John Smith Hurt (March 8, 1893 – November 2, 1966), known as Mississippi John Hurt, was an American country blues singer, songwriter, and guitarist.

Biography

Early years

John Hurt was born in Teoc, Carroll County, Mississippi and raised in Avalon, Mississippi. His parents, Isom and Mary, had both been slaves and as was common after the Civil War, they continued working on the same plantation, now as sharecroppers, for the same owner.

John taught himself to play guitar at the age of nine. To earn extra money, his mother took in boarders. One of them, William Henry Carson, who played a guitar and was a friend of John's mother, often stayed at the Hurt home while courting a woman who lived nearby. When no one was around, John would play Carson's guitar. As a youth, he played old-time music for friends and at dances or at the local general store. His syncopated playing style was ideal for dancing.

He worked as a farmhand and sharecropper, sometimes working for the railroad into the 1920s. On occasion, a medicine show came through the area. Hurt recalled that one wanted to hire him: "One of them wanted me, but I said no because I just never wanted to get away from home." After auditioning "Monday Morning Blues" at his home, Hurt took part in two recording sessions where he recorded 20 songs, in Memphis and New York City.

Rediscovery and death

thumb|Hurt's grave

In 1952, musicologist Harry Smith included John's version of "Frankie and Johnny" and "Spike Driver Blues" in his seminal collection The Anthology of American Folk Music which generated considerable interest in locating him. When a copy of his "Avalon Blues" was discovered in 1963, it led musicologist Dick Spottswood to locate Avalon, Mississippi on a map and ask his friend, Tom Hoskins, who was traveling that way, to enquire after Hurt.

Upon locating Hurt, Hoskins persuaded him to perform several songs, to ensure that he was genuine.

This added to the American folk music revival which was blooming at that time and inspired the search for and the rediscovery of many other bluesmen of Hurt's era such as Son House, Skip James, Bukka White, Mance Lipscomb and Lightnin' Hopkins. Hurt performed on the festival, university and coffeehouse concert circuits with other Delta blues musicians who were brought out of retirement. His performances in 1963 at the Newport Folk Festival and the Philadelphia Folk Festival caused his star to rise.

For three years, Hurt performed extensively at colleges, concert halls, and coffeehouses, appearing on The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson, on Pete Seeger's public TV show, Rainbow Quest alongside Sonny Terry and Brownie McGhee and Hedy West and had a write up in Time. He also recorded three albums for Vanguard Records. He died of a heart attack on November 2, 1966 at a hospital in Grenada, Mississippi.

Tributes

thumb|Mississippi John Hurt Museum, in Avalon, Mississippi

There was a memorial and museum dedicated to Hurt in Avalon, Mississippi, parallel to Rural Route 2, the rural road he grew up on. On February 20, 2024, it was destroyed in a fire the day after being made a National Landmark. Arson is not suspected.

The folk-rock band The Lovin' Spoonful took their name from a recurring phrase in Hurt's song "Coffee Blues".

The singer-songwriter Tom Paxton, who met Hurt and played on the same bill with him at the Gaslight in Greenwich Village around 1963, wrote and recorded a song about him in 1977, "Did You Hear John Hurt?".

The first track of John Fahey's 1968 solo acoustic guitar album Requia is "Requiem for John Hurt". Fahey's posthumous live album, The Great Santa Barbara Oil Slick, also features a version of the piece, entitled "Requiem for Mississippi John Hurt".

Norman Greenbaum's eclectic minor hit, "Gondoliers, Shakespeares, Overseers, Playboys And Bums" refers to Mississippi John Hurt singing the blues.

The British folk and blues artist Wizz Jones recorded a tribute song, "Mississippi John", for his 1977 album Magical Flight.

The Delta blues artist Rory Block recorded the album Avalon: A Tribute to Mississippi John Hurt, released in 2013 as part of her "Mentor Series".

The New England singer-songwriter Bill Morrissey released the Grammy-nominated album Songs of Mississippi John Hurt in 1999.

In 2017, Hurt's life story was told in the documentary series American Epic. The film featured footage of Hurt performing and being interviewed, and improved restorations of his 1920s recordings. Director Bernard MacMahon stated that Hurt "was the inspiration for American Epic".

In 2023, Rolling Stone ranked Hurt at number 159 on its list of the 200 Greatest Singers of All Time.

In 2019, the Killer Blues Headstone Project placed a stone for Hurt at the family plot in Avalon.

Discography

Stefan Wirtz's in depth, illustrated discography

Dixon, Robert M., Goodrich, John W. and Rye, Howard - Blues and Gospel Records, 1890-1943, Fourth Edition

AllMusic discography

78 rpm releases

  • "Frankie" / "Nobody's Dirty Business" (Okeh Records, Okeh 8560), 1928
  • "Stack O' Lee" / "Candy Man Blues" (Okeh Records, OKeh 8654), 1928
  • "Blessed Be the Name" / "Praying on the Old Camp Ground" (Okeh Records, OKeh 8666), 1928
  • "Blue Harvest Blues" / "Spike Driver Blues" (Okeh Records, OKeh 8692), 1928
  • "Louis Collins" / "Got the Blues (Can't Be Satisfied)" (Okeh Records, OKeh 8724), 1928
  • "Ain't No Tellin'" / "Avalon Blues" (Okeh Records, OKeh 8759), 1928

Later career albums

  • Folk Songs and Blues (Piedmont Records, PLP 13157), 1963
  • Worried Blues, live recordings (Piedmont Records, PLP 13161), 1964
  • Today! (Vanguard Records, VSD-79220), 1966
  • The Immortal Mississippi John Hurt (Vanguard Records, VSD-79248), 1967
  • The Best of Mississippi John Hurt, live recording from Oberlin College, April 15, 1965 (Vanguard Records, VSD-19/20), 1970
  • Last Sessions (Vanguard Records, VSD-79327), 1972
  • Volume One of a Legacy, live recordings (Piedmont Records, CLPS 1068), 1975
  • Monday Morning Blues: The Library of Congress Recordings, vol. 1 (Flyright Records, FLYLP 553), 1980
  • Avalon Blues: The Library of Congress Recordings, vol. 2 (Heritage Records, HT-301), 1982
  • Satisfied, live recordings (Quicksilver Intermedia, QS 5007), 1982
  • The Candy Man, live recordings (Quicksilver Intermedia, QS 5042), 1982
  • Sacred and Secular: The Library of Congress Recordings, vol. 3 (Heritage Records, HT-320), 1988
  • Avalon Blues (Flyright Records, FLYCD 06), 1989
  • Memorial Anthology, live recordings (Genes Records, GCD 9906/7), 1993
  • Rediscovered (Vanguard Records, CD 79519), 1998
  • The Complete Recordings (Vanguard Records, CD 70181–2), 1998

Selected pre-war albums

  • The Original 1928 Recordings (Spokane Records SPL 1001) 1971
  • 1928: Stack O' Lee Blues – His First Recordings (Biograph Records BLP C4) 1972
  • 1928 Sessions (Yazoo Records L 1065) 1979
  • Satisfying Blues (Collectables Records VCL 5529) 1995
  • Avalon Blues: The Complete 1928 Okeh Recordings (Columbia Records CK64986) 1996
  • Candy Man Blues: The Complete 1928 Sessions (Snapper Music SBLUECD 010) 2004
  • American Epic: The Best of Mississippi John Hurt (Lo-Max / Sony Legacy / Third Man, TMR-459) 2017
  • MISSISSIPPI JOHN HURT - The Man From Avalon Pristine PABL004, pitch corrected, 13 tracks including one unissued track.

Notes

Further reading

  • Ratcliffe, Philip R. (2011). Mississippi John Hurt: His Life, His Times, His Blues. Jackson: University Press of Mississippi.

References

  • Mississippi John Hurt Foundation, official website, includes information about the annual Mississippi John Hurt Music Festival in Avalon, Mississippi.
  • Mississippi John Hurt Museum, official website.
  • Mississippi John Hurt News. Website run by Hurt's grandnephew Fred Bolden, with forums and discussions open to the public.
  • Illustrated Mississippi John Hurt discography
  • [ Allmusic]
  • Mississippi John Hurt's "Stackolee", Recording, sheet music, and guitar tab.
  • Interview of Mississippi John Hurt Interview conducted by Tom Hoskins and Nick Perls on October 13, 1963 in Washington, DC.