Text and photos by Michael Swanger

It's 1951 and the migration of millions of Southern blacks to northern industrial centers is in full swing. Poor country and city folk from Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia and Louisiana are headed north to find jobs, to escape Jim Crow, to start their lives anew.

On the South Side of Chicago, on Maxwell Street and in the bustling clubs where the Stevenson Expressway now stands, a group of black raconteurs - blues musicians - congregate to play for tips and gamble. Most are from the country; some, like Sunnyland Slim, Big Bill Broonzy, Tampa Red and Big Maceo have been there since the '30s and '40s. Raised in Southern Baptist churches, they're making a name for themselves in the bright lights of the big city, playing what the old people call "devil's music."

Rock 'n' roll, or at least the popular version that recognizes Elvis Presley's cover of Arthur Crudup's "That's All Right," is three years away. Sterile, safe pop artists like Nat King Cole, Rosemary Clooney and Perry Como are on the charts. Deviant, newly-amplified back-alley blues, such as those sung by Muddy Waters, are pregnant, but haven't yet given birth to rock 'n' roll.

In 1951, the kings of rock are freewheeling electrified bluesmen like Waters, Howlin' Wolf, Jimmy Reed, Robert Nighthawk, J.B. Lenoir, Little Walter Jacobs, Willie Dixon, Elmore James and John Lee Hooker. They're selling records mostly to black audiences, laying down soulful, honest and meaningful music for record labels like Bea and Baby, Bluebird, Checker, Chess, Fury, JOB, Parrot, Sun and Vee-Jay. And the prospect of white listeners recognizing their work, let alone embracing it, is a figment of their imagination.

Meanwhile, about 200 miles away in Burlington, Iowa, a blue-collar town located on the banks of the Mississippi River - a waterway that has lent so much hyperbole and romanticism to the blues - a future purveyor of the genre, Robert Franklin "Bo" Ramsey, is born to a couple who hail from the South.

The Ramsey patriarch is a former guitarist who used to play in swing bands during the '30s but now works a day job to feed his family. Music permeates the Ramsey home, though it will be a few years before a young Bo Ramsey learns to pick Johnny Cash's "Folsom Prison Blues" on his father's 1934 Gibson L-7 guitar, and a few years more before he discovers the glory of Muddy and Wolf.

But in 1951, the seeds have been sown for Ramsey's lifelong journey into the blues, one that is marked by reverence for its traditions and founders. Ramsey's devotion will grow exponentially, allowing him to work with some of the finest songwriters of his time - Greg Brown, Kevin Gordon, Ani DiFranco, Lucinda Williams and Pieta Brown. Now, more than a half-century later, the time seems right for Ramsey to honor the blues giants who walked the earth in 1951.

Like the burning cigarette tucked carefully between the strings and neck of his snarling guitar, Bo Ramsey smolders onstage. Stalking the front of the room with his cowboy hat pulled down to shield his eyes, he commands attention when he strikes a contorted pose with his skinny body and wrings out hypnotic blue notes that waft through the crowd.

Ramsey may well be Iowa's King Bee of the blues ... though he would be the first to deny it. His image is that of a mysterious guitar slinger, yet he's the ultimate anti-guitar hero who openly serves the song first and the solo last. He is, in a nutshell, a walking contradiction, part truth, part fiction.

"It's about the music, not being a bad-assed guitar player, though he is because he lets go of his ego," says Nashville singer-songwriter-guitarist Kevin Gordon, who spent some time during the late '80s in Ramsey's band, The Sliders. "He's the consummate minimalist, always going for the right note, and very often that is one note. It's an awesome, heroic thing to do."

That kind of understatement, both onstage and off - he speaks as deliberately as he plays - is what makes Ramsey the essence of cool. It bolsters his credibility with discerning music fans, those who appreciate how careful and respectful Ramsey is about the music he plays.

"Bo has huge amounts of charisma," says fellow blues singer-guitarist Joe Price. "He floors people. They just look at him and love him."

That's the way it's been for Ramsey, who soaked up blues, rock and country music as a teenager and college student before breaking out in 1974, co-founding the Mother Blues Band with Price and Patrick Hazell. Four years later, he left to form The Sliders, a roots-rock band grounded in the blues that developed a loyal following while touring the Midwest for nearly 12 years.

Following a brief hiatus in the late '80s, when he took a factory job and went back to school to earn his sociology degree, Ramsey met Iowa City singer-songwriter Greg Brown. In 1989, they collaborated on Brown's "One Big Town," which Ramsey co-produced and played guitar on. It would be the first of more than 10 albums they would record together, establishing a personal and professional kinship that continues today.

In the '90s, Ramsey was getting noticed in the music industry as a hired gun, both as a guitarist and producer. During that decade he worked with Americana artists like Gordon, David Zollo, Teddy Morgan, Iris DeMent, Dave Moore and Joan Baez. He also released two solo albums, 1995's "Live" and 1997's "In The Weeds," both of which were heavily influenced by the blues.

Ramsey's most recognized collaboration during that time was with acclaimed singer-songwriter Lucinda Williams. After hearing Ramsey's 1991 debut "Down to Bastrop," she asked him to join her band. The Iowa City musician eventually agreed and served as guitarist and producer for Williams' 1998 Grammy Award-winning album, "Car Wheels On A Gravel Road" and its follow-up, "Essence."

By 2002, Ramsey had left Williams and joined forces with Brown's daughter, Pieta Brown, a gifted young singer-songwriter. Together, they have toured and recorded three albums in the last four years. They're wrapping up a fourth album with a working title of "Remember the Sun" and plan to shop it this fall to record companies in hopes of releasing it next spring.

Last year, Ramsey was inducted into the Iowa Rock 'n' Roll Hall of Fame (curiously, he's absent from the Iowa Blues Hall of Fame). And though he has found success performing with a number of artists who may or may not fit neatly into the blues category, he says they all share an intense passion.

"It's that blues thing that has really been the bond," he says. "These are really fine artists, and their stuff comes up out of there and to me that's what makes it great."

Price, whose music is as stone-cold blues as it gets, says people shouldn't confuse what Ramsey has been doing the last seven or eight years with anything but blues.

"He's been playing the blues the whole time," he says. "Even when he plays a country song he's playing the blues. He's been like that since day one."

Earlier this year, Ramsey realized a lifelong dream by releasing his first all-blues album, "Stranger Blues." The independent album is Ramsey's reverent tribute to the musicians who have inspired him over the years - Muddy (the atmospheric "Little Geneva"), Wolf (the moanin' "No Place to Go," which is actually "How Many More Years"), Reed (complete with spot-on vocals on "You Got Me Dizzy"), the Mississippi Sheiks (a particularly languid "Sitting On Top of the World") and Albert King (a sultry "I Wanna Get Funky") - as he resurrects their spirit with his special touch. It also includes guest appearances by longtime friends and family members like Greg and Pieta Brown, Price, Zollo, Steve Hayes, Rico Cicalo, Rickey Peterson and his sons, Benson and Alex Ramsey.

To celebrate its release, Ramsey is taking time out of his busy touring schedule as a sideman with Brown to headline a handful of all-blues shows with her like the one at Blues on Grand this Friday. Billed as Bo Ramsey & Stranger Blues, it's one of only a handful of Iowa shows designed to promote the album and the only Des Moines stop.

"I'm thrilled and honored he would choose a place like Blues on Grand to do a CD release party," says the club's co-owner Jeff Wagner, "especially considering his stature in the music world."

Last week, Ramsey spoke to Cityview about the making of "Stranger Blues," the state of the blues, and what they mean to him. The following is an excerpt from that conversation - stripped down, honest and real, just like Ramsey's music.

CV: Why make this album at this point in your career?
Bo: The last seven or eight years I've been working mostly on other people's music and I thought, "God, man, I'm not getting any younger. I've got to do this blues record. It's important I do this."

CV: Are you pleased with it?
Bo: At the end of the day I'm pleased with it. This is something I've wanted to do for quite a while. It was a labor of love. I was trying in my small way to pay tribute to the music that's been a constant source of inspiration to me, the music that moved me to play music seriously and has been a guiding light.

CV: Was it challenging to select the material?
Bo: Very challenging. I began to do some listening and started digging out LPs and thought, "How am I going to do this? This is such a big place. There's so many great songs, artists and performances on record." After a while I just picked songs by some of my favorite artists, like Little Walter, Elmore James, Willie Dixon, Sonny Boy Williamson and Jessie Mae Hemphill. There's a lot more. I'm thinking about doing another one.

CV: Still, you chose some fairly obscure tunes. Was that a conscious decision?
Bo: Yes and no. They were songs I could connect with and do justice to by performing them. Some went away right away, others stuck around so I pursued them.

CV: Many of the songs feature new arrangements. Was that difficult?
Bo: It was natural. I was lucky enough to see guys like Muddy Waters and Howlin' Wolf when I was growing up, and I learned early on one of the many things they were saying was to be yourself. I'm not going to try and be Muddy Waters. I would be a fool to try and do that.

CV: How important are tension, space, dynamics and tempo on this album?
Bo: I think it's vitally important. I look at it like breath. A living thing must breathe. Songs are living things. So in my opinion they must breathe, and if you're not breathing you're dead.

CV: What did Pieta Brown bring to the project as your co-producer?
Bo: A lot. She has such a deep knowledge of blues music. She's been listening to it her whole life. I didn't hire her because I've been working with her. I hired her because she has great instincts and big ears and is a great producer. That was her idea to include the instrumental version of "Freight Train."

CV: There are a lot of familiar collaborators on the album. That must have been comforting?
Bo: Yes, very much so. I hired people I could trust and who could bring a lot to the table. That the record has my dear friends and two of my sons, I felt really good about that.

CV: How do you feel about returning to center stage when you promote the album with these shows?
Bo: I'm a little nervous because I haven't done it in a while [laughs]. I just hope I can remember the songs. I'm looking forward to taking it back to some of the places I used to play, like the Grand. I appreciate what they're doing. It's a blues club, and there's not that many of those out there.

CV: Good blues is about storytelling, not just solos and licks, right?
Bo: A good song is really the big deal. To be honest, if I go listen to something and it's a lot of guitar solos, I usually leave because I'm not interested in that. It doesn't move me. It doesn't go all the way there. The song is the big deal and the groove. And good songs come out of good grooves.

CV: Some of those songs come out of grooves that are barely faster than a crawl, don't they?
Bo: There are a lot of up-tempo songs that I like. But this whole thing about "If it's not fast," geez man, that bores me to tears. That's so amateur hour. Music is a big deal, and if the song is there it doesn't matter what tempo it is. I used to hear that in the clubs and it used to wear me out.

CV: You've shown the guitar is a dynamic instrument and not just for soloing. With that said, do you find it ironic your image is that of a guitar slinger?
Bo: I work hard to be a good guitar player, but there's so much more to learn. You've got to have the song first. Serve the song. That's right at the top of my list. Lots of times I think of the guitar in terms of colors. What color does this picture contain?

CV: What do you think of guitarists who play too loud and too fast?
Bo: It's a cheap trick and I'm weary of it, man. You go to some club and everything's on 12 and your ears are bleeding. It's tired. I mean come on, how much more of this do we have to take?
You'd go hear Muddy Waters and you'd have to lean in. I love that.
I remember Howlin' Wolf. That night changed my life. He was playing with no PA system and the club was full. He was singing through an amplifier, there was a full band and people were dancing and there was sawdust on the floor and the band was cookin' and you could hear the couples' feet on the floor. I mean to tell you, man, that blew my mind. I thought, "How cool is this?" That's ultra cool. And that's something people in this country don't get.
CV: How do you define the blues?
Bo: It's a feeling. Everybody gets the blues. That's why they've been around so long. It's about real feelings and real people. That's why there's so much great music that comes out of the blues.

CV: Do you fear its traditions are being lost?
Bo: Yeah, I do. I don't hear it as much as I used to. I don't know what happened. Back when I was growing up listening to the Rolling Stones, Led Zeppelin, Bob Dylan and Jimi Hendrix, they had blues in their music, and you could hear it and feel it. Tom Petty is one of the last ones doing it in the pop world. That's another reason I did this record - to get it out there. I don't know where it's going to go. I probably won't sell very many records, but I want to remind people: Don't turn your back on what's gone before you.

CV: Once you're on the blues track it's a lifelong journey, isn't it?
Bo: It is. They're mysterious, which I find intriguing. When I went to college somebody put a Muddy Waters record on, and I remember just staring at the record and thinking "Good lord, what is that?" Thirty years later, I'm still listening to that stuff. It gets in your blood.

CV: What performers inspired you?
Bo: I remember the first time I saw Muddy, it had a big affect on me. I haven't seen anybody like him since, just the sheer power. Muddy could command a room like nobody else, and he wasn't trying to do it. There was no show business involved. It was just the man.

CV: Do you feel like you've come full circle from your days in the Mother Blues Band?
Bo: Absolutely. And it's a tribute to Joe Price and Patrick Hazell. They were very influential. I learned a lot from those guys.

CV: Are you comfortable being looked upon as someone who has helped shape the Iowa blues scene?
Bo: I don't think of it like that. I just do what I do. I'm serious about it. I'm passionate about it, and I try to do good work.

CV: Why is the Eastern Iowa blues sound so distinct?
Bo: I think geography has something to do with it. I used to go to clubs and dance to guys like Mighty Joe Young and J.B. Hutto. Those guys came up the river from Mississippi. I grew up in Burlington, which is on the Mississippi River, which transports a lot of goods - and music being one of them. But we're also in the middle of a cornfield, which is very beautiful and open.

CV: Maybe that's where the space in your playing comes from?
Bo: Maybe so, because I'm very affected by open spaces.

CV: What do you hope people take away from "Stranger Blues"?
Bo: That's a great question. I hope that people are affected by it in some way. Different people listen in different ways. If someone puts it on and enjoys it, then that's a good thing. I tried to pay attention to the songs and I hope people will appreciate them. Those songs have been around and that's a beautiful thing and we should honor that. I don't expect everyone to like it, but I hope some get something out of it. CV

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