When The Levee Breaks
   HOME
*





When The Levee Breaks
"When the Levee Breaks" is a country blues song written and first recorded by Memphis Minnie and Kansas Joe McCoy in 1929. The lyrics reflect experiences during the upheaval caused by the Great Mississippi Flood of 1927. "When the Levee Breaks" was re-worked by English rock group Led Zeppelin as the last song on their untitled fourth album. Singer Robert Plant used many of the original lyrics and the songwriting is credited to Memphis Minnie and the individual members of Led Zeppelin. Many other artists have performed and recorded versions of the song. Background and lyrics When blues musical duo Kansas Joe McCoy and Memphis Minnie wrote "When the Levee Breaks," the Great Mississippi Flood of 1927 was still fresh in people's memories. The flooding affected 26,000 square miles of the Mississippi Deltahundreds were killed and hundreds of thousands of residents were forced to evacuate. The event is the subject of several blues songs, the most popular being "Backwater Blues ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Memphis Minnie
Lizzie Douglas (June 3, 1897 – August 6, 1973), better known as Memphis Minnie, was a blues guitarist, vocalist, and songwriter whose recording career lasted for over three decades. She recorded around 200 songs, some of the best known being "When the Levee Breaks", " Me and My Chauffeur Blues", "Bumble Bee" and "Nothing in Rambling". Childhood Douglas was born on June 3, 1897, probably in Tunica County, Mississippi, although she claimed to have been born in New Orleans, Louisiana and raised in the Algiers neighborhood.Harris, Sheldon (1989). ''Blues Who's Who: A Biographical Dictionary of Blues SIngers''. pp. 161–162. She was the eldest of 13 siblings. Her parents, Abe and Gertrude Douglas, nicknamed her Kid when she was young, and her family called her that throughout her childhood. It is reported that she disliked the name Lizzie. When she first began performing, she played under the name Kid Douglas. When she was seven years old, she and her family moved to Walls, Miss ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Kansas Joe McCoy
Wilbur "Kansas Joe" McCoy (May 11, 1905 – January 28, 1950) was an American Delta blues singer, musician and songwriter. Career McCoy performed under various stage names but is best known as Kansas Joe McCoy. Born in Raymond, Mississippi, he was the older brother of the blues accompanist Papa Charlie McCoy. As a young man, McCoy was drawn to the music scene in Memphis, Tennessee, where he played guitar and sang during the 1920s. He teamed up his with future wife, Lizzie Douglas, a guitarist better known as Memphis Minnie, and their 1930 recording of the song "Bumble Bee" for Columbia Records was a hit. In 1930, the couple moved to Chicago, where they were an important part of the burgeoning blues scene there. After they were divorced, McCoy teamed up with his brother to form the Harlem Hamfats, a band that performed and recorded during the second half of the 1930s. In 1936, the Harlem Hamfats released their recording of the song "The Weed Smoker's Dream". McCoy later refin ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

John Bonham
John Henry Bonham (31 May 1948 – 25 September 1980) was an English musician, best known as the drummer for the rock band Led Zeppelin. Esteemed for his speed, power, fast single-footed kick drumming, distinctive sound, and feel for groove, John Bonham Biography ''AllMusic'' he is regarded as one of the greatest and most influential drummers in music history.John Bonham at Modern Drummer Magazine
. ''''
The Greatest Drumm ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Atlantic Records
Atlantic Recording Corporation (simply known as Atlantic Records) is an American record label founded in October 1947 by Ahmet Ertegun and Herb Abramson. Over its first 20 years of operation, Atlantic earned a reputation as one of the most important American labels, specializing in jazz, R&B, and soul by Aretha Franklin, Ray Charles, Wilson Pickett, Sam and Dave, Ruth Brown and Otis Redding. Its position was greatly improved by its distribution deal with Stax. In 1967, Atlantic became a wholly owned subsidiary of Warner Bros.-Seven Arts, now the Warner Music Group, and expanded into rock and pop music with releases by Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young, Led Zeppelin, and Yes. In 2004, Atlantic and its sister label Elektra were merged into the Atlantic Records Group. Craig Kallman is the chairman of Atlantic. Ahmet Ertegun served as founding chairman until his death on December 14, 2006, at age 83. History Founding and early history In 1944, brothers Nesuhi and Ahmet Erte ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Urban Blues
Blues is a music genre and musical form which originated in the Deep South of the United States around the 1860s. Blues incorporated spirituals, work songs, field hollers, shouts, chants, and rhymed simple narrative ballads from the African-American culture. The blues form is ubiquitous in jazz, rhythm and blues, and rock and roll, and is characterized by the call-and-response pattern (the blues scale and specific chord progressions) of which the twelve-bar blues is the most common. Blue notes (or "worried notes"), usually thirds, fifths or sevenths flattened in pitch, are also an essential part of the sound. Blues shuffles or walking bass reinforce the trance-like rhythm and form a repetitive effect known as the groove. Blues as a genre is also characterized by its lyrics, bass lines, and instrumentation. Early traditional blues verses consisted of a single line repeated four times. It was only in the first decades of the 20th century that the most common current s ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  



MORE