David Whiteis

David Whiteis is a writer and educator living in Chicago. He is a past winner of the Blues Foundation’s Keeping the Blues Alive Award for Achievement in Journalism. He is the author of “Chicago Blues: Portraits and Stories”; “Southern Soul-Blues”; and “Blues Legacy: Tradition and Innovation in Chicago,” and the co-author of “Always the Queen: The Denise LaSalle Story.” His articles have appeared in numerous blues and jazz magazines, both in the U.S. and overseas.

Stories

Story

Blues Breakthrough at Newport

By 1960, though he’d scored 16 R&B chart hits and still enjoyed a steady performing schedule both in Chicago and on the road, Muddy Waters had just begun to gain recognition among hardcore white folk and blues fans.

Story

The Soul-Blues Master

Though it’s probably safe to assume that Albert King never sought to codify an entirely new blues-related genre so late in his career, he became a soul-blues pioneer almost by default after he signed with Stax in 1966 when he was in his 40s (a rarity in itself for a label concerned primarily with appealing to the youth market).

Story

The Blues Master as Showman

“He didn’t just play the guitar — he attacked it.” That’s how the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame’s website, commemorating the 2012 induction of bluesman Freddie King, described King’s sound, adding that “[h]is heavy-handed licks can still be heard today in the playing of Eric Clapton, Peter Green and Mick Taylor, all King acolytes.”