Jan Lower

Blind Willie Johnson (1897-1945) was an American blues singer, guitarist, and evangelist whose 30 songs influenced generations of musicians. He is considered the dominant player of “holy blues” music, which conveys religious themes through the medium of blues.

[The Blues is a music genre, originating in the Deep South, that incorporated spirituals, work songs, field hollers, shouts, chants, and simple rhyming narrative ballads from the African-American culture. It is characterized by a 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, and contribute to the “blues scale,” formed by the addition of an out-of-key "blue note" to an existing scale, notably the flat fifth.]

As explained by the Metro Music Makers web site, the lyrical form of the blues is usually AAB, such as this example from "The Thrill is Gone":

“The thrill is gone, the thrill is gone away (A line, measures 1-4)

The thrill is gone baby, the thrill is gone away (A line, measures 5-8)

You know you done me wrong baby, and you’ll be sorry someday (B line, measures 9-12)”

Luther Brown and John Heggen, Directors of The Delta Center for Culture & Learning, point out that the flattened notes help convey “hope and despair, leaving and being left, wronging and being wronged, lynching and loving, tragedy and triumph, Saturday night and Sunday morning. It’s a way of taking trouble and making a song out of it, and helping to explain why the righteous suffer in the process, all in a completely vernacular and secular manner.”

When the Voyager space exploration mission took off in 1977, 27 pieces of music were selected to be a part of the golden record etched with facts and cultural information about life on Earth. This book on Willie Johnson’s life for kids begins with the fact that a blues song considered iconic by Willie Johnson was one of them. We then learn about Willie’s life and why one of his works was chosen.

Willie lost his mother when he was four, and his father made a guitar to cheer him up. The guitar became his companion. The author also tells us:

“…one day when Willie was about seven, his father argued with his new wife. Angry, she threw a pan of water, harsh with lye soap, that splashed onto Willie’s face. It blinded him.”

When he was older, Willie got a six-string guitar, and lived on the street, singing songs of praise to the Lord on street corners. It was a hard life though, and one of his songs reflected that existence: “Dark Was the Night, Cold Was the Ground.”

A record company scout heard him play and brought him to a recording studio in Dallas. “Dark Was the Night” was made into a record, along with 29 other songs. The book doesn’t tell much about what made Johnson’s music so unique, and I think it would have interested kids. To record "Dark Was the Night, Cold Was the Ground,” for example, he substituted a penknife for the glass bottleneck used for slide guitar, and played with a thumb pick. The result created the impression of moaning, making an apt accompaniment to the lyrics.

Willie Johnson married, but the Depression came, and no one had money to buy records. Then his small house caught fire, and he and his wife slept on a damp mattress in the ruins of the house. Willie contracted malarial fever, and his wife later claimed the hospital refused to treat him because he was blind, although he would also have not been admitted to many hospitals because he was Black. He died at age 48.

Some 30 years later, the head of the Voyager space mission asked a team of six to create a message from the people of Earth “to send human experience into outer space.” They chose photographs, sounds of nature, and greetings in 55 languages. And,“to explain emotions, they chose music.” Lower writes:

“‘Dark Was the Night, Cold Was the Ground’ spoke the message of Voyager, a longing to connect in the huge vastness of space.”

Voyager and its golden record took off to fly by Saturn, Jupiter, Uranus, and Neptune, toward the edge of the solar system and beyond.

Back matter includes more about Blind Willie Johnson, the song, the golden record, and the Voyager Mission.

[You can listen to all of the golden record on its website, here. Other musicians included Bach, Mozart, Beethoven, Stravinsky, Chuck Berry, and more, and you can listen to each selection. On the Voyager website, a bar at the bottom gives constant updates on each missions distance from the earth, the sun, and other data.]

The outstanding illustrator Gary Kelley uses ink and soft pastels, in muted tones dominated by blue and sepia, to help tell the story. As always, his artwork is notable for its simplicity, beauty, and ability to engage the emotions of the viewer. Any book illustrated by Gary Kelley is worth perusing for the art.

Evaluation: As depressing as Johnson’s story sounds, the author omitted most of the sadder details, focusing on Johnson’s immortality through his music. Kids may be inspired to find out more about what was selected to be on the Golden Record, and perhaps opine on what they would have included.… (mais)