Tag: Lightnin Malcolm

Posted on

Experimenting with the Petri 2.8 Color-Corrected Super Rangefinder Camera

Although I have spent most of my life working with electronic cameras, both during the film era and since the advent of DSLR cameras, I have always wanted to own a Leica camera. The Leica, with a rangefinder rather than a viewfinder, was famous as a great camera for street work, at least in part due to its almost silent shutter. Unfortunately, Leicas, even the film ones, are extremely expensive. But while searching for them on Ebay earlier this month, another kind of rangefinder camera appeared, a Petri 2.8 “color corrected super” 35 milimeter camera. In contrast with the Leicas, it was eminently affordable, and a beautiful instrument as well. Reading descriptions of it, I learned that it was fully mechanical and needed no batteries. Having desired to experiment with film photography to see how the final product differed from the look of today’s digital pictures, and feeling that it would give me good practice on using a rangefinder, I bought the camera.

What I have since learned is that film, particularly a good film like Agfa Vista 200, if you can still find any, gives a vibrant, rich color palette that is missing in today’s digital photos. Agfa film isn’t made anymore, but I was able to find some online.

However, there have certainly been some bumps in the road, too. Film is hard to find, and has become really expensive. You cannot buy just one roll anymore, at least not at retail. Black-and-white film is not available in stores, and most stores, if they sell film at all, only sell one ISO speed, usually 200 or 400. Fuji and Agfa are out of business, so Kodak is the only option currently made. as best I can tell. Developing, too, is a chore. Gone are the days when you can get same day processing, or even next day processing. Walgreens takes more than a week, and you won’t get your negatives back. The local place I ultimately used, Memphis Photo Imaging is much quicker, but charges $20 if you want scans, which of course I do.

The hardest part for me of course has been learning how to use F-stops and shutter speeds, since cameras have been largely automatic most of my life. My first roll of film was not usable at all, and my second was destroyed by the camera, as it wasn’t threaded properly on the take-up reel. But my third roll, a 36-picture roll of Agfa Vista 200, resulted in the images above, after I had done some research on what is called the “Sunny 16 rule” and thus had some idea of proper F-stop and shutter speed for a bright and sunny day.

As the day wore down, of course, the light level grew less, and I failed to change the settings to account for it, resulting in less-satisfying pictures. But I enjoy the occasional use of film. It probably won’t replace my good Nikon D3200, but I intend to keep playing with the Petri rangefinder, and seeing what results I get.

Posted on

Great Music and A Glorious Sunset at WEVL’s Blues on the Bluff in Memphis

Brownsville drummer Kesha Burton had asked me if I would take her to the annual Blues on the Bluff fundraiser for Memphis community radio station WEVL, so although I hadn’t originally planned on going, I agreed. Although the weather had been horribly hot all day, showers had popped up in Fayette County, and things began to cool off as we headed into Memphis.

The Blues on the Bluff event is always held at the National Ornamental Metal Museum, which occupies a portion of the former Naval Hospital on the bluff south of the old Memphis-Arkansas and Harahan Bridges. There are few better views of the river than that location, and with its lovely tree-shaded courtyard, it makes a great venue for live music.

This year’s line-up included a Booker T. & The MG’s tribute band called the MD’s, who were on stage when we arrived, and after their performance, then the Ghost Town Blues Band marched into the courtyard in a Dixieland jazz band fashion before playing their set, which included a lot of new music from their forthcoming album “Shine.” A noteworthy feature of GTBB is their large brass section, which includes my homeboy Suavo J on trombone.

The headliner for the night was Lightnin Malcolm , the Hill Country bluesman from Byhalia, and Kesha got a chance to perform with him on percussion. His music consists of Hill Country standards, and originals in the Hill Country style, as well as some that are more alternative and even reggae-influenced, and the crowd of about 200 thoroughly enjoyed themselves.

In addition to music, there was a food truck from Fuel, the former restaurant on Madison Avenue, the folks from MemPops selling homemade ice cream pops, plenty of beer from Memphis Made Brewing, and a silent auction.

But the overwhelming highlight of the evening was the absolutely amazing sunset over the river, which started out a dazzling yellow, changing to a golden orange and then a deep red before it disappeared behind the treeline to the west in Arkansas. It was the perfect end to the day.

At the end of the evening, Kesha decided to stay with friends in Memphis, and I was starving, as the Fuel food truck had offered only tacos, so I headed to the Slider Inn in Midtown for a late-night dinner on the outdoor deck.

Posted on

More Blues and Roots Music at Clarksdale Caravan Music Festival

At one time, as far as music festivals went, Clarksdale, Mississippi had one, the Sunflower River Blues and Gospel Festival in August. Later, after former advertising executive Roger Stolle came to town, a second one, the venerable Juke Joint Festival took root, becoming the city’s largest festival, attracting people from all over the world. But now, Clarksdale’s burgeoning tourism business is driven by a succession of festivals, stretching nearly all year long. Music, film, art….all are celebrated in different events. The Clarksdale Caravan Music Festival is one of these newer events, held in May, with performances at Cat Head Delta Blues and at the New Roxy.

Like the better-known events, the Clarksdale Caravan is primarily about blues, although it is in a much more intimate setting, with only two stages, and therefore a lot more interaction between the artists and performers. On this year’s festival, there had been a considerable amount of rain up in Memphis, and I feared that could disrupt the event, as the Cat Head stage was outside, but in Clarksdale the sun was out, and shining.

My primary goal was to catch R. L. Boyce at the Cat Head stage, and I did. He was performing with Lightnin Malcolm and a violinist with whom I was not familiar. A small crowd had gathered under the tent in front of the store, and due to the threat of rain, I decided to do my photographic work with my iPhone instead of my Nikon. Indeed it did start raining briefly, and I eventually took refuge in the Meraki Coffee Roasters shop a block down the street.

In the afternoon, Lightnin Malcolm was scheduled to perform on the stage at New Roxy, a former theatre in the New World district of Clarksdale, but I arrived early, and nothing was happening yet, so I spent some time walking around the area shooting pictures of the buildings, many of which are sadly beginning to collapse. Local artists have attempted to brighten the ruins of what remains, with painted images and slogans, such as “I am of this city and this city is of me,” but the loss of such history is not easy to bear. The New Roxy is a better story, however, as it has survived, despite the loss of its roof, to become a popular music venue in Clarksdale.

Perhaps because of the rain threat, Malcolm’s performance took place in the smaller, lounge portion of the New Roxy, within the former box office of the theatre, rather than the larger outdoor stage. He performed primarily with his drummer, but also did a couple of tunes with R. L. Boyce, with whom he had played earlier at Cat Head. The crowd was fairly small but enthusiastic. It was ultimately a great day of music, and the rain threatened but never actually disrupted anything.

Posted on

Together We Stand: Como, Mississippi Celebrates Its Vibrant Legacy

    “Can’t One Make One” read the shirts with the iconic image of the Como water tower on the front, and the legend “Together We Stand” on the back. The shirts are popular in this town, another way of saying “It takes a village. We can’t build this up as individuals.” The message of struggle is an odd twist in the 150-year history of this North Mississippi town, once home to the largest concentration of millionaires in the state.

    Glimpses of that past are still visible in the stately homes that face the railroad track on the east side, whose porches look across to Main Street. One of them belonged to relatives of Tallulah Bankhead, and the future actress spent summers in Como in her youth. The house later belonged to a local artist, and was briefly lived in by Jimbo Mathus of Squirrel Nut Zippers fame. His Delta Recording Service was briefly located on Main Street across the tracks. 

    But cotton, cattle and agriculture are no longer king, and Como today is a predominantly-Black town, and a singificantly poorer one than the Como of the last century. What it lacks in financial riches it more than makes up for in cultural riches, however. Como was home to legendary blues musician Mississippi Fred McDowell, and fife-and-drum musicians like Napolian Strickland. Gospel musicians like the Rev. John Wilkins (son of blues great Robert Wilkins) and the Como Mamas live here, as does the living Hill Country bluesman R. L. Boyce.  Downtown Como too has seen something of a renaissance in recent years, with great restaurants like the Windy City Grill and Como Steakhouse opening on Main Street, even a Thai restaurant. A new catfish place opened just a few weeks ago. 

    Like many predominantly-Black towns, Como has a special day to celebrate its legacy, Como Day, which is held every year in October. The phenomenon is not unique to Como, but is found throughout the Delta in towns like Crenshaw and Tutwiler. A few of the events are called something else, like I’m So Greenwood in Greenwood, or Founder’s Day in Mound Bayou, but the vast majority are simply named for the town, as in Crenshaw Day or Como Day. The latter celebration is truly huge, with a day full of live music, Corvette cars and local vendors selling clothes, food and snacks. Music had started at noon, but when I arrived a band called the Southern Soul Band was on stage. They were quite good, but there was not a particularly large crowd in the park yet, as the weather was far colder than usual this year. At 5 PM, hometown favorite R. L. Boyce appeared on stage with Steve Toney on drums and Lightnin Malcolm backing him up. Boyce, who began as a drummer in fife and drum bands, is also an accomplished drummer in his own right, having played behind Jessie Mae Hemphill on a couple of her albums, and is also a self-taught guitarist, with some influence from Fred McDowell and R. L. Burnside. Compared to other Hill Country players, Boyce is largely unique, setting up a pattern of recurring, trance-like riffs over which he often improvises lyrics, based on people he sees in the crowd, or recent events. Hermetic and idiosyncratic, Boyce’s music is largely unaffected by music outside his own special system. 

    Fife and drum music has a large history in Como. In fact, the first well-known fife and drum band in the modern era was dubbed the Como Fife and Drum Band when it played at the inaugural New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival in Congo Square in 1970. Napolian Strickland was the driving force behind this band, with the drummers often being John Tytus and Otha Turner. Otha’s granddaughter, Sharde Thomas, has continued the tradition with her grandfather’s Rising Star Fife and Drum Band, whose appearance hyped the crowd considerably Saturday evening.  Despite the ancient nature of this music, which pre-dates blues, there were plenty of people in the crowd ready to dance to it, even some young people. Fife and drum music on a moonlit night in North Mississippi seems like a right thing, something that is supposed to happen. It feels like a connection to a sacred past, a summoning of the ancestors. 

    Behind the fife and drum band came Duwayne Burnside, joined by his nephew Kent Burnside who had come down from the Midwest for a Burnside reunion which was being held in Byhalia. Duwayne, son of the late R. L. “Rural” Burnside is continuing the legacy of his father. He is an amazing electric guitarist, who has managed to combine the Hill Country tradition with other influences, such as the electric guitar styles of Albert King, B. B. King and Stevie Ray Vaughan. Duwayne typically fronts a fairly large band, and is as comfortable singing Tyrone Davis or Bobby Womack tunes as he is Hill Country classics. He had likely been singing all day at the family reunion, and when he moved aside to take a break, Kent came up to perform a couple of tunes, including the iconic “Going Away Baby” AKA “Four Women” which was so beloved by his grandfather. 

    Como Day is always anchored by a headliner, and this year it was Omar Cunningham, a southern soul star from Alabama. Unfortunately, the weather, which had been warmer during the late afternoon, turned bitterly cold in the space of about an hour, and also, Windy City Grill has curtailed their kitchen hours, ending food service at 10 PM. So, although I would have liked to have caught Omar’s set, I walked back over to Main Street instead to order a deep dish pizza at Windy City Grill, which was jampacked with football fans and others who had come over from Como Day. It was a satisfying ending to a great day celebrating a great town. 

    Posted on

    Joyce She-Wolf Jones’ Authentic Hill Country Blues Picnic at Potts Camp

      Joyce She-Wolf Jones is the mother of up-and-coming blues guitarist and drummer Cameron Kimbrough, but she is also a talented vocalist and song-writer in her own right, and each August, she puts on a traditional Hill Country blues picnic in the front yard of her home near Bethlehem, Mississippi, a wide spot in the road south of the Marshall County town of Potts Camp. 

      August is typically a hot month, and there had been strong thunderstorms at Holly Springs when I came through, but the weather was quite pleasant when I arrive at Joyce’s modest home along the rural highway. The smell of barbecue was in the air, and former Soul Blues Boy Little Joe Ayers was on stage. Everybody was having a good time, despite the ominous flashes of lightning to the north. Joe soon launched into a skillful version of Willie Cobbs’ classic “You Don’t Love Me,” a standard blues that doesn’t get heard all that often in the Hill Country. The crowd was loving it. 

      As the night progressed, we got to hear Cameron on drums, Lightnin Malcolm, Duwayne Burnside and R. L. Boyce, as well as Cam’s cousin Kelly Payson on vocals, and of course, our hostess Joyce She-Wolf Jones herself, who sang a couple of her original songs.

      With good food, plenty to drink, great music, and the rain staying away, it was a perfect evening in Mississippi’s Hill Country. 

      Posted on

      Remembering Willie “Po Monkey” Seaberry at Merigold, Mississippi


      Although a few of my friends expressed concern and disapproval of the name of Merigold, Mississippi’s Po Monkey Day, the event was organized for the first time last year to honor the late Willie “Po Monkey” Seaberry, who was the owner of the legendary Po Monkey Lounge just outside the town of Merigold. This year’s festival was somewhat hampered by outrageous heat, with the heat index by some accounts near 114 degrees. Still, a hundred people or so showed up in downtown Merigold near Crawdad’s Restaurant to hear from musicians such as Lightnin Malcolm, Cedric Burnside, R. L. Boyce and Super Chikan. Cedric performed a new single called “We Made It” from his forthcoming LP Benton County Relic which is due out in September. Toward the afternoon, storms approached, but they never really developed near the festival area, and things never really cooled off at all. After R. L. Boyce’s performance, with every table in Crawdad’s reserved because of the festival, we headed down to Airport Grocery in Cleveland instead, and not only was the food good but so was the all-blues soundtrack. Airport Grocery was once a live blues venue when it was on Highway 8, but since it has moved onto Highway 61, it doesn’t seem to book live music, or at least not as much. As for the legendary Po Monkey Lounge, we learned this week that our hopes that someone might purchase and preserve the historic juke joint were in vain. The contents will be sold at auction next month, and presumably the building will be demolished.




      Posted on

      Celebrating West Tennessee’s Lost Fife and Drum Tradition


      Last summer, the Tennessee Arts Commission began a Folklife Apprenticeship program to preserve endangered folkways in the state, and one of the areas of interest was in Black fife and drum music. Unfortunately, Black fife and drum music seems to have died out in Tennessee around 1980 or 1981, but it still exists in a remote part of North Mississippi among the members of two families, so a decision was made to have people from that region mentor a young apprentice from West Tennessee. The apprentice chosen was a female drummer from Brownsville named Kesha Burton, and because the lessons between her, bluesman R. L. Boyce and fife-player Willie Hurt took place at the West Tennessee Delta Heritage Center in Brownsville, that institution became interested in sponsoring a festival of Black fife and drum music. The first annual Fife Fest was held at the center on June 16, featuring performances by Kesha Burton with R. L. Boyce and Lightnin Malcolm, and with the Hurt Family Fife and Drum Band from Sardis, Mississippi. I gave a somewhat rambling lecture on the legacy of fife and drum music in Tennessee, and Willie Hurt demonstrated to the crowd how a bamboo cane fife is made. Another expert scholar on Black fife and drum music Carl Vermilyea had driven up from Tallahassee, Florida with his wife for the event, and ended up joining in on the snare drum. The weather was absolutely perfect for the event, and about a hundred people attended. It is to be hoped that festivals like this one and programs like the apprenticeship may reintroduce Black fife and drum music to Tennessee.









      Posted on

      Lightnin Malcolm Live at the Juke Joint Chapel at Clarksdale’s Shack Up Inn


      My last stop of the evening was to see Lightnin Malcolm at the Juke Joint ChapelJuke Joint Chapel at the Shack Up Inn complex at Hopson Plantation, just outside of Clarksdale. But the venue is always crowded, and it isn’t always easy to get a good view of the stage unless you get there early. Also, by the time I arrived out there, I was exhausted, so I caught Malcolm’s first set of songs, and then I headed back to Memphis. All in all, despite the rain, wind and power outages, it was a great Juke Joint Festival this year.

      Posted on

      Duwayne Burnside and David Kimbrough at Pete’s Grill in Clarksdale


      When I left Our Grandma’s Sports Bar, I headed out to Pete’s Grill on Sunflower Avenue to catch the Duwayne Burnside and David Kimbrough performance. Pete’s is another juke joint in Clarksdale that generally has live music only during the Juke Joint Festival, but it is a perfect venue for live blues, just a block or so from the legendary Riverside Hotel. Unfortunately, the performance started late, as the musicians were waiting for someone to arrive with an amp or microphone, and the first set only involved Duwayne Burnside, as David Kimbrough was nowhere to be seen. Of course Duwayne is one of Mississippi’s most gifted blues performers, so it was still an enjoyable show, and I heard that later, after I had left, that David did show up and perform with Duwayne. But Lightnin’ Malcolm was performing out at the Shack Up Inn, so I decided to head out there and see if I could catch him.

      Posted on

      Bourbon and Blues with R. L. Boyce and Lightnin Malcolm at the Oxford Bourbon Festival


      This year’s premiere Oxford Bourbon Festival in Oxford, Mississippi consisted two nights of tasting at the historic Lyric Theatre and a night of live blues and more bourbon at the Oxford location of New Albany’s Tallahatchie Gourmet, which, the last time I was there, was a cool coffee bar called The Shelter on Van Buren, where Duwayne Burnside had been performing on a New Year’s Eve. As Tallahatchie Gourmet, the place seems brighter and sharper, but it still retains its homey, comfortable vibe. The music of the evening was Como, Mississippi bluesman R. L. Boyce, who was playing with fellow blues musician Lightnin Malcolm, and Boyce’s daughter Sherena, a well-known juke joint dancer in the Hill Country region. The crowd was somewhat sparse, but full of people who knew the musicians and yelled their enthusiasm from the audience. Although I didn’t eat, I have to add that the Tallahatchie Gourmet menu leans toward New Orleans cuisine and looks worth checking out.