The two are easy to distinguish. Williamson I played the harmonica acoustically and was essentially a pre-War artist. Williamson II was entirely an electrified harpist, in the style of Little Walter, reflecting the advent of the jukebox and electrified instruments following World War II.
(Compare the albums Sonny Boy Williamson I ~~ Sonny Boy Williamson II)
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Sonny Boy Williamson I (30 March 1914 - 1 June 1948)
also known as John Lee Curtis Williamson, was an American blues harmonica player, born in Jackson, Tennessee, whose first record Good Morning little School Girl was a hit in 1937. He was widely popular throughout the whole southeast of the U.S., and was practically synonymous with the blues harmonica for the next decade, making his a commonly used stage name by the time he was murdered in 1948. He is buried at the Old Blairs Chapel Church, south west of Jackson, Tennessee.
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Sonny Boy Williamson II (11 March 1908 - 25 May 1965) also known as Willie Williamson, Willie Miller, Little Boy Blue, The Goat and Footsie.
Aleck "Rice" Miller was an American blues harmonica player, singer and songwriter.
Born as Aleck Ford to Millie Ford on the Sara Jones Plantation in Tallahatchie County, Mississippi, his date and year of birth are a matter of uncertainty. He claimed to have been born on December 5, 1899, but one researcher, David Evans, claims to have found census record evidence that he was born around 1912. His gravestone lists his date of birth as March 11, 1908.
He lived and worked with his sharecropper stepfather, Jim Miller, whose last name he soon adopted, and mother, Millie Ford, until the early 1930s. Beginning in the 1930s, he traveled around Mississippi and Arkansas and encountered Big Joe Williams, Elmore James and Robert Lockwood, Jr., also known as Robert Junior Lockwood, who would play guitar on his later Checker Records sides. He was also associated with Robert Johnson during this period. Miller developed his style and raffish stage persona during these years. Willie Dixon recalled seeing Lockwood and Miller playing for tips in Greenville, Mississippi in the 1930s. He entertained audiences with novelties such inserting one end of the harmonica into his mouth and playing with no hands.
In 1941 Miller was hired to play the King Biscuit Time show, advertising the King Biscuit brand of baking flour on radio station KFFA in Helena, Arkansas with Lockwood. It was at this point that the radio program's sponsor, Max Moore, began billing Miller as Sonny Boy Williamson, apparently in an attempt to capitalize on the fame of the well known Chicago-based harmonica player and singer John Lee Williamson (Sonny Boy Williamson I). Although John Lee Williamson was a major blues star who had already released dozens of successful and widely influential records under the name "Sonny Boy Williamson" from 1937 onward, Aleck Miller would later claim to have been the first to use the name, and some blues scholars believe that Miller's assertion he was born in 1899 was a ruse to convince audiences he was old enough to have used the name before John Lee Williamson, who was born in 1914 (this is made somewhat less likely, however, by the fact that Miller was certainly older than Williamson even if one does not accept the 1899 birthdate.) Whatever the methodology, Miller became commonly known as "Sonny Boy Williamson", and Lockwood and the rest of his band were billed as the King Biscuit Boys.
In 1949 he relocated to West Memphis, Arkansas and lived with his sister and her husband, Howlin' Wolf (later, for Checker Records, he did a parody of Howlin' Wolf entitled "Like Wolf"). Sonny Boy started his own KWEM radio show from 1948 to 1950 selling the elixir Hadacol.
Sonny Boy also brought his King Biscuit musician friends to West Memphis: Elmore James, Houston Stackhouse, Arthur "Big Boy" Crudup, Robert Nighthawk and others, to perform on KWEM Radio.
In the 1940s Williamson married Mattie Gordon, who remained his wife until his death.
Williamson's first recording session took place in 1951 for Lillian McMurry of Jackson, Mississippi's Trumpet Records (three years after the death of John Lee Williamson, which for the first time allowed some legitimacy to Miller's carefully worded claim to being "the one and only Sonny Boy Williamson"). McMurry later erected Williamson's headstone, near Tutwiler, Mississippi, in 1977.
When Trumpet went bankrupt in 1955, Sonny Boy's recording contract was yielded to its creditors, who sold it to Chess Records in Chicago, Illinois. Sonny Boy had begun developing a following in Chicago beginning in 1953, when he appeared there as a member of Elmore James's band. It was during his Chess years that he enjoyed his greatest success and acclaim, recording about 70 songs for Chess subsidiary Checker Records from 1955 to 1964.
In the early 1960s he toured Europe several times during the height of the British blues craze, recording with The Yardbirds and The Animals, and appearing on several TV broadcasts throughout Europe. According to the Led Zeppelin biography 'Hammer of the Gods', while in England Sonny Boy set his hotel room on fire while trying to cook a rabbit in a coffee percolator. Robert Palmer's "Deep Blues" mentions that during this tour he allegedly stabbed a man during a street fight and left the country abruptly.
Sonny Boy took a liking to the European fans, and while there had a custom-made, two-tone suit tailored personally for him, along with a bowler hat, matching umbrella, and an attaché case for his harmonicas. He appears credited as "Big Skol" on Roland Kirk's live album 'Kirk in Copenhagen' (1963). One of his final recordings from England, in 1964, featured him singing "I'm Trying To Make London My Home" with Hubert Sumlin providing the guitar. Due to his many years of relating convoluted, highly fictionalized accounts of his life to friends and family, upon his return to the Delta, some expressed disbelief upon hearing of Sonny Boy's touring across the Atlantic, visiting Europe, seeing the Eiffel Tower, Big Ben, and other landmarks, and recording there.
Upon his return to the U.S., he resumed playing the King Biscuit Time show on KFFA, and performed around Helena, Arkansas. As fellow musicians Houston Stackhouse and Peck Curtis waited at the KFFA studios for Williamson on May 25, 1965, the 12:15 broadcast time was closing in and Sonny Boy was nowhere in sight. Peck left the radio station and headed out to locate Williamson, and discovered his body in bed at the rooming house where he'd been staying, dead of an apparent heart attack suffered in his sleep the night before.
Williamson is buried on New Africa Rd. just outside Tutwiler, Mississippi at the site of the former Whitman Chapel cemetery.
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Skinny Woman
Sonny Boy Williamson Lyrics
Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴
I don't want no skinny woman, I want some, a woman with a-plenty a-meat
Now, we can roll all night long, an' this woman, won't have to stop 'n eat
Well I've got so, so many women, now an' I don't know who I love
Yes Lord, I've got me, so many women, til I'm, I really don't know who I love
Now an' it seems like the girl I been cravin' for, slipped away to the good Lord, up above
An' Lord I have, the blues in the mo'nin, blues is the first thing when I lay down at night
Now that's the reason my baby worries me, my baby she don't treat me right
Now if you take me, take me back, baby, now an' I won't do you mean no mo', oh Lord
If you just forgive me this time, I won't never do you mean no mo'
Now that you been get all-a my labor, love n' you, just let Mister So an' So, go
Now she is gone, she is gone but she'll for'ever be on my mind, oh Lord
I, she gone, she's gone, she'll for'ever be on my mind
Now she was a sweet little woman, she just, wouldn't be lovin' n' kind
In Sonny Boy Williamson's song "Skinny Woman", the singer is expressing his preference for a woman with a fuller figure. He does not want a skinny woman, but instead wants one with "plenty of meat". His desire for a woman with a larger body seems to stem from his desire to spend the entire night with her without interruption. He laments that the girl he's been "cravin' for" has passed away and he doesn't know who he loves. He sings about having the blues in the morning and at night, and how his girlfriend causes him to worry because she doesn't treat him right. He pleads for forgiveness so he can have another chance, promising not to mistreat her again.
The song "Skinny Woman" is a blues standard that has been covered by many artists over the years. The lyrics capture the essence of the blues, with its focus on love troubles and the hardships of life. It's a song that can be interpreted in different ways, depending on the listener's perspective. One could see the singer's desire for a fuller-figured woman as a celebration of diverse body types, while others might feel it objectifies women. Nevertheless, the song's catchy rhythm and bluesy melody make it a timeless classic that continues to be enjoyed today.
Line by Line Meaning
Now I don't want no, no skinny woman, I want the woman, she got a-plenty of, Lord
I don't desire a thin woman, I want somebody with lots and lots of flesh.
Now, we can roll all night long, an' this woman, won't have to stop 'n eat
I can enjoy all night long without a break because the lady has enough meat to keep her going
Well I've got so, so many women, now an' I don't know who I love
I've got a lot of women around me, but I'm confused whom to love among them.
Yes Lord, I've got me, so many women, til I'm, I really don't know who I love
I've got myself so many women that it's hard to decide and end up not loving anyone in particular.
Now an' it seems like the girl I been cravin' for, slipped away to the good Lord, up above
It seems like the girl I desired passed away and went to heaven.
An' Lord I have, the blues in the mo'nin, blues is the first thing when I lay down at night
I feel the blues in the morning, and it's the first thing that bothers me when I lay down at night.
Now that's the reason my baby worries me, my baby she don't treat me right
My baby doesn't treat me well, and that's one reason for my distress.
If you just forgive me this time, I won't never do you mean no mo'
If you excuse me now, I will never wrong you again, ever.
Now that you been get all-a my labor, love n' you, just let Mister So an' So, go
I've done so much for you as your labor and love, just let me go and let Mister So and So take over.
I, she gone, she's gone, she'll for'ever be on my mind
She's gone forever, but she'll always be remembered and missed.
Now she was a sweet little woman, she just, wouldn't be lovin' n' kind
Although she was a lovely and charming woman, she was not loving or kind at all.
Lyrics © O/B/O APRA AMCOS
Written by: JOHN LEE WILLIAMSON
Lyrics Licensed & Provided by LyricFind
Arthur Zaith
harp is in D?
Keith Randall
Yes.