Magic Sam - Chicago Folk Festival US 1967 (Bootleg)

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Samuel "Magic Sam" Gene Maghett (February 14, 1937 – December 1, 1969) was an American blues musician. Maghett was born in Grenada, Mississippi and learned to play the blues from listening to records by Muddy Waters and Little Walter. After moving to Chicago at the age of nineteen, he was signed by Cobra Records and became well known as a bluesman after his first record, "All Your Love" in 1957. He had several more hits and became very popular. He was known for his distinctive tremolo guitar playing.

After moving to Chicago, Illinois in 1950, his guitar playing earned bookings at blues clubs in Chicago's West Side. Sam recorded for the Cobra label from 1957 to 1959, recording singles, including "All Your Love" and "Easy Baby". They never appeared on the charts yet they had a profoud influence, far beyond Chicago's guitarists and singers. Together with the records of Otis Rush (also a Cobra artist) and Buddy Guy, they made a manifesto for a new kind of blues. Around this time Sam also worked briefly with Homesick James Williamson. Sam gained a following before being drafted into the Army. Not a natural soldier, Sam deserted after a couple of weeks' service and was subsequently caught and sentenced to six months imprisonment. He was given a dishonourable discharge on release, but the experience had undermined his confidence and immediate recordings for Mel London's Chief Records lacked the purpose of their predecessors.

In 1963, he gained national attention for his single "Feelin' Good (We're Gonna Boogie)". After successful touring of the United States, UK and Germany, he was signed to Delmark Records in 1967, where he recorded West Side Soul and Black Magic. He also continued performing live and toured with blues harp player Charlie Musselwhite.

Sam's breakthrough performance was at the Ann Arbor Blues Festival in 1969, which won him many bookings in the United States and Europe. His life and career was cut short when he suddenly died of a heart attack in December of the same year. He was 32 years old. He was buried in the Restvale Cemetery in Alsip, Illinois.

His guitar style, vocals and songwriting ability have inspired and influenced many blues musicians ever since. In The Blues Brothers, Jake Blues dedicates the band's performance of "Sweet Home Chicago" to the "late, great Magic Sam".

"Magic Sam had a different guitar sound," said his record producer, Willie Dixon. "Most of the guys were playing the straight 12-bar blues thing, but the harmonies that he carried with the chords was a different thing altogether. This tune "All Your Love", he expressed with such an inspirational feeling with his high voice. You could always tell him, even from his introduction to the music." 

Magic Sam
University of Chicago Folk Festival
Chicago IL
1967.01.00

Blues Before Sunrise radio show broadcast

01. Announcer
02. Leaving in the morning
03. Hard road to travel
04. Been down so hard / Feel so good i wanna boogie
05. That's alright
06. Sweet home chicago
07. Scratch my back
08. Outro
09. Intro for the extra
10. Bloody tears

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