Jody Williams
Biography
Jody Williams ( born Joseph Leon Williams on February 3, 1935; died December 1, 2018) was an American blues guitarist and singer. His singular guitar playing, marked by flamboyant string-bending, imaginative chord voicings and a distinctive tone, was influential in the Chicago blues scene of the 1950s.
In the mid-1950s, Williams was one of the most sought-after session guitarists in Chicago, but he was little known outside the music industry, since his name rarely appeared on discs. His acclaimed comeback in 2000 led to a resurgence of interest in his early work and a reappraisal as one of the great blues guitarists. Williamss stinging lead guitar work is still stirringly felt every time someone punches up Billy Boy Arnolds "I Was Fooled," Bo Diddleys "Who Do You Love," Otis Spanns "Five Spot," or Williamss eerie minor-key instrumental masterpiece, "Lucky Lou."
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Born in Alabama, Williams moved to Chicago at age six. He grew up alongside Bo Diddley, the two trading licks as kids and playing for real by 1951. By the mid-50s, Williams was ensconced as a Chicago session guitarist of high stature, but he began to grow disenchanted when the signature lick he created for newcomer Billy Stewarts Argo waxing of "Billys Blues" was appropriated by Mickey Baker for the Mickey and Sylvia smash "Love Is Strange." Baker apparently caught Williams playing the riff in Washington, D.C., at the Howard Theatre. When the legal smoke had cleared, Bo Diddleys wife owned the writing credit for "Love Is Strange" and Jody Williams had zipola for monetary compensation.
Williams made his recording debut (singing as well as playing) as a leader for powerhouse deejay Al Bensons Blue Lake imprint in 1955: "Looking for My Baby" was credited to Little Papa Joe. That alias pattern held in 1957, when Argo unleashed "Lucky Lou" and its sumptuous slow blues vocal flip "You May" as by Little Joe Lee (quite a band here -- saxists Harold Ashby and Red Holloway, keyboardist Lafayette Leake, and bassist Willie Dixon). In 1960, Herald Records labeled him Sugar Boy Williams on "Little Girl." 1960s outings for Nike, Jive, Smash, and Yulando rounded out Williamss slim discography.
Williams dropped out of the blues game and went to work at Xerox as a technical engineer. He retired in 1994 and began to think about getting back into music. In 1999 at the urging of producer Dick Shurman, he went to a blues club for the first time in many, many years to see his old friend Robert Lockwood, Jr.. Soon after Williams broke out some old tapes he made in 1964, liked what he heard so much that it brought tears to his eyes and decided to recapture the sound he created back when he was a top session man. After playing some gigs in 2000 and 2001, Williams and Dick Shurman went into the studio to cut his first solo album. Return of a Legend was issued in 2002, garnering rave reviews and sparking newfound interest in one of the unsung heroes of the blues guitar. Read more on Last.fm. User-contributed text is available under the Creative Commons By-SA License; additional terms may apply.
Biography text from Last.fm, available under CC BY-SA.