PAPA LEGBA BLUES

Papa Legba Blues is a little slice of Voodoo straight from the Delta.

Music by Carvin Knowles. Performed by John "Iron Lung" Faulding and Rev. Kingfish. Special thanks to Neal Hallford.
© Ozone Layer Music (BMI)

Reverend Obadiah Kingfish was literally born on the Mississippi river. His mother gave birth to him on-board the stern-wheeler Natchez while returning home from a trip to visit family in Memphis. The son of a Pentecostal preacher, he studied divinity at Apostolic Bible College in Hattiesburg Mississippi, but it is likely that he left without graduating. On a missionary trip to New Orleans at the age of 23, he discovered both African Catholicism and Jazz music, and he quickly became a devotee of both. His early Jazz and Blues songs reflect a strong belief in "Saints" who would exact justice on evildoers. Best known for "King David Danced (Before the Lord)" which featured the All Saints Holiness Choir, most of his songs have been consigned to obscurity. Despite living a life of scandal, he continued to tour with his travelling "Camp-meeting Revival" until his death in 1998, at the age of 99.

John "Iron Lung" Faulding's first guitar was a one-stringed "diddle-bow" which he made from a pine 2x4 and a length of bailing wire attached to a cigar box. At the age of 9 he made his way to New Orleans where he spent several years as a pan-handler. Much of his success relied on a ruse in which he pretended to be a blind musician. But that success allowed him to purchase his first real guitar. His skills with a bottle-neck drew huge crowds at the corner of St. Peter and Bourbon Streets. At the age of 16, in a whiskey fueled rampage he stole 22 pairs of silk knickers hanging on a wash-line outside Storeyville. For this outrage he was sentenced to 6 years hard labor. While in prison, his skill at cards gained him a great wealth of cigarettes, which led to his recurring emphysema that plagued him his entire life. It was at the Louisiana State Penitentiary that he met Reverend Kingfish, who was conducting Sunday services. After serving 5 years of his sentence, Iron Lung was paroled to Reverend Kingfish. The two performed on 13 recordings over 9 years, despite Iron Lung skipping out on parole several times. Iron Lung died of alcohol-related complications in 1961, at the age of 52.