Chester Arthur Burnett (June 10, 1910January 10, 1976), better known by his stage name Howlin' Wolf, was an American
blues
Blues is a music genre and musical form that originated among African Americans in the Deep South of the United States around the 1860s. Blues has incorporated spiritual (music), spirituals, work songs, field hollers, Ring shout, shouts, cha ...
singer, guitarist and harmonica player. He was at the forefront of transforming acoustic
Delta blues into electric
Chicago blues, and over a four-decade career, recorded blues,
rhythm and blues
Rhythm and blues, frequently abbreviated as R&B or R'n'B, is a genre of popular music that originated within African American communities in the 1940s. The term was originally used by record companies to describe recordings marketed predomina ...
,
rock and roll
Rock and roll (often written as rock & roll, rock-n-roll, and rock 'n' roll) is a Genre (music), genre of popular music that evolved in the United States during the late 1940s and early 1950s. It Origins of rock and roll, originated from African ...
, and
psychedelic rock
Psychedelic rock is a rock music Music genre, genre that is inspired, influenced, or representative of psychedelia, psychedelic culture, which is centered on perception-altering hallucinogenic drugs. The music incorporated new electronic sound ...
. He is regarded as one of the most influential blues musicians of all time.
Born into poverty in
Mississippi
Mississippi ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern and Deep South regions of the United States. It borders Tennessee to the north, Alabama to the east, the Gulf of Mexico to the south, Louisiana to the s ...
, Burnett became a protégé of Delta blues musician
Charley Patton
Charlie Patton (April 1891 (probable) – April 28, 1934), more often spelled Charley Patton, was an American Delta blues musician and songwriter. Considered by many to be the "Father of the Delta Blues", he created an enduring body of America ...
in the 1930s. In the
Deep South
The Deep South or the Lower South is a cultural and geographic subregion of the Southern United States. The term is used to describe the states which were most economically dependent on Plantation complexes in the Southern United States, plant ...
, he began a solo career by performing with other notable blues musicians of the day. By the end of the decade, he had established himself in the
Mississippi Delta
The Mississippi Delta, also known as the Yazoo–Mississippi Delta, or simply the Delta, is the distinctive northwest section of the U.S. state of Mississippi (and portions of Arkansas and Louisiana) that lies between the Mississippi and Yazo ...
. Following a number of legal issues, a stint in prison, and Army service, he was recruited by A&R man
Ike Turner
Izear Luster "Ike" Turner Jr. (November 5, 1931 – December 12, 2007) was an American musician, bandleader, songwriter, record producer, and talent scout. An early pioneer of 1950s rock and roll, he is best known for his work in the 1960s and ...
to record for producer
Sam Phillips in Memphis. His first record "
Moanin' at Midnight" (1951) led to a record deal with
Chess Records
Chess Records was an American record company established in 1950 in Chicago, specializing in blues and rhythm and blues. It was the successor to Aristocrat Records, founded in 1947. It expanded into soul music, gospel music, early rock an ...
in Chicago. Between 1951 and 1969, six of his songs reached the
''Billboard'' R&B charts. His studio albums include ''Howlin' Wolf'' a..k.a The Rocking Chair Album, a collection of singles from 1957 to 1961, ''
The Howlin' Wolf Album'' (1969), ''
Message to the Young'' (1971), ''
The London Howlin' Wolf Sessions'' (1971), and ''
The Back Door Wolf'' (1973). His reputation grew throughout the
blues revival of the 1960s, and he continued to perform until November 1975, when he performed for the last time alongside fellow blues musician
B.B. King. He died on January 10, 1976, after years of deteriorating health. In 1980, Howlin' Wolf was inducted into the
Blues Hall of Fame
The Blues Hall of Fame is a music museum operated by the Blues Foundation at 421 S. Main Street in Memphis, Tennessee. Initially, the "Blues Hall of Fame" was not a physical building, but a listing of people who have significantly contributed to b ...
, and in 1991, he was inducted into the
Rock and Roll Hall of Fame
The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame (RRHOF), also simply referred to as the Rock Hall, is a museum and hall of fame located in downtown Cleveland, Ohio, United States, on the shore of Lake Erie. The museum documents the history of rock music and the ...
.
With a booming voice and an imposing physical presence, he is one of the best-known Chicago blues artists.
AllMusic
AllMusic (previously known as All-Music Guide and AMG) is an American online database, online music database. It catalogs more than three million album entries and 30 million tracks, as well as information on Musical artist, musicians and Mus ...
has described him as "a primal, ferocious blues belter with a roster of classics rivaling anyone else, and a sandpaper growl of a voice that has been widely imitated".
Several of his songs have become blues and blues rock standards. The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame listed "
Little Red Rooster
"Little Red Rooster" (or "The Red Rooster" as it was first titled) is a blues standard credited to arranger and songwriter Willie Dixon. The song was first recorded in 1961 by American blues musician Howlin' Wolf in the Chicago blues style. Hi ...
", "
Smokestack Lightning" and "
Spoonful" in its "500 Songs That Shaped Rock and Roll" and “Smokestack Lightning" was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 1999.
In 2011, ''
Rolling Stone
''Rolling Stone'' is an American monthly magazine that focuses on music, politics, and popular culture. It was founded in San Francisco, California, in 1967 by Jann Wenner and the music critic Ralph J. Gleason.
The magazine was first known fo ...
'' magazine ranked him number 54 on its list of the "
100 Greatest Artists of All Time".
Early life
Chester Arthur Burnett was born on June 10, 1910, in
White Station, near
West Point, Mississippi, to Gertrude Jones and Leon "Dock" Burnett. He later said that his father was "Ethiopian", while Jones had
Choctaw
The Choctaw ( ) people are one of the Indigenous peoples of the Southeastern Woodlands of the United States, originally based in what is now Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama. The Choctaw language is a Western Muskogean language. Today, Choct ...
ancestry on her father's side. He was named for
Chester A. Arthur, the 21st President of the United States. The name "Howlin' Wolf" originated from Burnett's maternal grandfather, John Jones; Burnett had been squeezing his grandmother's chicks so hard he was likely to kill them, and his grandfather told him wolves would come and get him. The blues historian
Paul Oliver
Paul Hereford Oliver MBE (25 May 1927 – 15 August 2017) was an English architectural historian and writer on the blues and other forms of African-American music. He was equally distinguished in both fields, although it is likely that afici ...
wrote that Burnett once claimed to have been given his nickname by his idol
Jimmie Rodgers
James Charles Rodgers ( – ) was an American singer, songwriter, and musician who rose to popularity in the late 1920s. Widely regarded as the "Honorific nicknames in popular music, Father of Country Music", he is best known for his di ...
.
Burnett's parents separated when he was a year old. Dock, who had worked seasonally as a farm laborer in the
Mississippi Delta
The Mississippi Delta, also known as the Yazoo–Mississippi Delta, or simply the Delta, is the distinctive northwest section of the U.S. state of Mississippi (and portions of Arkansas and Louisiana) that lies between the Mississippi and Yazo ...
, moved there permanently while Jones and Burnett moved to
Monroe County. Jones and Burnett would sing together in the choir of the Life Boat Baptist Church near
Gibson, Mississippi
Gibson is an unincorporated area, unincorporated community in Monroe County, Mississippi, Monroe County, Mississippi. Gibson is located west of Aberdeen, Mississippi, Aberdeen on Mississippi Highway 8.
History
Gibson is located along the Kansas C ...
, and Burnett would later claim that he got his musical talent from her. Jones kicked Burnett out of the house, for unknown reasons, during the winter when he was a child. At the peak of his success, he returned from Chicago to see his mother in Mississippi and was driven to tears when she refused to take money offered by him, saying it was from his playing the "devil's music".
He moved in with his granduncle Will Young, who had a large household and treated him badly. While in the Young household he worked almost all day and did not receive an education at the school house. When he was thirteen, he killed one of Young's hogs in a rage after the hog had caused him to ruin his dress clothes; this enraged Young who then whipped him while chasing him on a mule. He then ran away and claimed to have walked barefoot to join his father, where he finally found a happy home with his father's large family. During this era he went by the name "John D." to dissociate himself from his past, a name by which several of his relatives would know him for the rest of his life.
His physique garnered him the nicknames "Big Foot Chester" and "Bull Cow" as a young man: he was tall and weighed .
Musical career
Beginnings, 1930s
On January 15, 1928, at the age of 17, Burnett gathered enough money to buy his first guitar. It was a date that Burnett reportedly never forgot until "the day he died".
In 1930, Burnett met
Charley Patton
Charlie Patton (April 1891 (probable) – April 28, 1934), more often spelled Charley Patton, was an American Delta blues musician and songwriter. Considered by many to be the "Father of the Delta Blues", he created an enduring body of America ...
, the most popular bluesman in the
Mississippi Delta
The Mississippi Delta, also known as the Yazoo–Mississippi Delta, or simply the Delta, is the distinctive northwest section of the U.S. state of Mississippi (and portions of Arkansas and Louisiana) that lies between the Mississippi and Yazo ...
at the time. He would listen to Patton play nightly from outside a nearby
juke joint. There he remembered Patton playing "
Pony Blues", "
High Water Everywhere", "A Spoonful Blues", and "Banty Rooster Blues". The two became acquainted, and soon Patton was teaching him guitar. Burnett recalled that "the first piece I ever played in my life was... a tune about hook up my pony and saddle up my black mare"—Patton's "Pony Blues". He also learned about showmanship from Patton: "When he played his guitar, he would turn it over backwards and forwards, and throw it around over his shoulders, between his legs, throw it up in the sky". He played with Patton often in small Delta communities and would perform the guitar tricks he learned from him for the rest of his life.
Burnett was influenced by other popular blues performers of the time, including the
Mississippi Sheiks,
Blind Lemon Jefferson,
Ma Rainey,
Lonnie Johnson,
Tampa Red,
Blind Blake, and
Tommy Johnson. Two of the earliest songs he mastered were Jefferson's "
Match Box Blues" and
Leroy Carr's "
How Long, How Long Blues". The country singer Jimmie Rodgers was also an influence. Burnett tried to emulate Rodgers's "blue
yodel" but found that his efforts sounded more like a growl or a howl: "I couldn't do no yodelin', so I turned to howlin'. And it's done me just fine". His harmonica playing was modeled after that of
Sonny Boy Williamson II
Alex or Aleck Miller (originally Ford, possibly December 5, 1912 – May 24, 1965), known later in his career as Sonny Boy Williamson, was an American blues harmonica player, singer and songwriter. He was an early and influential blues harp s ...
, who taught him how to play when Burnett moved to
Parkin, Arkansas, in 1933.
During the 1930s, Burnett performed in the South as a solo performer and with numerous blues musicians, including
Floyd Jones,
Johnny Shines,
Honeyboy Edwards, Sonny Boy Williamson II,
Robert Johnson
Robert Leroy Johnson (May 8, 1911August 16, 1938) was an American blues musician and songwriter. His singing, guitar playing and songwriting on his landmark 1936 and 1937 recordings have influenced later generations of musicians. Although his r ...
,
Robert Lockwood Jr.,
Willie Brown,
Son House and
Willie Johnson. By the end of the decade, he was a fixture in clubs, with a harmonica and an early
electric guitar
An electric guitar is a guitar that requires external electric Guitar amplifier, sound amplification in order to be heard at typical performance volumes, unlike a standard acoustic guitar. It uses one or more pickup (music technology), pickups ...
. It was around this time that Burnett got into some legal trouble in
Hughes, Arkansas: While he was in town, he tried to protect a female acquaintance from an angry boyfriend, and the two men fought, with Burnett killing the man with a
hoe. What happened after this is a matter of dispute; Burnett either fled the area, or did some jail time.
Military service, 1940s
On April 9, 1941, he was inducted into the U.S. Army and was stationed at several bases around the country. Years later, he stated that the plantation workers in the Delta had alerted military authorities because he refused to work in the fields. He was assigned to the
9th Cavalry Regiment, which was famous for being one of the units dubbed "
Buffalo Soldiers". Burnett was first sent to
Pine Bluff, Arkansas
Pine Bluff, officially the City of Pine Bluff, is the List of municipalities in Arkansas, tenth-most populous city in the U.S. state of Arkansas and the county seat of Jefferson County, Arkansas, Jefferson County. The population of the city wa ...
, for basic training, and was given long hours performing menial work. Then he was transferred to
Camp Blanding, in
Starke, Florida
Starke is a city in and the county seat of Bradford County, Florida, United States. The population was 5,796 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census. The origin of the city's name is disputed. Starke may have been named in honor of local la ...
, where he was assigned to the kitchen patrol. During the day he would cook food for the enlisted soldiers, and at night he would play the guitar in the assembly room. Burnett was later sent to
Fort Gordon in
Georgia
Georgia most commonly refers to:
* Georgia (country), a country in the South Caucasus
* Georgia (U.S. state), a state in the southeastern United States
Georgia may also refer to:
People and fictional characters
* Georgia (name), a list of pe ...
, and he would play his guitar on the steps of the mess hall, which is where a young
James Brown
James Joseph Brown (May 3, 1933 – December 25, 2006) was an American singer, songwriter, dancer, musician, and record producer. The central progenitor of funk music and a major figure of 20th-century music, he is referred to by Honorific nick ...
, who came to the Fort nearly every day to earn money shining shoes and performing buck dances for the troops, first heard him play.
Burnett was then sent to a tutoring camp in
Tacoma, Washington
Tacoma ( ) is the county seat of Pierce County, Washington, United States. A port city, it is situated along Washington's Puget Sound, southwest of Seattle, southwest of Bellevue, Washington, Bellevue, northeast of the state capital, Olympia ...
, where he was in charge of decoding communications. Because Burnett was functionally illiterate, having never received formal education, he was repeatedly beaten by the drill instructor for reading and spelling errors. Soon, he began having uncontrollable shaking fits, dizzy spells, fainting, and also began experiencing mental confusion.
Burnett participated in the
Louisiana Maneuvers in 1941, where one of the earliest photographs of him was taken cleaning the
frog
A frog is any member of a diverse and largely semiaquatic group of short-bodied, tailless amphibian vertebrates composing the order (biology), order Anura (coming from the Ancient Greek , literally 'without tail'). Frog species with rough ski ...
of a horse's hoof.
In 1943, he was evaluated at an Army mental hospital. In November 1943, Burnett was found unfit for duty and given an honorable discharge on November 3. Recalling his experiences in the Army years later, Burnett stated, "The Army ain't no place for a black man. Jus' couldn't take all that bossin' around, I guess. The Wolf's his own boss."
He returned to his family, which had recently moved near
West Memphis, Arkansas, and helped with the farming while also performing, as he had done in the 1930s, with Floyd Jones and others. In 1948 he formed a band, which included the guitarists Willie Johnson and
Matt "Guitar" Murphy, the harmonica player
, a pianist remembered only as "Destruction" and the drummer Willie Steele. Radio station
KWEM in West Memphis began broadcasting his live performances, and he occasionally sat in with Williamson on
KFFA in
Helena, Arkansas
Helena is the eastern portion of Helena–West Helena, Arkansas, a city in Phillips County, Arkansas, located on the west bank of the Mississippi River. It was founded in 1833 by Nicholas Rightor and is named after the daughter of Sylvanus Phil ...
.
First recordings and initial success, 1950s
In 1951, 19-year-old
Ike Turner
Izear Luster "Ike" Turner Jr. (November 5, 1931 – December 12, 2007) was an American musician, bandleader, songwriter, record producer, and talent scout. An early pioneer of 1950s rock and roll, he is best known for his work in the 1960s and ...
, who was a freelance talent scout, heard Howlin' Wolf in West Memphis. Turner brought him to record several songs for
Sam Phillips at Memphis Recording Service (later renamed
Sun Studio) and the
Bihari brothers at
Modern Records
Modern Records (Modern Music Records before 1947) was an American record company and label formed in 1945 in Los Angeles by the Bihari brothers. Modern's artists included Hadda Brooks, Etta James, Joe Houston, Little Richard, Ike & Tina Turn ...
. Phillips praised his singing, saying, "God, what it would be worth on film to see the fervour in that man's face when he sang. His eyes would light up, you'd see the veins come out on his neck and, buddy, there was nothing on his mind but that song. He sang with his damn soul." Howlin' Wolf quickly became a local celebrity and began working with a band that included the guitarists Willie Johnson and
Pat Hare.
Sun Records
Sun Records is an American independent record label founded by producer Sam Phillips in Memphis, Tennessee on February 1, 1952. Sun was the first label to record Elvis Presley, Charlie Rich, Roy Orbison, Jerry Lee Lewis, Carl Perkins, and Jo ...
had not yet been formed, so Phillips licensed his recording to
Chess Records
Chess Records was an American record company established in 1950 in Chicago, specializing in blues and rhythm and blues. It was the successor to Aristocrat Records, founded in 1947. It expanded into soul music, gospel music, early rock an ...
. Howlin' Wolf's first singles were issued by two different record companies in 1951: "
Moanin' at Midnight"/"
How Many More Years" was released on Chess, while "Riding in the Moonlight"/"Morning at Midnight" and "Passing By Blues"/"Crying at Daybreak" were released on Modern's subsidiary
RPM Records. In December 1951,
Leonard Chess
Leonard Samuel Chess (born Lejzor Szmuel Czyż; March 12, 1917 – October 16, 1969) was a Polish-American record company executive and the founder of Chess Records alongside his brother Phil. He was influential in the development of the recor ...
was able to secure Howlin' Wolf's contract, and at the urging of Chess, he relocated to Chicago in late 1952.
In Chicago, Howlin' Wolf assembled a new band and recruited the Chicagoan
Jody Williams from Memphis Slim's band as his first guitarist. Within a year he had persuaded the guitarist
Hubert Sumlin to leave Memphis and join him in Chicago; Sumlin's understated solos and surprisingly subtle phrasing perfectly complemented Burnett's huge voice. The lineup of the band changed often over the years. Wolf employed many different guitarists, both on recordings and in live performance, including Willie Johnson, Jody Williams,
Lee Cooper, L.D. McGhee,
Otis "Big Smokey" Smothers, his brother
Little Smokey Smothers,
Jimmy Rogers,
Freddie Robinson,
Buddy Guy and others. He was able to attract some of the best musicians available because of his policy, unusual among bandleaders, of paying his musicians well and on time, even including their
unemployment insurance and
Social Security contributions. With the exception of a couple of brief absences in the late 1950s, Sumlin remained a member of the band for the rest of Wolf's career and is the guitarist most often associated with the Howlin' Wolf sound.
Howlin' Wolf had a series of hits with songs written by
Willie Dixon
William James Dixon (July 1, 1915January 29, 1992) was an American blues musician, vocalist, songwriter, arranger and record producer. He was proficient in playing both the upright bass and the guitar, and sang with a distinctive voice, but he ...
, who had been hired by the Chess brothers in 1950 as a songwriter. During that period, the competition between
Muddy Waters
McKinley Morganfield (April 4, 1913April 30, 1983), better known as Muddy Waters, was an American blues singer-songwriter and musician who was an important figure in the post-World War II blues scene, and is often cited as the "father of moder ...
and Howlin' Wolf was intense. Dixon reported "Every once in a while Wolf would mention the fact that, 'Hey man, you wrote that song for Muddy. How come you won't write me one like that?' But when you'd write for him he wouldn't like it." So, Dixon decided to use reverse psychology on him, by introducing the songs to Wolf as written for Muddy, thus getting Wolf to accept them.
In the 1950s, Howlin' Wolf had five songs on the ''
Billboard
A billboard (also called a hoarding in the UK and many other parts of the world) is a large outdoor advertising structure (a billing board), typically found in high-traffic areas such as alongside busy roads. Billboards present large advertis ...
'' national R&B charts: "Moanin' at Midnight", "How Many More Years", "Who Will Be Next", "
Smokestack Lightning", and "I Asked for Water (She Gave Me Gasoline)". His first LP, ''
Moanin' in the Moonlight'', was released in 1959. As was standard practice during that time, it was a collection of previously released singles.
Album releases and European tours, 1960s and 1970s
In the early 1960s, Howlin' Wolf recorded several songs that became his most famous, despite receiving no radio play: "
Wang Dang Doodle", "Back Door Man", "Spoonful", "
The Red Rooster", "
I Ain't Superstitious
"I Ain't Superstitious" is a song written by bluesman Willie Dixon and first recorded by Howlin' Wolf in 1961.
It recounts various superstitions, including that of a black cat crossing the pathway. The song has been recorded by a number of arti ...
", "
Goin' Down Slow", and "
Killing Floor", many of which were written by
Willie Dixon
William James Dixon (July 1, 1915January 29, 1992) was an American blues musician, vocalist, songwriter, arranger and record producer. He was proficient in playing both the upright bass and the guitar, and sang with a distinctive voice, but he ...
. Several became part of the repertoires of British and American rock groups, who further popularized them. Howlin' Wolf's second compilation album, ''
Howlin' Wolf
Chester Arthur Burnett (June 10, 1910January 10, 1976), better known by his stage name Howlin' Wolf, was an American blues singer, guitarist and harmonica player. He was at the forefront of transforming acoustic Delta blues into electric Chica ...
''—often called "the rocking chair album" from its cover illustration—was released in 1962.
During the
blues revival in the 1950s and 1960s, black blues musicians found a new audience among white youths, and Howlin' Wolf was among the first to capitalize on it. He toured Europe in 1964 as part of the
American Folk Blues Festival, produced by the German promoters
Horst Lippmann and Fritz Rau. Also, in that year, the
Rolling Stones
The Rolling Stones are an English Rock music, rock band formed in London in 1962. Active for over six decades, they are one of the most popular, influential, and enduring bands of the Album era, rock era. In the early 1960s, the band pione ...
recording of "Little Red Rooster" reached number one in the UK. In 1965, at the height of the British Invasion, the Stones came to America for an appearance on ABC-TV's rock music show, ''
Shindig!'' They insisted, as part of their appearing on the program, that Howlin' Wolf would be their special guest. With the Stones sitting at his feet, Wolf performed an empassioned version of "How Many More Years" with a few million people watching his network TV debut.
In the late 1960s and early 1970s, Howlin' Wolf recorded albums with other established musicians starting with ''
The Super Super Blues Band'' (1968), which featured
Bo Diddley
Ellas Otha Bates (December 30, 1928 – June 2, 2008), known professionally as Bo Diddley, was an American guitarist and singer who played a key role in the transition from the blues to rock and roll. He influenced many artists, including Buddy ...
and Muddy Waters. ''
The Howlin' Wolf Album'' (1969) had psychedelic rock and free-jazz musicians like Gene Barge,
Pete Cosey, Roland Faulkner,
Morris Jennings,
Louis Satterfield,
Charles Stepney and
Phil Upchurch.''The Howlin' Wolf Album'', like rival bluesman Muddy Waters's album ''
Electric Mud'', was designed to appeal to the hippie audience.
The album had an attention-getting cover: large black letters on a white background proclaiming "This is Howlin' Wolf's new album. He doesn't like it. He didn't like his electric guitar at first either." The album cover may have contributed to its poor sales. Chess co-founder
Leonard Chess
Leonard Samuel Chess (born Lejzor Szmuel Czyż; March 12, 1917 – October 16, 1969) was a Polish-American record company executive and the founder of Chess Records alongside his brother Phil. He was influential in the development of the recor ...
admitted that the cover was a bad idea, saying, "I guess negativity isn't a good way to sell records. Who wants to hear that a musician doesn't like his own music?"
British rock musicians
Eric Clapton
Eric Patrick Clapton (born 1945) is an English Rock music, rock and blues guitarist, singer, and songwriter. He is regarded as one of the most successful and influential guitarists in rock music. Clapton ranked second in ''Rolling Stone''s l ...
,
Steve Winwood
Stephen Lawrence Winwood (born 12 May 1948) is an English musician and songwriter whose genres include blue-eyed soul, rhythm and blues, blues rock, and pop rock. Though primarily a guitarist, keyboard player, and vocalist prominent for his dis ...
,
Ian Stewart,
Bill Wyman
William George Wyman ( né Perks; born 24 October 1936) is an English musician who was the bass guitarist with the rock band the Rolling Stones from 1962 to 1993. Wyman was part of the band's first stable lineup and performed on their first 19 ...
, and
Charlie Watts
Charles Robert Watts (2 June 1941 – 24 August 2021) was an English musician who was the drummer of the Rolling Stones from 1963 until his death in 2021.
Originally trained as a Graphic designer, graphic artist, Watts developed an interest i ...
backed him for
The London Howlin' Wolf Sessions, which proved more successful with British audiences than American.
His last album''
The Back Door Wolf'' (1973) was entirely composed of new material. It was recorded with musicians who regularly backed him on stage, including Hubert Sumlin,
Detroit Junior,
Andrew "Blueblood" McMahon, Chico Chism, Lafayette "Shorty" Gilbert and the bandleader,
Eddie Shaw. The album is shorter than any other he recorded, a little more than 35 minutes, because of his declining health.
Wolf's last public performance was in November 1975 at the
International Amphitheatre in Chicago. He shared the bill with
B.B. King,
Albert King,
Luther Allison, and
O. V. Wright. Wolf reportedly gave an "unforgettable" performance, even crawling across the stage during the song, "Crawling King Snake". The crowd gave him a five-minute standing ovation. When he got off the stage after the concert was over, a team of paramedics had to revive him.
Artistry and legacy
Musical style
Wolf is among the most influential blues musicians of the postwar years. He was at the forefront of transforming the rural acoustic blues of the South, to the electric, more urban blues of Chicago. When Wolf first formed his band in West Memphis, Arkansas, his sound was much more aggressive, with guitarist Willie Johnson's raucous, distorted guitar playing being the signature sound of his early recordings.
When Wolf switched guitarists and added Hubert Sumlin to his lineup, his sound became less aggressive with Sumlin adding "angular riffing" and "wild soloing". He also adopted the backbeat that Chicago blues was mainly known for.
The musician and critic
Cub Koda
Michael John "Cub" Koda (né Uszniewicz; October 1, 1948 – July 1, 2000) was an Americans, American rock and roll musician, songwriter, and critic. ''Rolling Stone'' magazine considered him best known for writing the song "Smokin' in the Boys ...
noted, "no one could match Howlin' Wolf for the singular ability to rock the house down to the foundation while simultaneously scaring its patrons out of its wits." Producer
Sam Phillips recalled, "When I heard Howlin' Wolf, I said, 'This is for me. This is where the soul of man never dies.
Equipment
Although Sumlin was the main guitar player in Wolf's band, Wolf played a number of guitars himself throughout the years. He played a 1965
Epiphone Casino
The Epiphone Casino is a thinline semi-acoustic guitar, hollow body electric guitar manufactured by Epiphone, a branch of Gibson Guitar Corporation, Gibson. The guitar debuted in 1961 and has been associated with such guitarists as Howlin' Wolf, ...
on his musical tour in Europe, a
Fender Coronado, a
Gibson Firebird
The Gibson Firebird is a particularly distinctive solid-body electric guitar manufactured by Gibson Guitar Corporation, Gibson beginning in 1963.
It features several unusual features for a Gibson guitar. It has distinctive shape. It is made wit ...
V in the "Down in the Bottom" video recorded in 1966, a white
Fender Stratocaster
The Fender Stratocaster, colloquially known as the Strat, is a model of double- cutaway electric guitar designed between 1952 and 1954 by Leo Fender, Bill Carson, George Fullerton, and Freddie Tavares. The Fender Musical Instruments Corpora ...
, a Teisco Tre-100, and he also played a
Kay K-161 ThinTwin in his earlier years. The Kay K-161 ThinTwin is currently residing in the
Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in
Cleveland, Ohio
Cleveland is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Cuyahoga County, Ohio, Cuyahoga County. Located along the southern shore of Lake Erie, it is situated across the Canada–United States border, Canada–U.S. maritime border ...
.
Accolades
In 1980, Burnett was posthumously inducted into the Blues Foundation's
Blues Hall of Fame
The Blues Hall of Fame is a music museum operated by the Blues Foundation at 421 S. Main Street in Memphis, Tennessee. Initially, the "Blues Hall of Fame" was not a physical building, but a listing of people who have significantly contributed to b ...
.
He was also inducted into the
Rock & Roll Hall of Fame as an early influence, and the Hall of Fame located in his hometown of
West Point, Mississippi, in 1995.
On September 17, 1994, the
U.S. Postal Service
The United States Postal Service (USPS), also known as the Post Office, U.S. Mail, or simply the Postal Service, is an independent agencies of the United States government, independent agency of the executive branch of the federal governmen ...
issued a 29 cent commemorative postage stamp depicting Howlin' Wolf.
On September 1, 2005, the Howlin' Wolf Blues Museum opened at 57 E. Westbrook Street in West Point, Mississippi. An annual festival is held there.
The Howlin' Wolf Foundation, a nonprofit corporation organized under the US tax code, section
501(c)(3)
A 501(c)(3) organization is a United States corporation, Trust (business), trust, unincorporated association or other type of organization exempt from federal income tax under section 501(c)(3) of Title 26 of the United States Code. It is one of ...
, was established by Bettye Kelly to preserve and extend his legacy. The foundation's mission and goals include preserving blues music, providing scholarships for students to participate in music programs, and support for blues musicians and blues programs.
The experimental rock band
Swans performs a song titled "Just A Little Boy (for Chester Burnett)" on their 2014 album ''
To Be Kind''. The song takes heavy blues inspiration and features lead singer
Michael Gira vocalizing in a manner similar to Burnett's howling style.
[ ]
In 2023, ''
Rolling Stone
''Rolling Stone'' is an American monthly magazine that focuses on music, politics, and popular culture. It was founded in San Francisco, California, in 1967 by Jann Wenner and the music critic Ralph J. Gleason.
The magazine was first known fo ...
'' ranked Howlin' Wolf at number 59 on its list of the 200 Greatest Singers of All Time.
Personal life
Burnett was noted for his disciplined approach to his personal finances. Having already achieved a measure of success in Memphis, he described himself as "the onliest one to drive himself up from the Delta" to Chicago, which he did, in his own car on the
Blues Highway and with $4,000 in his pocket, a rare distinction for a black bluesman of the time. Although functionally illiterate into his forties, Burnett eventually returned to school, first to earn a
General Educational Development (GED) diploma and later to study accounting and other business courses to help manage his career.
Burnett met his future wife, Lillie Handley (1925–2001), when she attended one of his performances at a Chicago club. She and her family were urban and educated and were not involved in what was considered the unsavory world of blues musicians. Nevertheless, he was attracted to her as soon as he saw her in the audience. He immediately pursued her and won her over. According to those who knew them, the couple remained deeply in love until his death. Together, they raised two daughters Betty and Barbara, Lillie's daughters from an earlier relationship. West Coast rapper
Skeme is his great nephew, who was born 14 years after his death.
After he married Lillie, who was able to manage his professional finances, he was so financially successful that he was able to offer band members not only a decent salary but benefits such as health insurance. This enabled him to hire his pick of available musicians and keep his band one of the best around. According to his stepdaughters, he was never financially extravagant (for instance, he drove a
Pontiac station wagon rather than a more expensive, flashy car).
Health
Burnett's health began declining in the late 1960s. He suffered his first heart attack in 1969 as he and Hubert Sumlin were traveling to a show at
University of Chicago
The University of Chicago (UChicago, Chicago, or UChi) is a Private university, private research university in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Its main campus is in the Hyde Park, Chicago, Hyde Park neighborhood on Chicago's South Side, Chic ...
. He fell against the dashboard of the car he was riding in, and Sumlin, who was driving, pulled over and grabbed a two-by-four piece of wood that was lying in the road. Sumlin then rammed the wood into Burnett's back, which kick-started his heart.
Three weeks later, while he was in Toronto for a gig, Burnett suffered additional heart and kidney problems, but refused an operation recommended by doctors, telling his wife that "he needed to keep working".
In 1970, Burnett was involved in a serious car accident that sent him flying through the windshield, which caused extensive damage to his kidneys. For the rest of his life, he received dialysis treatments every three days, which wife Lillie administered.
In May that same year, while he was in the United Kingdom to record ''The London Howlin' Wolf Sessions'', his health problems worsened. A year later, Burnett suffered another heart attack, and his kidneys had failed. He also began suffering from high blood pressure. By May 1973, Burnett was back performing again.
The bandleader, Eddie Shaw, was so concerned for Burnett's health that he limited him to performing six songs per concert.
Death
In January 1976, Burnett checked into the
Edward Hines Jr. Veterans Administration Hospital in
Hines, Illinois, for kidney surgery. Three days before his death, a
carcinoma
Carcinoma is a malignancy that develops from epithelial cells. Specifically, a carcinoma is a cancer that begins in a tissue that lines the inner or outer surfaces of the body, and that arises from cells originating in the endodermal, mesoder ...
was found in his brain. He died from a combination of the tumor,
heart failure
Heart failure (HF), also known as congestive heart failure (CHF), is a syndrome caused by an impairment in the heart's ability to Cardiac cycle, fill with and pump blood.
Although symptoms vary based on which side of the heart is affected, HF ...
, and kidney disease on January 10, 1976, at the age of 65.
He was buried in
Oakridge Cemetery, outside Chicago, in a plot in Section 18, on the east side of the road. His gravestone has an image of a guitar and harmonica etched into it.
Awards and nominations
In 1972, Howlin' Wolf was awarded an honorary doctor of arts degree from
Columbia College in Chicago.
Grammy Hall of Fame
In 1999, Wolf's recording of "Smokestack Lightning" was selected for a
Grammy Hall of Fame Award, an award established in 1973 to honor recordings that are at least 25 years old and have "qualitative or historical significance".
Rock and Roll Hall of Fame
The
Rock and Roll Hall of Fame
The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame (RRHOF), also simply referred to as the Rock Hall, is a museum and hall of fame located in downtown Cleveland, Ohio, United States, on the shore of Lake Erie. The museum documents the history of rock music and the ...
listed three songs by Howlin' Wolf in its "500 Songs That Shaped Rock and Roll".
The Blues Foundation Awards
Inductions
Discography
For a more in depth discography, see https://www.wirz.de/music/howlwolf.htm
Albums
*1959: ''
Moanin' in the Moonlight'' (
Chess
Chess is a board game for two players. It is an abstract strategy game that involves Perfect information, no hidden information and no elements of game of chance, chance. It is played on a square chessboard, board consisting of 64 squares arran ...
) 1951–1958 recordings
*1962: ''
Howlin' Wolf
Chester Arthur Burnett (June 10, 1910January 10, 1976), better known by his stage name Howlin' Wolf, was an American blues singer, guitarist and harmonica player. He was at the forefront of transforming acoustic Delta blues into electric Chica ...
'' (Chess) 1957–1962 recordings
*1962: ''
Howling Wolf Sings the Blues'' (Crown) 1951–1952 RPM recordings
*1965: ''
The Real Folk Blues'' (Chess) 1956–1965 recordings
*1967: ''
More Real Folk Blues'' (Chess) 1953–1956 recordings
*1968: ''
The Super Super Blues Band'' (Chess) with
Muddy Waters
McKinley Morganfield (April 4, 1913April 30, 1983), better known as Muddy Waters, was an American blues singer-songwriter and musician who was an important figure in the post-World War II blues scene, and is often cited as the "father of moder ...
and
Bo Diddley
Ellas Otha Bates (December 30, 1928 – June 2, 2008), known professionally as Bo Diddley, was an American guitarist and singer who played a key role in the transition from the blues to rock and roll. He influenced many artists, including Buddy ...
*1969: ''
The Howlin' Wolf Album'' (Cadet Concept)
*1971: ''
Message to the Young'' (Chess)
*1971: ''
The London Howlin' Wolf Sessions'' (Chess)
*1972: ''Chester Burnett A.K.A. Howlin' Wolf'' (Chess) 1951–1965 recordings
*1972: ''
Live and Cookin''' (Chess)
*1973: ''
The Back Door Wolf'' (Chess)
*1974: ''London Revisited'' (Chess) split album with Muddy Waters
*1975: ''Change My Way'' (Chess) 1958–1966 recordings
*1977: ''The Legendary Sun Performers: Howlin' Wolf'' (Charly)
*1979: ''Heart Like Railroad Steel (Memphis & Chicago Blues 1951–57)'' (Blues Ball)
*1979: ''Can't Put Me Out (Chicago 1956–72, Volume II)'' (Blues Ball)
*1984: ''Muddy & the Wolf'' (Chess) split album with Muddy Waters
*1984: ''His Greatest Sides, Volume One'' (Chess)
*1991: ''The Chess Box—Howlin' Wolf'' (Chess/MCA)
*1991: ''Howlin' Wolf Rides Again'' (Flair/Virgin)
*1994: ''Ain't Gonna Be Your Dog (Chess Collectibles, Vol. 2)'' (Chess/MCA)
*1997: ''
His Best'' (Chess/MCA); reissued as ''The Definitive Collection'' (Geffen, 2007)
*1999: ''His Best, Vol. 2'' (Chess/MCA)
*2011: ''Smokestack Lightning (The Complete Chess Masters 1951–1960)'' (Hip-O Select/Geffen)
Singles
Sessionography
Notes
Citations
Explanatory notes
General references
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External links
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Howlin' Wolf Photo Page
{{DEFAULTSORT:Howlin Wolf
1910 births
1976 deaths
20th-century African-American male singers
20th-century American male singers
20th-century American singer-songwriters
20th-century American guitarists
African-American guitarists
African-American male singer-songwriters
American male singer-songwriters
American blues guitarists
American blues harmonica players
American blues singers
American harmonica players
American male guitarists
Blues musicians from Mississippi
Chess Records artists
Chicago blues musicians
Crown Records artists
Guitarists from Illinois
Guitarists from Mississippi
Guitarists from Tennessee
People from Clay County, Mississippi
Musicians from Memphis, Tennessee
RPM Records (United States) artists
Singer-songwriters from Illinois
Singer-songwriters from Mississippi
Singer-songwriters from Tennessee