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by: Eric Steiner
(photo by Dan Locke)
DAUGHTER OF THE BLUES
Shirley King is a blues original. Her father is the
King of the Blues,
B.B. King, and she’s working hard to establish herself as a blues force based
on her own initiative. If her recent interview with your Midwest BEAT
blues
correspondent is any indication of Shirley’s drive to succeed, and give
something back through some innovative work in the schools, Shirley’s future
in the blues is mighty secure.
During the Blues First celebration last month in Memphis,
Shirley broke
her ankle. However, in true blues tradition, she kept on keepin’ on.
“I fell and broke my ankle, but my band played on,” she
said. “The same
thing happened to my father last month as he was getting off his tour bus,
but my break required a special brace.”
I truly hope that this string of bad luck and trouble is at
an end. We
need folks like Shirley and her father to bring the blues to the world,
injury-free.
Instead of dwelling on such a tough break, though, Shirley
described to
me the special qualities that she brings to the blues, such as the way she
turns the blues up a notch during her live gigs. Her live shows are what
set
Shirley King apart from other daughters of the blues. Make no mistake
about
it: even though Shirley is the daughter of the King of the Blues himself, she
wants to be a blueswoman on the merits of her own talent and hard work.
A PEOPLE-PLEASIN' LIVE SHOW:
“I try my best to give the customers what they want,” she
said. “I work
hard to give the audience, and the people at the club, what they came to see:
a show that helps them get up and get moving. My shows motivate
people to
get up and have fun. I want to give people a pretty good reason to go out
and see a live blues show, instead of just sitting back at home playing a
record. If I don’t do that as a performing artist, it’s the same
experience
for the audience when they are sitting at home playing a record, and I want
people to come out and put their workday aside and have some fun. If I
don’t
know a specific request for a song, I will work on it and make sure we please
the customer. We’ll just make it up sometimes, but we’ll have some fun
doing it.”
“I know that many people think of my father when they know
I’m his
daughter,” said Shirley. We are very different, you know. He plays
Memphis
style blues, and I play real Chicago blues in the style of Koko Taylor and
Willie Dixon. These two styles are very very different. He’s male
and I’m
female, and men and women have different perspectives on the blues. I sing
the blues and shake a mean hip and he sings the blues and plays Lucille.”
BLUES EDUCATION FROM A NATURAL TEACHER:
Despite her recent injury, Shirley remains active in
helping young
people discover the blues.
“I really enjoy working with the kids,” she said.
“Our young people are
our future. Whenever I work in the schools, I try to give the young people
hope. Over the years, I’ve performed at over 300 schools, working
directly
with young people. I’d guess that 75 to 80 percent of the young people
that
participate in one of my presentations actually will go on to listen and
learn more about the blues themselves. At one school, we had a very, very
energetic young man who was labeled as a troublemaker. I knew nothing about
him when I called him up onstage. Later on, everyone told me that he was a
very, very difficult child and that he was probably destined to go to
juvenile. Well, he smiled and played and sang onstage with me and almost
stole the show! That’s the type of effect that the blues can have on
young
people and I enjoy being a part of that.”
Shirley’s been a touring artist at Chicago’s Urban
Gateways, one of the
nation’s most innovative ways to reach young people through a variety of
hands-on experiences through the arts. Urban Gateways brings young people
together with working musicians, visual artists and others who want to help
young people experience the arts through classroom performances and school
assemblies. Her passion for the blues, and for young people,
has made her
a sought-after artist in the greater Chicagoland area.
“Shirley King gave Chicago schools a real taste of the
blues with a
performance through Urban Gateways that told captivating stories of rhythm,
syncopation, and spirit,” according to Urban Gateways Program Director Tim
Sauer.
The Urban Gateways program is celebrating its 40th
anniversary this year
as a nonprofit organization that provides multicultural performing, visual,
and literary arts programs for children, teachers, and parents in the greater
Chicago metropolitan area. Their line-up of programs featuring
artists-in-residence, touring performers, and a cultural enrichment program
targeted to Chicago’s most economically disadvantaged communities, is first-rate.
Shirley King is not alone being the daughter of a famous
bluesman, but
she’s unique in that her father is a working musician touring more than six
months out of the year. For too many sons and daughters of the blues,
their
fathers have passed on.
Bernard Allison, Shemekia Copeland, and Big Bill Morganfield
all have
fathers who were true blues legends in their day. Luther Allison remains
an
inspiration to many guitar players as one of prime purveyors of the Chicago
sound, and Shemekia Copeland’s work has been recognized by folks at the
Grammy Awards and the W.C. Handy Awards. When it comes to the history of
the
blues, from the Mississippi Delta in the 1940’s to the bright lights of the
big city in the 1980’s, two words come to mind: Muddy Waters, the King
Bee
himself. I’m sure that Luther, Johnny, and Muddy are all looking
down from
heaven, pleased that their children have carried on their blues legacies.
Once Shirley King’s recovered from her broken ankle, watch
out.
She’ll
be back to the blues, and we’ll be all the richer for it.
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