Tampa Red (January 8, 1904 - March 19, 1981), born Hudson Woodbridge but kn… Read Full Bio ↴Tampa Red (January 8, 1904 - March 19, 1981), born Hudson Woodbridge but known from childhood as Hudson Whittaker, was an influential American musician.

Tampa Red is best known as an accomplished and influential blues guitarist who had a unique single-string bottleneck style. His songwriting and his silky, polished slide technique influenced other leading Chicago blues guitarists, such as Big Bill Broonzy and Robert Nighthawk, as well as Muddy Waters, Elmore James, Mose Allison and many others. In a career spanning over 30 years he also recorded pop, R&B and hokum records.

He was born Hudson Woodbridge in Smithville, Georgia. His parents died when he was a child, and he moved to Tampa, Florida, where he was raised by his aunt and grandmother and adopted their surname, Whittaker. He emulated his older brother, Eddie, who played guitar, and he was especially inspired by an old street musician called Piccolo Pete, who first taught him to play blues licks on a guitar.

In the 1920s, having already perfected his slide technique, he moved to Chicago, Illinois, and began his career as a musician, adopting the name "Tampa Red" from his childhood home and red hair. His big break was being hired to accompany Ma Rainey and he began recording in 1928 with "It's Tight Like That", in a bawdy and humorous style that became known as "hokum". Early recordings were mostly collaborations with Thomas A. Dorsey, known at the time as Georgia Tom. Tampa Red and Georgia Tom recorded almost 90 sides, sometimes as "The Hokum Boys" or, with Frankie Jaxon, as "Tampa Red's Hokum Jug Band".

In 1928, Tampa Red became the first black musician to play a National steel-bodied resonator guitar, the loudest and showiest guitar available before amplification, acquiring one in the first year they were available. This allowed him to develop his trademark bottleneck style, playing single string runs, not block chords, which was a precursor to later blues and rock guitar soloing. The National guitar he used was a gold-plated tricone, which was found in Illinois in the 1990s and later sold to the "Experience Music Project" in Seattle. Tampa Red was known as "The Man With The Gold Guitar", and, into the 1930s, he was billed as "The Guitar Wizard".

His partnership with Dorsey ended in 1932, but he remained much in demand as a session musician, working with John Lee "Sonny Boy" Williamson, Memphis Minnie, and many others. In 1934 he signed for Victor Records. He formed the Chicago Five, a group of session musicians who created what became known as the Bluebird sound, a precursor of the small group style of later jump blues and rock and roll bands. He was a close friend and associate of Big Bill Broonzy and Big Maceo Merriweather. He enjoyed commercial success and reasonable prosperity, and his home became a centre for the blues community, informally providing rehearsal space, bookings, and lodgings for the flow of musicians who arrived in Chicago from the Mississippi Delta as the commercial potential of blues music grew and agricultural employment in the south diminished.

By the 1940s he was playing electric guitar. In 1942 "Let Me Play With Your Poodle" was a # 4 hit on Billboard Magazine's new "Harlem Hit Parade", forerunner of the R&B chart, and his 1949 recording "When Things Go Wrong with You (It Hurts Me Too)", another R&B hit, was covered by Elmore James. He was "rediscovered" in the late 1950s, like many other surviving early recorded blues artists such as Son House and Skip James, as part of the blues revival. His final, undistinguished, recordings were in 1960.

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Grievin' and worryin' blues
Tampa Red Lyrics

Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴

I went down on the corner with my gun in my hand
To kill my woman 'bout loving another man.
CHO: 'Cause I'm grieving and worrying. Yes, I'm grieving and worrying.
Yes, I'm grieving and worrying, baby, 'bout the way you do.

Now, if I should call you, mama, and you refuse to come,
Heart Spring Water sure won't help you none. CHO.

Now, you call me in the morning and you call me late at night.
You swear that you love me but you sure don't treat me right. CHO.

Now, baby, I cried all night and all the night befo',
But if you can stand to leave me, I can stand to see you go. CHO.

Now, you say you're going to leave me all alone by myself,
But if you ever come back, baby, maybe I'll be loving someone else.

CHO: Then you'll be grieving and worrying. You'll be grieving and worrying.
You'll be grieving and worrying, baby, 'bout the way I do.

Overall Meaning

The lyrics of Tampa Red’s song Grievin’ and Worryin’ Blues depict a man who is devastated and heartbroken as he has discovered that his woman is with another man. The singer reveals his intention to kill her due to the betrayal and the pain he is feeling. The first verse is quite direct and straightforward as it describes the gun-wielding singer, indicating that he means business. However, the chorus reveals that he is genuinely grieved and worried about his current situation with his wife. The singer’s pain is highlighted in the repetition of the phrase “grieving and worrying,” which creates emphasis and suggests how much he is hurting.

The second verse illustrates a time when the woman refuses to come when he calls her. The phrase, “Heart Spring Water sure won't help you none” infers that nothing would heal her from the singer’s pain. The third verse is a desperate plea from the singer to his woman; he feels unloved and disrespected despite her declarations of love. However, he offers one last glimmer of hope, stating that even though he had cried all night, he would be able to stand her leaving him. The final verse flips the script, as the woman appears to be leaving the heartbroken singer. He suggests that his future actions would not cause her to grieve and worry in the same way he did, indicating that he will be able to move on.

Line by Line Meaning

I went down on the corner with my gun in my hand
I was so angry and jealous that I went to confront you with a gun.

To kill my woman 'bout loving another man.
I wanted to kill you because I thought you were cheating on me.

Now, if I should call you, mama, and you refuse to come, Heart Spring Water sure won't help you none.
If you don't come to me when I call you, nothing can save you from the consequences.

Now, you call me in the morning and you call me late at night. You swear that you love me but you sure don't treat me right.
You call me all the time and say you love me, but your actions show otherwise.

Now, baby, I cried all night and all the night befo', But if you can stand to leave me, I can stand to see you go.
I've been crying for so long, but I'll be okay if you decide to leave me.

Now, you say you're going to leave me all alone by myself, But if you ever come back, baby, maybe I'll be loving someone else.
You're leaving me, but I might have moved on if you ever decide to come back.

Then you'll be grieving and worrying. You'll be grieving and worrying. You'll be grieving and worrying, baby, 'bout the way I do.
If you come back and see me with someone else, you'll feel the same pain and jealousy I'm feeling now.

Writer(s): HUDSON WHITTAKER

Contributed by Max R. Suggest a correction in the comments below.

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