James Cotton
Encyclopedia
Blues
Blues is the name given to both a musical form and a music genre that originated in African-American communities of primarily the "Deep South" of the United States at the end of the 19th century from spirituals, work songs, field hollers, shouts and chants, and rhymed simple narrative ballads...
harmonica
Harmonica
The harmonica, also called harp, French harp, blues harp, and mouth organ, is a free reed wind instrument used primarily in blues and American folk music, jazz, country, and rock and roll. It is played by blowing air into it or drawing air out by placing lips over individual holes or multiple holes...
player, singer and songwriter, who has performed and recorded with many of the great blues artists of his time as well as with his own band.
Career
Cotton became interested in music when he first heard Sonny Boy Williamson IISonny Boy Williamson II
Willie "Sonny Boy" Williamson was an American blues harmonica player, singer and songwriter, from Mississippi. He is acknowledged as one of the most charismatic and influential blues musicians, with considerable prowess on the harmonica and highly creative songwriting skills...
on the radio. He left home with his uncle and moved to West Helena, Arkansas
West Helena, Arkansas
West Helena is the western portion of Helena-West Helena, Arkansas, a city in Phillips County, Arkansas, United States. As of the 2000 census, this portion of the city population was 8,689....
, finding Williamson there. For many years Cotton claimed that he told Williamson that he was an orphan, and that Williamson took him in and raised him; a story he admitted in recent years is not true. Williamson did however mentor Cotton during his early years. When Williamson left the south to live with his estranged wife in Milwaukee, Wisconsin
Milwaukee, Wisconsin
Milwaukee is the largest city in the U.S. state of Wisconsin, the 28th most populous city in the United States and 39th most populous region in the United States. It is the county seat of Milwaukee County and is located on the southwestern shore of Lake Michigan. According to 2010 census data, the...
, he left his band in Cotton's hands. Cotton was quoted as saying, "He just gave it to me. But I couldn't hold it together 'cause I was too young and crazy in those days an' everybody in the band was grown men, so much older than me."
Cotton began his professional career playing the blues harp
Blues harp
The Richter-tuned harmonica, or 10-hole harmonica or blues harp , is the most widely known type of harmonica...
in Howling Wolf's band in the early 1950s. He made his first recordings as a solo artist for the Sun Records
Sun Records
Sun Records is a record label founded in Memphis, Tennessee, starting operations on March 27, 1952.Founded by Sam Phillips, Sun Records was known for giving notable musicians such as Elvis Presley , Carl Perkins, Roy Orbison, and Johnny Cash...
label in Memphis, Tennessee
Memphis, Tennessee
Memphis is a city in the southwestern corner of the U.S. state of Tennessee, and the county seat of Shelby County. The city is located on the 4th Chickasaw Bluff, south of the confluence of the Wolf and Mississippi rivers....
in 1953. Cotton began to work with the Muddy Waters
Muddy Waters
McKinley Morganfield , known as Muddy Waters, was an American blues musician, generally considered the "father of modern Chicago blues"...
Band around 1955. He performed songs such as "Got My Mojo Working
Got My Mojo Working
"Got My Mojo Working" is a 1956 song written by Preston Foster and first recorded by Ann Cole, but popularized by Muddy Waters in 1957. Waters' rendition of the song was featured on the Rolling Stone magazine's list of 500 Greatest Songs of All Time at #359 and was inducted in the Grammy Hall of...
" and "She's Nineteen Years Old", although he did not appear on the original recordings; long-time Muddy Waters harmonica player Little Walter
Little Walter
Little Walter, born Marion Walter Jacobs , was an American blues harmonica player, whose revolutionary approach to his instrument has earned him comparisons to Charlie Parker and Jimi Hendrix, for innovation and impact on succeeding generations...
was utilized on most of Muddy's recording sessions in the 1950s. Cotton's first recording session with Waters took place in June 1957, and he would alternate with Little Walter on Muddy's recording sessions until the end of the decade, and thereafter until he left to form his own band. In 1965 he formed the Jimmy Cotton Blues Quartet, utilizing Otis Spann
Otis Spann
Otis Spann was an American blues musician, who many consider the leading postwar Chicago blues pianist.-Career:Born in Jackson, Mississippi, United States, Spann became known for his distinct piano style....
on piano to record between gigs with Muddy Waters' band. Their performances were captured by producer
Record producer
A record producer is an individual working within the music industry, whose job is to oversee and manage the recording of an artist's music...
Samuel Charters
Samuel Charters
Samuel Charters, born Samuel Barclay Charters in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, August 1, 1929 , is an American music historian, writer, record producer, musician, and poet...
on volume two of the Vanguard
Vanguard Records
Vanguard Records is a record label set up in 1950 by brothers Maynard and Seymour Solomon in New York. It started as a classical label, but is perhaps best known for its catalogue of recordings by a number of pivotal folk and blues artists from the 1960s; the Bach Guild was a subsidiary...
recording Chicago/The Blues/Today!. After leaving Muddy's band in 1966, Cotton toured with Janis Joplin
Janis Joplin
Janis Lyn Joplin was an American singer, songwriter, painter, dancer and music arranger. She rose to prominence in the late 1960s as the lead singer of Big Brother and the Holding Company and later as a solo artist with her backing groups, The Kozmic Blues Band and The Full Tilt Boogie Band...
while pursuing a solo career. He formed the James Cotton Blues Band in 1967. They mainly performed their own arrangements of popular blues and R&B
Rhythm and blues
Rhythm and blues, often abbreviated to R&B, is a genre of popular African American music that originated in the 1940s. The term was originally used by record companies to describe recordings marketed predominantly to urban African Americans, at a time when "urbane, rocking, jazz based music with a...
material from the 1950s and 1960s. Two albums were recorded live in Montreal
Montreal
Montreal is a city in Canada. It is the largest city in the province of Quebec, the second-largest city in Canada and the seventh largest in North America...
that year.
Bobby Bland
Robert Calvin Bland better known as Bobby "Blue" Bland, is an American singer of blues and soul. He is an original member of the Beale Streeters, and is sometimes referred to as the "Lion of the Blues"...
. Four tracks that featured the big band horn sound and traditional songs were captured on the album Two Sides of the Blue.
In the 1970s, Cotton recorded several albums with Buddah Records
Buddah Records
Buddah Records was founded in 1967 in New York City. The label was born out of Kama Sutra Records, an MGM Records-distributed label, which remained a key imprint following Buddah's founding...
. Cotton played harmonica on Muddy Water's Grammy Award
Grammy Award
A Grammy Award — or Grammy — is an accolade by the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences of the United States to recognize outstanding achievement in the music industry...
winning 1977 album Hard Again
Hard Again
Hard Again is a 1977 Chicago-style electric blues album by Muddy Waters. It was recorded by its producer, Johnny Winter, in a rough, bare-bones style...
, produced by Johnny Winter
Johnny Winter
John Dawson "Johnny" Winter III is an American blues guitarist, singer, and producer. Best known for his late 1960s and 1970s high-energy blues-rock albums and live performances, Winter also produced three Grammy Award-winning albums for blues legend Muddy Waters...
. The James Cotton Blues Band received a Grammy nomination in 1984 for Live From Chicago: Mr. Superharp Himself!, and a second for his 1987 release, Take Me Back. He finally was awarded a Grammy for Deep in the Blues in 1996 for Best Traditional Blues Album.
Cotton appeared on the cover of Living Blues magazine in 1987 in the July/August issue (#76). He was featured in the same publication's 40th anniversary issue, released in 2010 in August/September.
Cotton battled throat cancer in the mid-1990s, and his last recorded vocal performance was on 2000's Fire Down Under the Hill, but he continued to tour, utilizing singers or his backing band members as vocalists. Cotton's latest studio album, Giant, is scheduled for release on Alligator Records in late September 2010.
On March 10, 2008, Cotton and Ben Harper
Ben Harper
Benjamin Chase "Ben" Harper is an American singer-songwriter and musician. Harper plays an eclectic mix of blues, folk, soul, reggae and rock music and is known for his guitar-playing skills, vocals, live performances and activism. Harper's fan base spans several continents...
inducted Little Walter
Little Walter
Little Walter, born Marion Walter Jacobs , was an American blues harmonica player, whose revolutionary approach to his instrument has earned him comparisons to Charlie Parker and Jimi Hendrix, for innovation and impact on succeeding generations...
into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame
Rock and Roll Hall of Fame
The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum is a museum located on the shore of Lake Erie in downtown Cleveland, Ohio, United States. It is dedicated to archiving the history of some of the best-known and most influential artists, producers, engineers and others who have, in some major way,...
. They performed "Juke
Juke
Juke can refer to:* Juke , a harmonica instrumental recorded by Little Walter Jacobs* Juke house, a form of electronic dance music originating from Chicago* Juke joint, an informal establishment featuring blues music, dancing, and alcoholic drinks,...
" and "My Babe
My Babe
"My Babe" is a blues song and a blues standard written by Willie Dixon for Little Walter. Released in 1955 on Checker Records, a subsidiary of Chess Records, the song was the only Dixon composition ever to become a no...
" together at the induction ceremony which was broadcast nationwide on VH1 Classic
VH1 Classic
VH1 Classic is a television network, launched on May 8, 2000. It is operated as part of MTV Networks, a subsidiary of Viacom and primarily features music videos and concert footage from the 1970s through the mid-1990s, though it formerly included a wider range of genres and time periods...
. On August 30, 2010, Cotton was the special guest on Larry Monroe's farewell broadcast of Blue Monday which he hosted on KUT
Kut
Al-Kūt is a city in eastern Iraq, on the left bank of the Tigris River, about 160 kilometres south east of Baghdad. the estimated population is about 374,000 people...
in Austin, Texas for nearly 30 years.
Musical company
Cotton has worked with artists including:-- Big Mama ThorntonBig Mama ThorntonWillie Mae "Big Mama" Thornton was an American rhythm and blues singer and songwriter. She was the first to record the hit song "Hound Dog" in 1952. The song was #1 on the Billboard R&B charts for seven weeks in 1953. The B-side was "They Call Me Big Mama," and the single sold almost two million...
- Janis JoplinJanis JoplinJanis Lyn Joplin was an American singer, songwriter, painter, dancer and music arranger. She rose to prominence in the late 1960s as the lead singer of Big Brother and the Holding Company and later as a solo artist with her backing groups, The Kozmic Blues Band and The Full Tilt Boogie Band...
- Sonny Boy WilliamsonSonny Boy Williamson IIWillie "Sonny Boy" Williamson was an American blues harmonica player, singer and songwriter, from Mississippi. He is acknowledged as one of the most charismatic and influential blues musicians, with considerable prowess on the harmonica and highly creative songwriting skills...
- Howlin' WolfHowlin' WolfChester Arthur Burnett , known as Howlin' Wolf, was an influential American blues singer, guitarist and harmonica player....
- Muddy WatersMuddy WatersMcKinley Morganfield , known as Muddy Waters, was an American blues musician, generally considered the "father of modern Chicago blues"...
- Mike BloomfieldMike BloomfieldMichael Bernard "Mike" Bloomfield was an American musician, guitarist, and composer, born in Chicago, Illinois, who became one of the first popular music superstars of the 1960s to earn his reputation almost entirely on his instrumental prowess, since he rarely sang before 1969–70...
- Freddie KingFreddie KingFreddie King , thought to have been born as Frederick Christian, originally recording as Freddy King, and nicknamed "the Texas Cannonball", was an influential African-American blues guitarist and singer. He is often mentioned as one of "the Three Kings" of electric blues guitar, along with Albert...
- Steve MillerSteve Miller (musician)Steven H. "Steve" Miller is an American guitarist and singer-songwriter who began his career in blues and blues rock and evolved to a more popular-oriented sound which, from the mid 1970s through the early 1980s, resulted in a series of successful singles and albums.-Early years:Born in Milwaukee,...
- SantanaCarlos SantanaCarlos Augusto Alves Santana is a Mexican rock guitarist. Santana became famous in the late 1960s and early 1970s with his band, Santana, which pioneered rock, salsa and jazz fusion...
- B.B. King
- The Grateful Dead
- Willie "Big Eyes" Smith
- Johnny WinterJohnny WinterJohn Dawson "Johnny" Winter III is an American blues guitarist, singer, and producer. Best known for his late 1960s and 1970s high-energy blues-rock albums and live performances, Winter also produced three Grammy Award-winning albums for blues legend Muddy Waters...
- Jimmie VaughanJimmie VaughanJames Lawrence "Jimmie" Vaughan is an American blues rock guitarist and singer from Dallas, Texas, United States. He is the older brother of the late Stevie Ray Vaughan....
- Todd RundgrenTodd RundgrenTodd Harry Rundgren is an American multi-instrumentalist, songwriter and record producer. Hailed in the early stage of his career as a new pop-wunderkind, supported by the certified gold solo double LP Something/Anything? in 1972, Todd Rundgren's career has produced a diverse range of recordings...
- Taj MahalTaj Mahal (musician)Henry Saint Clair Fredericks , who uses the stage name Taj Mahal, is an American Grammy Award winning blues musician. He incorporates elements of world music into his music...
- Paul ButterfieldPaul ButterfieldPaul Butterfield was an American blues vocalist and harmonica player, who founded the Paul Butterfield Blues Band in the early 1960s and performed at the original Woodstock Festival...
- Elvin BishopElvin BishopElvin Bishop is an American blues and rock and roll musician and guitarist.-Career:Bishop was born in Glendale, California, and grew up on a farm near Elliott, Iowa. His family moved to Tulsa, Oklahoma, when he was ten years old...
- William "Billy Boy" ArnoldBilly Boy ArnoldBilly Boy Arnold is an American blues harmonica player, singer and songwriter.-Biography:...
- Charlie MusselwhiteCharlie MusselwhiteCharlie Musselwhite is an American electric blues harmonica player and bandleader, one of the non-black bluesmen who came to prominence in the early 1960s, along with Mike Bloomfield and Paul Butterfield. Though he has often been identified as a "white bluesman", he claims Native American heritage...
- Joe Louis WalkerJoe Louis WalkerJoe Louis Walker, also known as JLW is an American musician, best known as a electric blues guitarist, singer, songwriter and producer. A feature of his work is his recourse to older material or playing styles, which revealed his knowledge of blues history.-Career:Joe Louis Walker was born in San...
Selected discography
- Chicago/The Blues/Today! vol. 2
- 1966 Cut You Loose! (Vanguard)
- 1967 Cotton in Your Ears (Verve)
- 1970 Taking Care of Business (Capitol)
- 1976 Live & On the Move (Buddah)
- 1978 High Energy (Buddah)
- 1984 High Compression (Alligator)
- 1986 Live from Chicago Mr. Superharp Himself (Alligator)
- 1987 Take Me Back (Blind Pig; reissued on vinyl 2009)
- 1988 Live at Antone's (Antone's)
- 1990 Harp Attack! (Alligator; w/ Carey Bell, Junior Wells, and Billy Branch)
- 1991 Mighty Long Time (Antone's)
- 1994 3 Harp Boogie (Tomato)
- 1994 Living the Blues (Verve)
- 1995 Two Sides of the Blues
- 1996 Deep in the Blues (Verve)
- 1998 Seems Like Yesterday (Justin Time)
- 1998 Late Night Blues: Live at the Penelope Café 1967 (Justin Time)
- 1999 Best of the Vanguard Years (Vanguard)
- 1999 Superharps (Telarc; w/ Charlie Musselwhite, Sugar Ray Norcia, and Billy Branch)
- 2000 Fire Down Under the Hill (Telarc)
- 2002 35th Anniversary Jam (Telarc)
- 2004 Baby, Don't You Tear My Clothes (Telarc)
- 2007 Breakin' it Up, Breakin' it Down (Legacy; with Muddy Waters and Johnny Winters)
- 2010 Giant (Alligator)
External links
- [ Allmusic]
- James Cotton discography from Music City
- His official website
- [ Review of Breakin' It Up Breakin' It Down CD on Allmusic.com]
- Hondarribia blues festival
- PBS American Roots Music Oral History