My Friend Blind Lemon

Album: Leadbelly Volume One (1935)
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Songfacts®:

  • The title of this short tribute song can be rendered "Blind Lemon - My Friend" or simply "Blind Lemon." Lemon Henry Jefferson (1893-1929) was known as the Father of the Texas Blues, and when Leadbelly wasn't in prison, he spent some time traveling with him. >>>
    Suggestion credit:
    Alexander Baron - London, England
  • Leadbelly first recorded this song in 1934 when the folklorist John Lomax brought recording equipment to Angola prison in Louisiana, where Leadbelly was doing time for attempted murder. Lomax was doing work for the Library of Congress, trying to get folk songs sung by Black Americans on tape before they were lost to history. Leadbelly got out of jail later that year, and in 1935 Lomax made a more proper recording that was entered into the Library of Congress and appears on many compilations.

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