mentioned Duwayne Burnside, Garry Burnside and Robert Kimbrough, musicians that were supposed to play that day.
By the time I walked back around to Graceland Too, things were starting to happen. A lot of fans and musicians had arrived, and although I had intended to observe, photograph and record until Duwayne Burnside went on stage, Robert called me to the stage to play keyboards for his set as well. In actuality, the event became something of a jam session, with Garry Burnside on bass, Duwayne on guitar beside Robert, and Kinney Kimbrough, another son of Junior’s on drums. The crowd was enthusiastic, but at least one neighbor evidently was not. She stood at the door of her house across the street, with a frown of disapproval on her face. She was there at least five minutes before she disappeared back into her house, and almost immediately thereafter, a Holly Springs Police Department unit pulled up. Duwayne Burnside went and talked to the officer, and whatever he said must have worked, because they drove off. Around the corner of the house, catfish and chicken wings were cooking, and there was a little wading pool for the little kids so they could stay cool.
However, as the evening progressed, the breeze picked up and the heat subsided. There were performances by Oliver Kostrinsky, who is a decent blues guitarist in his own right, and by an unknown that he introduced me to, Eddie “Shawty” Hinton of Pearson, Georgia, whom Oliver said had played this year’s Bentonia Blues Festival. Hinton proved to be a great old-style guitarist, who plays in a “songster” style reminiscent of Mississippi John Hurt. He first engaged the crowd with a rousing performance of “I Shall Not Be Moved,” and followed it up with a song entitled “Prison Blues.” Hinton was by far the most exciting discovery of the evening. There was also a young man from Jackson, Tennessee, playing Acadian style accordion music, who was relatively talented, and whose version of “Meet Me In The City” worked amazingly well.
Eventually, Duwayne and Robert came back to the stage, adding Pinkie Pulliam on bass, with a rousing version of “Somebody Stole My Girl,” a Junior Kimbrough composition that exists on field recordings, but which Kimbrough never recorded commercially. This was followed by the cutting of a luscious chocolate cake for Junior’s birthday, and another 45 minutes of music before people began to drift away. Altogether it had been a fun evening of food, music and good times.