Robert Johnson Robert Leroy Johnson (May 8, 1911 – August 16, 1938) was an American blues singer, songwriter, and musician. His landmark recordings in 1936 and 1937 display a combination of singing, guitar skills, and songwriting talent that has influenced later generations of musicians. Johnson’s poorly documented life and death have given rise to many…
Michael Lee Firkins Michael Lee Firkins (born May 19, 1967) is an electric guitar player whose sound fuses bluegrass, country, blues, and jazz elements into his distorted rock sound. He is noted amongst guitarists for his prolific use of hybrid picking at high speeds. Playlist 3 Videos Cajun Boogie 2:58 Laughing Stacks 6:33 Blues Garage…
Jerry Reed Jerry Reed Hubbard (March 20, 1937 – September 1, 2008) was an American country music singer, guitarist, composer, and songwriter, as well as an actor who appeared in more than a dozen films. His signature songs included “Guitar Man”, “U.S. Male”, “A Thing Called Love”, “Alabama Wild Man”, “Amos Moses”, “When You’re Hot,…
Tommy Tedesco Thomas J. Tedesco (July 3, 1930 – November 10, 1997) was an American guitarist and studio musician in Los Angeles and Hollywood. He was part of the loose collective of the area’s leading session musicians later popularly known as The Wrecking Crew, who played on thousands of studio recordings in the 1960s and…
Chuck Berry Charles Edward Anderson Berry (October 18, 1926 – March 18, 2017) was an American singer and songwriter, and one of the pioneers of rock and roll music. Nicknamed the “Father of Rock and Roll”, Berry refined and developed rhythm and blues into the major elements that made rock and roll distinctive with songs…
Carl Kress Kress started on piano before picking up the banjo. Beginning in 1926, he played guitar during his brief time as a member of Paul Whiteman’s orchestra. For most of his career, he was a studio musician and sideman buried in large orchestras, and his name was little known. His work in the 1920s…