Shirley Johnson
Shirley Johnson appears at Harbourfront's Labatt Blue's Festival on July 5, where she performs blues and R&B, including material from her latest Delmark CD, Killer Diller.
The female blues singer in Chicago was an exotic, endangered species for some thirty years, until the Windy City's blues scene of the late 1990s gave birth to a revival.
Ma Rainey, Bessie Smith and Dinah Washington are part of the city's tradition of female blues singers, as is Koko Taylor. Still going strong today, Taylor helped keep the flame burning during the '60s, '70s and '80s, a time when few women sang the blues in Chicago.
A group of talented singers emerged at the end of the last decade, sparking a revival of the city's tradition of female vocalists. The singers have been recorded on three compilation CDs, Red Hot Mamas and Mojo Mamas on Blue Chicago and Women of Blue Chicago on Delmark.
Karen Carroll, Lynne Jordan, Liz Mandville Greeson, Bonnie Lee, Patricia Scott, Peaches Staten and Shirley Johnson are featured on Red Hot Mamas. Gino Battaglia's club Blue Chicago was their incubator. "Gino believes in giving women a chance," Johnson says. "That's where I met most of the girls."
Johnson, 53, is one of the first of the new group of singers to distinguish herself. Her voice, passionate, confident and controlled, has thrilled Chicago audiences for two decades. Success in the city led to work abroad and she has toured 21 countries singing gospel, blues and R&B.
Johnson, who was raised by her extended family in Norfolk, Virginia, began singing gospel at the age of six. As a child, she loved blues, but her religious family, other than her grandfather, disapproved of the music. At eight, she'd go next door to listen to B.B. King, Etta James, Bobby "Blue" Bland and Ruth Brown on the Norfolk radio station WRAP.
Later on, Johnson branched out into pop and soul music, opening in and around Norfolk for such artists as Aretha Franklin, Z.Z. Hill and Jerry Butler, and recording 45s for two small regional labels.
Johnson's move to Chicago sounds like a hard-luck story but it turned out to be a blessing in disguise since her career was to blossom there. In 1983, a friend of Johnson's, a singer who thought she ought to sing blues in Chicago, sent her a plane ticket, promising to record her. But when she got there, intending to stay only four days, she discovered that he didn't have enough money to pay for the recording session. With only $40 in her purse, Johnson couldn't leave town. "I had to get a job and I ended up staying," she says.
Johnson's first big break in Chicago was finding a gig singing with guitarist Buster Benton, just outside of the city in south suburban Robbins. After four years with Benton, she sang for two years with Little Johnny Christian at the Checkerboard Lounge on Chicago's Southside and then with singer Artie "Blues Boy" White. She toured Western Canada in 1991 with keyboard player "Professor" Eddie Lusk and went on to establish a long-term base at Blue Chicago.
Johnson's success snowballed and she soon found herself travelling the world singing. She has toured Russia, Turkey, Hong Kong, Greece, Israel and Spain among others. "They love and appreciate the blues so much," she says. "I've had no bad experiences, but the body gets so tired of travel."
Johnson says visiting Israel, where she did much sightseeing, was memorable for her because of her Christian upbringing. "I went to Jerusalem and saw the Dead Sea," she says. "I used to read about them in the Bible. I never thought I'd get to see the real thing."
This year, Johnson's travels take her to France, Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Belgium and The Netherlands to sing blues and R&B, as well as gospel with her group The Gospel Supremes.
Johnson is also taking a jog north from Chicago, to appear at Harbourfront's Labatt Blue's Festival on July 5, where she performs blues and R&B, including material from her latest Delmark CD, Killer Diller.
Killer Diller, Johnson's second CD, includes Chicago drummer Twist Turner's "Your Turn To Cry," Sam Cooke's "Somebody Have Mercy," a beautiful rendition of Jimi Hendrix' "Little Wing," Maurice John Vaughn's "Love Abuse" (Vaughn plays guitar on the CD) and Leiber and Stoller's "Saved." Johnson wrote "The Blues Is All I've Got" and "Missed The Best Chance" and the title song "Killer Diller" was penned by Willie Dixon.
Johnson sings songs that she can relate to and her performances reflect her personal experience. "Everything I sing I've been through and I've dealt with," she says.
- Ruth Schweitzer