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We Start our Tour With Touré

Global musicians regard Malian blues legend Ali Farka Touré as one of the most important guitar players of all time, noting his residence at the crossroads between traditional African and American musics.

In particular, blues from Mali fuses plaintive narrative with the shuffling rhythm that’s the staple of American bayou blues.  Ali Farka Touré’s 1994 CD with American guitarist Ry Cooder, “Talking Timbuktu,” demonstrated his blues prowess as well as his ability to blend disparate African cultures into a unified African statement–Touré sings in 11 languages on the album.

“Shoes on my feet, I don’t have to worry”


Yesterday we met the 1917/1918 Henry Creamer/Turner Layton early blues classic, “Everybody’s Crazy ‘bout the Doggone Blues but I’m Happy,” which we at All Around This World think is grand. Sing along with me to our slightly-shortened version:

Ev’ry body’s crazy ‘bout the doggone blues, but I’m happy, whew so happy
Ev’ry body’s crazy, but if I must choose, no doggone blues for mine.
I get plenty to eat, never have to worry
Shoes on my feet, I don’t have to hurry
Ev’ry body’s crazy ‘bout the doggone blues but I’m happy all the time.

“Blues ain’t nothin’ but the easy goin’ heart disease”


By 1917 the Blues had become a well-known musical craze, famous for its passionate, sorrowful laments. Henry Creamer and Turner Layton, two of the most succsesful African-American songwriters of the time, decided to put their own twist on the genre with, “Everybody’s Crazy ‘bout the Doggone Blues but I’m Happy.” In the song they referenced the genre’s trademark sadness to differentiate it in their lyric: “Blues ain’t nothin’ but the easy goin’ heart disease, Brother stop your moanin’ Blues can’t make you warmer if you’re bound to freeze, Sister stop your groanin’, Why don’t you rise and shine, Take dem blues right off your mind….” Let’s hear the most popular version, performed by Marion Harris.

Mother of the Blues


Around the turn of the 20th century, guitar-based music with hard livin’-based lyrics developed in several parts of America’s South. Ny the 1920s, African-American artists like W.C. Handy found themselves as the torchbearers of a new genre, performed by African-Americans and mainly marketed to African-Americans, though, through a revolutionary new medium radio, the music became accessible to everyone. One of the earliest blues musicians — and most dynamic performers of all time — was Ma Rainey, “Mother of the Blues.” Enjoy this recording of Ma Rainey singing “Prove it On Me Blues.”

The Blues: Everybody Hurts Sometimes

All Around This World US and Canada "Everywhere Map"The Blues is a globally-rooted, American-born genre of music that, while it has developed a very particular set of musical parameters and technical requirements, ultimately is about how that song you’re singing makes you feel. The original blues didn’t rise from just one source, but most music historians acknowledge that blues artists owe a great debt to musicians from Africa. Not only did early blues instruments originate in West Africa, but the terrible heartache of African slavery clearly provided blues musicians with a reason to feel sorrow.  That said, the blues music is not always serious or sad. Blues lyrics are often bawdy but also might be silly or sarcastic.

Over the next week we’ll keep sorrow in check, stay away from the bawdy and sarcastic, though I really hope we find a way to be silly.

Early “folk” was early “blues”

In the early days of genres we now know as folk and blues, much of the difference between the genres lay not in the themes of the songs or the way singers used songs to express their struggles, but in the race of the singer. The first recordings of American folk and blues music became widely available in the 1920s — enjoy the Mamie Smith hit, “Crazy Blues.” Folk records essentially fell into two camps: “race recordings,” which was the term for records featuring African-American musicians, marketed primarily to African-Americans (though musically-aware whites did seek them out), and “hillbilly music,” which was music performed by Appalachian whites, and marketed to a mainly white audience.