"That's when the blues overtook me," Charlie Musselwhite has written about hearing music as a youngster. And it's stayed with him: "Over the years blues have continued to express how I feel as a human being. Now, more than forty years later, as I work as a blues musician, the music I heard as a kid is still with me; it is a kind of antidote to all the things around us that lack compassion. Blues is a music of the heart. It expresses all human emotions, everything that life can throw at you — all the ups and downs — it's all there. When you hear the blues it reminds your heart what it means to be human."
Here is a glorious movie that reveals the truth of the blues. In February 2003, movie director Martin Scorsese sponsored a concert at Radio City Music Hall to pay tribute to the legacy of blues music. Director Antoine Fuqua films performers arriving in New York City for the event and beginning rehearsals. The concert itself features many of the greatest musicians and singers in a genre of music that has a rich and varied history in America.
We are treated to a fascinating chronological journey through the history of the blues: its roots in Africa, its migration up through the Mississippi Delta into Memphis, and its flourishing in Chicago in the 1950s and 1960s. While continuing in its distinctive form, this musical style also morphed into rock 'n' roll and later into hip-hop. Many of the artists who mastered the blues struggled with poverty and the burden of racism. Their music explores the universal feelings of love, yearning, hope, and loss.
Scorsese, Fuqua, and musical director Steve Jordan (playing drums) treat us to an exhilarating rollercoaster ride of emotions. Fans of the blues will savor the moves of the featured artists in an All-Star band of legendary blues musicians including Levon Helm, Dr. John, Danny Kortchmar, and others, along with the Beale Street Horns and three backup singers, Vanisse Thomas, Curtis King, and Babi Floyd.
Legendary Mavis Stapes performs a profoundly soulful version of "See That My Grave is Kept Clean," written by Blind Lemon Jefferson. Blues diva Ruth Brown excels with a rehearsal version of "Mama He Treat Your Daughter Mean" and then kicks out all the jams with a playful version of "Men are Like Streetcars" sung with Natalie Cole. The lyric goes: "If you miss one, you can get another right away." James "Blood" Ullmer excels with his guitar work on "Sittin' on Top of the World." Solomon Burke, who calls himself The King of Rock and Soul, does a wonderful version of "Turn On Your Love Light" and "Down in the Valley."
Other luminaries from the rock and pop music worlds are on hand to do bluesy numbers. John Fogerty of Creedence Clearwater Revival sings "Midnight Special"; Bonnie Raitt performs "Coming Home"; singer Steve Tyler and guitarist Joe Perry from the hard rock band Aerosmith sing "I'm a King Bee"; David Johansen cooks with an inspired version of "Killin' Floor"; and the evening ends with B. B. King singing "Sweet Sixteen" and "Paying the Cost to Be the Boss."
