'Woke up this mornin'....' The popular image of the bluesman as a blind, rural black, bemoaning his travails in flattened thirds on a guitar made from an old box, may have a germ of truth. But from its origins in the deltas of America's Deep South, blues grew in the commercial crucible of Chicago in the 1920s into a hugely influential and well-developed popular art form. It spawned rock and roll, and was part of the social revolution that put mass entertainment for teens and twenties at the top of the economic agenda for the rest of the 20th century - not bad for 12 bars.
And for anyone tempted to think of the blues as a 'primitive' or 'limited' art form, a listen to the recordings of such geniuses as Robert Johnson, Muddy Waters, BB King or dozens of others (some of them cultured and knowledgeable people, some self-taught innovators) will come as a revelation.
This is a definitive history of the Blues, hosted by Rolling Stones founder member and highly accomplished all-round musician Bill Wyman. The two-part programme examines the development of the songs, that characteristic 12-bar pattern, the writers, the performers, and the way that blues was reborn within rock music.
There is rare archive film footage the great blues artists speaking candidly - did they ever do otherwise? - about their lives and their music, and many newly recorded interviews including contributions from names such as Eric Clapton, BB King, Buddy Guy, Keith Richards, Taj Mahal, Albert Lee and Bruce Johnston.
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