Blues from the Bayou

"Julian Piper documents the integral but underappreciated center of blues music--Baton Rouge, Louisiana--with style and grit and no illusions or highfalutin' worship. He includes details of these unique characters that show why they and their music continue to live on." -David Kunian, award-winning documentarian and music curator for the Louisiana State Museum When forty-year-old Englishman Julian C. Piper spent a year abroad at Louisiana State University studying music and playing the blues in Baton Rouge, he had no idea how transformative the experience would be. For years he had played guitar with American blues artists across England and Europe, sharing the music firsthand, enthralled by their stories and almost religious devotion to the blues. His midlife sojourn to America brought him in contact with the music and people he had experienced only through records and well-thumbed books: a surreal experience that he documents through personal recollections in one engrossing chapter after another. Through his close friendship with Blues Box owner Tabby Thomas and his son Chris, Piper worked with blues luminaries including Silas Hogan and Guitar Kelly. He heard stories of many icons, such as Huddie "Lead Belly" Ledbetter and Lightnin' Slim, and even interviewed the elusive Lonesome Sundown. After returning home, he turned those intensely personal and entertaining conversations with the men he met into a series on BBC national radio called Blues on the Bayou--and ultimately into this fascinating look at Louisiana-grown blues. led Blues on the Bayou--and ultimately into this fascinating look at Louisiana-grown blues.