Country Negro Jam Sessions CD

Recorded in Louisiana and Mississippi between 1959-1962. Includes liner notes by Chris Strachwitz.

The remarkable Country Negro Jam Session assembles home recordings of southwest Lousiana-based blues singers collected during the late 1950s and 1960s by musicologist Dr. Harry Oster. Fourteen cuts by country fiddler Butch Cage make up the guts of the album, but the real highlights are the grim performances by Robert Pete Williams, who was serving a murder sentence at the notorious Angola State Prison at the time his tracks were recorded; equally powerful is a rendition of "Foxhunt" performed by a group of therapy patients. Despite its somewhat misleading title, a truly landmark recording. ~ Jason Ankeny

Engineers: Dr. Harry Oster, Chris Strachwitz, Paul Oliver.

Personnel: Clarence Edwards, Robert Smoky Babe Brown, Leon Strickland, Otis Webster, Robert Pete Williams, Willie B. Thomas, Willie Thomas (vocals, guitar); Butch Cage (vocals, fiddle, flute); Rebecca Smith, Ruth Miller, Sally Dotson, Tom Miller, Ben Douglas (vocals); Cornelius Edwards, Hillary Blunt, Robert Welch (guitar); Lucius Bridges (washboard); Martha Thomas (tom tom).

Liner Note Author: Chris Strachwitz.

Recording information: Louisiana.

Photographer: Chris Strachwitz.