Lizzie “Memphis Minnie” Douglas (1897-1973). Born in Algiers, Louisiana, Memphis Minnie recorded hundreds of sides over a 40-year period. Among the blues fanatics, she is well known and respected. Among the general population, she is all but unknown. Not only was Minnie unique as the only female blues guitarist of her era, her guitar-playing was excellent. While recording with her first husband, Kansas Joe McCoy, she supplied the leads while Joe played backing guitar. Moreover, she played with fingerpicks but with a volume many thought only possible with a flatpick. Minnie is thought to be the first blues guitarist to start using the metal-bodied resonator guitars that became such a craze in blues All the bluesmen I know of who switched over to them said they did so after hearing Minnie use one.
Minnie’s career began during the Depression when she was signed up to Bluebird Records. She got noticed because of her unique combination of Louisiana country mixed with Memphis blues. Minnie may have been the first of the Southern blues guitarists to journey to Chicago and switch her style over to the electric guitar—many believe Muddy Waters to have been the first but Minnie preceded him and is probably the true founder of Chicago blues along with Tampa Red and Big Bill Broonzy. She later lived in Indianapolis and then in Detroit. She returned to Chicago some years later and then to Memphis in the late 50s. Minnie played the toughest juke joints around and could handle her own with any man. If he made a play on her, she belted him. If he cussed at her, she cussed right back at him. She wasn’t afraid of anything and she knew how to fight. Memphis Minnie would die of a stroke in Memphis in 1973. Bonnie Raitt paid for her headstone.
Muddy’s hit, “Honey Bee,” was likely based on Minnie’s “Bumble Bee.” One of Minnie’s most famous songs was “When the Levee Breaks” due to being covered by Led Zeppelin. Joe McCoy sings the lead vocal on that one but Minnie was a perfectly fine singer. She could rank up there with the best blues divas of her day just on vocal ability alone (in fact, her niece was the great Chicago blues diva, LaVern Baker). Another song of Minnie’s that had a great influence was “What’s the Matter with the Mill” (again with Kansas Joe) which provided the framework by which Chuck Berry recorded many of his hits including “Johnny B. Goode,” “It Wasn’t Me,” “Roll Over Beethoven,” “Nadine,” etc. Some of her other outstanding songs are “Frisco Town” and “Frankie Jean.” Because of her gender, Memphis Minnie has been inexcusably neglected. When naming some of the finest blues guitarists and personalities of the day, Minnie is, more often than not, unmentioned despite having played with Big Bill Broonzy, Tampa Red, Booker White and Little Walter among others. Had she been a man, she would have been far better known than she is, her genius proclaimed loud and clear.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IVb-An-R4-Q
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tVPyOA_e5eQ