Sonny Terry

Saunders Terrell (October 24, 1911 – March 11, 1986), known as Sonny Terry, was an American Piedmont blues and folk musician, who was known for his energetic blues harmonica style, which frequently included vocal whoops and hollers and occasionally imitations of trains and fox hunts. Terry was born in Greensboro, Georgia. His father, a farmer, taught him to play basic blues harp as a youth. He sustained injuries to his eyes and went blind by the time he was 16, which prevented him from doing farm work, and was forced to play music in order to earn a living.
He began playing blues in Shelby, North Carolina. After his father died, he began playing with Piedmont blues–style guitarist Blind Boy Fuller. When Fuller died in 1941, Terry established a long-standing musical relationship with Brownie McGhee, and they recorded numerous songs together. The duo became well known among white audiences during the folk music revival of the 1950s and 1960s, including for collaborations with Styve Homnick, Woody Guthrie and Moses Asch, producing classic recordings for Folkways Records (now Smithsonian/Folkways).
(Read more at Wikipedia.)
==Links to Peel== 
Sonny Terry and Brownie McGhee belonged to the generation of blues musicians who made their names playing in a smooth style to white audiences during the Folk revival of the 1950s, before the 1960s blues boom took off. Peel mentioned in Margrave of the Marshes and elsewhere that they weren't among his favourite blues artists, despite their popularity with audiences during the 1950s and '60s (one of their albums was issued in the UK on Topic Records);
By this time, and inspired, as always, by Lonnie Donegan, I was beginning to take an interest in the blues. I started, as so many had before me, with Sonny Terry and Brownie McGhee. Sonny and Brownie toured Europe frequently, allegedly loathed each other, and their music, except when Sonny takes off on one of his deeply rural harmonica solos, now sounds rather anodyne (Margrave Of The Marshes, p132)
Nevertheless they were booked for a Peel session when they visited Britain in 1973. Later, he played tracks by the duo on his shows during the 90's and early 00's, some of them featuring the harmonica solos by Sonny Terry he praised in Margrave, and one track on which Terry combined with JP's lifelong favourite Lightnin' Hopkins was played three times in 2004. 
==Sessions==
1. Recorded with Brownie McGhee: 1973-06-05. First Broadcast: 19 June 1973
*Walkin' My Blues Away / Rock Island Line / Walk On / Life Is A Gamble
==Other Shows Played==
;1990
*25 August 1990 (BFBS): 'Going Down Slow' (Oriole)
*24 November 1990 (& Jaycee): You Keep On Doggin' Me (v/a album - Savage Kick Volume Four) Not On Label 
;thumb|220x220px1994
*23 July 1994: Locomotive Blues (LP - Harmonica Blues) Topic
;1995
*01 September 1995 (& Brownie McGhee): 'Riffin' Harmonica Jump' 
;1996
*23 February 1996 (& Brownie McGhee): 'If You Lose Your Money (LP-Brownie McGhee And Sonny Terry Sing)' (Folkways)
*02 March 1996 (BFBS) (& Brownie McGhee): 'If You Lose Your Money (LP-Brownie McGhee And Sonny Terry Sing)' (Folkways)
;1999
*20 April 1999 (& Brownie McGhee): No Need Of Running (LP: Sonny Terry And Brownie McGhee) Fantasy
*29 April 1999: Locomotive Blues (10" LP - Harmonica Blues) Topic 
;2002
*10 December 2002 (& Brownie McGhee): 'Cornbread, Beans And Black Molasses (LP - In London)' (Nixa) 
;thumb2004
*03 March 2004 (& Brownie McGhee): Fox Hunt (Album: Down Home Blues) Prestige Bluesville
*10 June 2004 (& Sam Lightnin' Hopkins): Got to Move Your Baby (LP - Last Night Blues) Prestige Bluesville
*June 2004 (FSK) (& Sam Lightnin' Hopkins): Got to Move Your Baby (LP - Last Night Blues) Prestige Bluesville
*09 July 2004 (BBC World Service) (& Sam Lightnin' Hopkins): Got to Move Your Baby (LP - Last Night Blues) Prestige Bluesville
==External Links==
*Wikipedia
*Discogs
Category:Artists