Sixth Annual Blues Symposium

Crowds of blues enthusiasts gathered in Oxford as the University of Mississippi and the Center for the Study of Southern Culture played host to the sixth annual Blues Today Symposium February 26–27, 2009. This year’s symposium, themed “Documenting the Blues,” featured such panelists, speakers, friends, and veteran folklorists as David Evans, George Mitchell, Art Rosenbaum, and Sylvester Oliver. Highlights included an all-blues Thacker Mountain Radio show, an unveiling of our own Blues Trail marker on the lawn of Barnard Observatory, and a coinciding performance by gospel great Mavis Staples at the Gertrude Castellow Ford Center.

After a prekickoff Brown Bag lecture with Mark Camarigg (Living Blues), Scott Barretta (Highway 61 radio, Mississippi Blues Trail), and Greg Johnson (Blues Archive) on Wednesday, audiences on Thursday heard a lecture by Evan Hatch (MA 2002) entitled John Work III and saw the unveiling of an exhibition of Work’s recordings. Johnson also unveiled the newly digitized audio and video from the Alan Lomax Archive, noting that “much of what we know about the history and development of blues music and culture was passed along to us through the research of David Evans, George Mitchell, Alan Lomax, Jim O’Neal, and others.” According to many participants and visitors alike, the blues edition of Thacker Mountain Radio on Thursday, February 26, was exceptional. George Mitchell, who first recorded R. L. Burnside in 1967, shared his love for the blues and the Blues Today Symposium with his kind words and music. Additionally performing on Thacker Mountain Radio was Grammy-winning symposium participant Art Rosenbaum, who performed on the fiddle with accompaniment from Oxford guitarist and incoming Southern Studies master’s student Jake Fussell. Local bluesmen Kenny Brown and Cedric Burnside with Lightnin’ Malcolm performed a tribute to Mitchell for his recordings of the earliest notable Burnside.

“The community support was particularly strong this year, especially for the special blues-themed Thacker Mountain Radio show, which had a standing-room-only crowd at the Lyric Theater,” Camarigg said. “The symposium is a great opportunity for scholars, fans, and musicians to come together and share their knowledge and passion for blues music and culture,” he added. In addition to the general celebration of the blues, this year’s event also specifically celebrated those who have contributed to the blues by recording, producing, and documenting. Nearly all of the former editors of Living Blues were in attendance, along with many who continue to work in the Blues Archive and on blues research elsewhere. Southern Studies graduate student Alan Pike said, “Having a blues marker placed at Barnard Observatory made this year’s symposium especially exciting among blues enthusiasts here at the University. The marker and the unveiling ceremony served to honor the great folks at Living Blues magazine and the various faculty and blues scholars that have helped to make Ole Miss the best place to study the blues.” Another graduate student, Duvall Osteen, continued, “It was an honor to see the marker unveiled at the Center, a place so devoted to creating ways for people to discover and explore Southern culture in a variety of ways.”

The Mississippi Blues Trail features more than 125 historical markers and interpretive sites located throughout the state. The unveiling of the most recent blues marker, entitled “Documenting the Blues,” became a celebratory event on the symposium schedule. It is the first trail marker in Lafayette County and is sponsored in part by the Oxford Tourism Council. As student remarks might suggest, this marker was particularly special to the Center for the Study of Southern Culture and the University of Mississippi. Similar markers will continue to be developed and identified in phases as funding becomes available.

Though not officially part of the Blues Today Symposium, Mavis Staples put on an outstanding performance Friday evening. The Blues Today Symposium official finale was a Big Jack Johnson show at Rooster’s Blues House on the Square in Oxford, but many symposium visitors still continued on a tour of the B. B. King Museum in Indianola, Mississippi, guided by blues scholar Scott Barretta, who served as a consultant in the museum’s creation.

Symposium sponsors include the Oxford Convention and Visitors Bureau, the Yoknapatawpha Arts Council, Mississippi Development Authority, the University of Mississippi’s Department of Archives and Special Collections in the J. D. Williams Library, Austin’s Music in Oxford, and the Center for the Study of Southern Culture.

Jen Lawrence