Downright Dirty Blues Guitar Like his pioneering father, Guitar Slim, before him, Rodney Armstrong (aka “Guitar Slim Jr.”) has garnered a reputation for playing downright dirty blues guitar, with some soul repertoire mixed in. Although there aren’t a lot of recordings to his name, his album The Story of My Life was nominated[…]
GUITAR SLIM, JR. THE STORY OF MY LIFE ORLEANS RECORDS TROUBLE DON’T LAST–LETTER TO MY GIRLFRIEND–THE STORY OF MY LIFE–BAD LUCK BLUES–CAN I CHANGE MY MIND–TOO WEAK TO FIGHT–REAP WHAT YOU SOW–WELL, I DONE GOT OVER IT–TURN BACK THE HANDS OF TIME–SUFFERIN’ MIND The tenth annual Record Store Day is[…]
Guitar Slim Jr., The Story of My Life (Orleans) Although some peg him as a one hit wonder, Eddie “Guitar Slim” Jones was a highly influential guitarist, and nowhere more so than on his son; this 1988 debut LP by Guitar Slim Jr. (born Rodney Glenn Armstrong) features seven of his dad’s[…]
VIA PRESS RELEASE | Orleans Records will be re-releasing The Story Of My Life, the Grammy-nominated debut album from singer-guitarist Guitar Slim Jr. on Record Store Day, April 22, distributed by Select-O-Hits. This will mark the album’s first-ever release on vinyl and its first re-issue on CD since the late 1980s. Slim Jr. aka Rodney[…]
A co-founder of the Orleans Record label, guitarist Carlo Ditta has put together the first recording under his own name. Ditta produced the recording, one of his many talents, and handles the lead vocals. He started the project in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, writing half of the songs. The[…]
The way Carlo Ditta tells the story of how he got his hands on a previously unreleased recording of Professor Longhair, it takes a minute. He starts with an anecdote about how guitarist Billy Gregory played in music stores with that big hat pressed low on his head. Then, Gregory went[…]
As the rhythms roll and tumble across the piano keyboard, sometimes it seems the world comes together in the hands of Henry Roeland Byrd, better known as Professor Longhair. Born in Bogalusa, Louisiana, and raised in New Orleans, “Fess” first began teaching himself piano when he found a broken-down one[…]
Professor Longhair, Live in Chicago. Talk about New Orleans, Roy “Professor Longhair” Byrd might be the ultimate musical ambassador to that fine burg that ever lived. Right up there with Fats Domino for sure. He created a crazed piano style that was equal parts rhythm & blues, stride, rhumba, and 100% personalized[…]
On Feb. 1, 1976, a living legend performed at the University of Chicago Folk Festival. His name was Henry Roeland “Roy” Byrd and he played the piano and sang. Most of the folks in the crowd knew him as Professor Longhair. He was 57 at the time. Live In Chicago (Orleans Records) documents the[…]
Henry Roeland Byrd, the New Orleans pianist known to the world as Professor Longhair, has been dead for 35 years. But he’s by no means forgotten. At the recently concluded (and rain-sodden) Jazz and Heritage Festival, there he was above the Arcura stage — or rather, an image of him[…]
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