Search - Johnny Maddox :: Where the Southern Crosses the Yellow Dog

A True W C Handy Tribute

04/09/2003

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Where the Southern Crosses the Yellow Dog, Johnny Maddox
This is another concept album form Crazy Otto Music, featuring the blues and blues-derived music of the early 20th-century. Nine of the 20 tracks are in fact by WC Handy, a legend that heard Maddox himself in 1952. Just about all of the most famous handy pieces are on the play list. And there is the understanding that the `ragtime era', as it is so-called, also encompassed the early blues tradition. It is hard to distinguish some of the rags from the blues of the time. It would be more accurate to describe a piece as a `bluesy rag' or as a `raggy blues'. Johnny gives those borderline pieces as much ragtime flavor as they can handle, and none of the tunes is mired down in the slow `down and out' feel often given by lesser-informed players.Another reason that Johnny Maddox is one of the most successful artists of his time is his total immersion in the music, as a prodigious collector and researcher who has at hand sheet music, vintage recordings, piano rolls and more. He's also the descendent and piano student of a musician from the St Louis World's Fair era (see CO-004) and as noted by a 1913 photograph in this CD, son of a trombonist with the Commercial Club Band, Gallatin Tennessee.Johnny's long been recognized as an artist and pioneer, but a particularly early note of recognition is displayed on the back of the CD booklet for this recording. None other than pioneering ragtime researcher Rudi Blesh wrote in a letter to Johnny in 1951: "(The records) have quite an infectious spirit and a kind of easy going lilt that ragtime should have." The assessment after more than 50 years remains the same.By David Reffkin, Director, The American Ragtime Ensemble; Producer/Host, "The Ragtime Machine" (KUSF, San Francisco)"