By RANDY RIELAND AND STAFF REPORTS
The John Jackson Piedmont Blues Festival returns later this month with a lineup of artists known for keeping alive the music the Rappahannock native helped make famous.
The event will be held at Eldon Farms in Woodville, not far from where Jackson was born into a family of tenant farmers and where his mastery of country guitar style brought him international fame.
Phil Wiggins remembers the first time he saw Jackson play, he was a blues harmonica player in Washington, D.C.
Jackson and his band were on the same bill at a club.
I realized this was a really special person. Jackson has been named a National Heritage Fellow, the highest honor bestowed on traditional and folk artists in the country.
When Jackson invited him to join him at a future show, he was dumbfounded.
He didn’t know me from Adam, but he was a world-class player. He invited me to go to his house. He was very open-hearted.
Jackson was an internationally acclaimed performer, but no one could have imagined him as a person.
He never made it past the first grade because he had to help on his family’s farm. He learned to play the guitar at a young age after listening to his father play.
After moving with his family to Fairfax Station in 1949, he kept playing for friends and neighbors but stopped performing in public because of a violent confrontation at a house party.
Jackson gave a guitar lesson to a mailman friend in the backroom of a gas station in 1964. Chuck Perdue was the president of the Folklore Society of Greater Washington when he heard Jackson play.
Perdue persuaded a dubious Jackson to record all the songs he knew, and encouraged him to start performing at clubs and coffeehouses in the region.
Jackson was invited to perform at folk and blues festivals around the world when his reputation grew. He performed for two Presidents. He did not give up his job as a cemetery caretakers.
Jackson played with many famous musicians, including B.B. King, Eric Clapton, Bob Dylan, Bonnie Raitt and Ricky Skaggs.
Even though he has a long list of accomplishments, he is almost completely unknown in Rappahannock County, where his story began.
According to festival organizers, it’s time to change that and bring his legacy to light. John Jackson was a blues musician and songster.
Jackson is most closely associated with Piedmont blues, a type of country music built around challenging, but sweet- sounding acoustic guitar licks.
One of the festival headliners said that Piedmont blues are different from other blues. It is not so dirty or down. It is more sophisticated. You are playing a syncopated melody with your fingers while you are playing the baseline with your thumb.
It’s more complex. Harpe’s latest album, “Meet Me in the Middle,” was named “Album of the Year” at the New England Music Awards. It is also more relaxed.
The title of John Jackson’s album “Front Porch Blues” is a perfect description.
The athlete would agree. He said he heard someone say that the music was born in an era when people made their own music at home.
He pointed out that the style came from rural communities.
If you listen to Piedmont guitar style, it’s a lot like a piano. The goal was to make the guitar work like a piano. It used to be that music made people move. Your goal was to make people dance.
Rick Franklin, one of the region’s leading blues guitarists, Jeffrey Scott, a blues artist who’s also Jackson’s grandnephew, and the Rev are some of the people filling out the lineup for the show.
Frank Matheis is a regular contributor to Living Blues magazine and is an author.
The event is supported by the PATH Foundation and Virginia Cooperative Extension.
The financial sponsors are William and Mary Greve Foundation, Virginia Commission for the Arts, Rappahannock Association for Arts and Community, Richard Lykes Fund and Northern Piedmont Community Foundation.
There are $10 tickets at the John Jackson Piedmont Blues Festival. There will be food and drinks for sale. Bring your own lawn chair.
There will be a book signing, historical and cultural exhibits, jam session with attendees invited to bring instruments to participate, craft vendors and food trucks on site.
Pets or umbrella chairs are not permitted. There are handicapped and elderly parking spaces. It is permissible to have picnics.
Randy Rieland is a volunteer for the John Jackson Piedmont Blues Festival.
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