Detroit Blues Society
The Detroit Blues Society's mission is 'Keeping the Blues Alive Since 1985." They have been a pillar society in Detroit by keeping the blues alive through their kindness, outreach, and fundraising efforts. One of their efforts is to raise funds for placing headstones at some of our blues players graves. Many of their families could not afford it and they want to make sure that they are recognized for their accomplishments. Uncle Jessie's headstones was one of those efforts: DBS Headstone dedication ceremonies
The Detroit Blues Society holds many events year round to keep the blues alive in Michigan. Please visit their sites to learn more and attend their events. Detroit Blues Society Website, and Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/DetroitBluesSociety/
The Detroit Blues Society holds many events year round to keep the blues alive in Michigan. Please visit their sites to learn more and attend their events. Detroit Blues Society Website, and Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/DetroitBluesSociety/
PBS Blues - Chicago and detroit
This is a great website which describes PBS roadtrip to Chicago and Detroit Blues. It describes the history, artists and even a roadmap showing the great northern migration. PBS Blues Roadtrip to Chicago and Detroit
Detroit Music History - Including black bottom and paradise valley
Other sites discusses how there was a Detroit music scene before Motown. Detroit had big band jazz in the 20's and 3s and bee bop in the 50's. Detroit Music History. Red Bull Music Academy describes Detroit Jazz and Blues.
Wikipedia entries describe Detroit's blues scene and black bottom as the start of the Delta Blues:
Detroit blues is blues played by musicians residing in and around Detroit, Michigan, particularly in the 1940s and 1950s. Detroit blues originated when Delta blues performers migrated north from the Mississippi Delta and Memphis, Tennessee, to work in industrial plants in Detroit in the 1920s and 1930s. Typical Detroit blues is similar in style to Chicago blues. Its sound is distinguished from Delta blues by the use of electric amplified instruments and more varied instrumentation, including the bass guitar and piano.
The only Detroit blues performer to achieve national fame was John Lee Hooker, as record companies and promoters have tended to ignore the Detroit scene in favor of the larger, more influential Chicago blues. The Detroit scene was centered on the Black Bottom neighborhood.
The area's main commercial avenues were Hastings and St. Antoine streets. An adjacent north-bordering area known as Paradise Valleycontained night clubs where famous Blues, Big Band, and Jazz artists such as Billie Holiday, Sam Cooke, Ella Fitzgerald, Duke Ellington,Billy Eckstine, Pearl Bailey, and Count Basie regularly performed. In 1941, the city's Orchestra Hall was named Paradise Theatre. Aretha Franklin's father, the late Reverend C. L. Franklin, first opened his New Bethel Baptist Church on Hastings Street. Hastings Street, which ran north-south through Black Bottom, had been an area populated by immigrants before World War I.With ethnic succession, by the 1940s it had become an African-American community of black-owned business, social institutions, and night clubs. Historically, this area was the source of the River Savoyard, which was buried as a sewer in 1827.[4] Its rich soils are the source of the name "Black Bottom".[5] Detroit's Broadway Avenue Historic District contains a sub-district sometimes called the Harmonie Park District which has taken on the renowned legacy of Detroit's music from the 1930s through the 1950s and into the present.[2]
Black Bottom endured the Great Depression, with many of its residents working in factories. Following World War II, the physical structures of Black Bottom were in need of replacement. In the early 1960s, the City of Detroit demolished the Black Bottom district as part of an urban renewal project. The area was replaced by the Chrysler Freeway (Interstate 75 and Interstate 375) and Lafayette Park, a residential development designed by Mies van der Rohe and intended as a model neighborhood. It combined residential townhouses, apartments and high-rises with commercial areas. Many of the residents relocated to large public housing projects such as the Brewster-Douglass Housing Projects Homes and Jeffries Homes.[4]
Wikipedia entries describe Detroit's blues scene and black bottom as the start of the Delta Blues:
Detroit blues is blues played by musicians residing in and around Detroit, Michigan, particularly in the 1940s and 1950s. Detroit blues originated when Delta blues performers migrated north from the Mississippi Delta and Memphis, Tennessee, to work in industrial plants in Detroit in the 1920s and 1930s. Typical Detroit blues is similar in style to Chicago blues. Its sound is distinguished from Delta blues by the use of electric amplified instruments and more varied instrumentation, including the bass guitar and piano.
The only Detroit blues performer to achieve national fame was John Lee Hooker, as record companies and promoters have tended to ignore the Detroit scene in favor of the larger, more influential Chicago blues. The Detroit scene was centered on the Black Bottom neighborhood.
The area's main commercial avenues were Hastings and St. Antoine streets. An adjacent north-bordering area known as Paradise Valleycontained night clubs where famous Blues, Big Band, and Jazz artists such as Billie Holiday, Sam Cooke, Ella Fitzgerald, Duke Ellington,Billy Eckstine, Pearl Bailey, and Count Basie regularly performed. In 1941, the city's Orchestra Hall was named Paradise Theatre. Aretha Franklin's father, the late Reverend C. L. Franklin, first opened his New Bethel Baptist Church on Hastings Street. Hastings Street, which ran north-south through Black Bottom, had been an area populated by immigrants before World War I.With ethnic succession, by the 1940s it had become an African-American community of black-owned business, social institutions, and night clubs. Historically, this area was the source of the River Savoyard, which was buried as a sewer in 1827.[4] Its rich soils are the source of the name "Black Bottom".[5] Detroit's Broadway Avenue Historic District contains a sub-district sometimes called the Harmonie Park District which has taken on the renowned legacy of Detroit's music from the 1930s through the 1950s and into the present.[2]
Black Bottom endured the Great Depression, with many of its residents working in factories. Following World War II, the physical structures of Black Bottom were in need of replacement. In the early 1960s, the City of Detroit demolished the Black Bottom district as part of an urban renewal project. The area was replaced by the Chrysler Freeway (Interstate 75 and Interstate 375) and Lafayette Park, a residential development designed by Mies van der Rohe and intended as a model neighborhood. It combined residential townhouses, apartments and high-rises with commercial areas. Many of the residents relocated to large public housing projects such as the Brewster-Douglass Housing Projects Homes and Jeffries Homes.[4]