Living Blues magazine has always been the leading periodical in the field in the US; one reason for this is the superb interviews with bluesmen/women that have graced its pages since its founding in the 1970s. Allowing artists to tell their stories fully and freely, often prodded on by knowledgeable and probing question by the interviewers Jim O'Neal and Amy Van Singel, produced important first-hand documentation of the art form. This book compiles a dozen of those interviews, ranging from Georgia Tom Dorsey to Muddy Waters, Eddie Boyd to Little Esther. One of the most fascinating is the very long (the longest in the magazine's history) interview with Delta blues legend Houston Stackhouse who was able to relate first-hand information and reminiscences of just about all the great bluesmen who worked in Mississippi and Arkansas going all the way back to Tommy Johnson. But all of the interviews plumb deeply into each artist's background, career, opinions, and memories, and that's what makes them (and the book) so interesting and indispensable. Hopefully additional volumes of more Living Blues interviews will be issued.
