The Blues Estafette 1996

ARTIST LINEUP

CARL HODGES

Musicians moved north from the tidewater region. Philadelphia became one of the favorite centers. Carl Hodges from Saluda, Middlesex County, between Newport News and Tappahannock, moved there about 1960, aged about twenty-seven, and worked there for two years before returning. While he was there he met other migrant musicians and was introduced by Maryland songster Bill Jackson to blues researchar Pete Welding, who recorded him in 1961, "Blues All Round My Bed" showed him to be a guitarist firmly in the mainstream of Piedmont country blues.

Hodges remembered his early days for Kip Lornell. He learned some of his g0uitar skills from his grandfather, Carl Hodges Sr., and other Middlesex County Bluesmen like Eli Roman and Roy Jackson as well as0 Goucester County bluesman Benny Sparks. Carl well remembered the days before roads were paved: ''There wasn't much chance to get nowhere lest you hitch up the wagon and drive somewhere. Couldn't go far that way. They didn't have dances like they have today, beer joints, nothing like that. so, mostly the places you did play was for houseparties. That was the biggest sport then anyway."

Hodges continues to play local gigs.

From: Bruce Bastin's Red River Runs-The Blues Tradition In The South-East