Photo by Cedric Chatterly

2002 NEA National Heritage Fellow David "Honeyboy" Edwards Chicago, IL Blues guitarist/singer

David Edwards was born in Shaw, Mississippi in 1915. He first learned music from his father, Henry Edwards, a guitar player and violinist for country dances. As a teenager, he started touring with Big Joe Williams, and over the course of the next few years he crossed paths with the patriarchs of the Delta blues, including Robert Johnson, Tommy McClennan, Charley Patton, and Tommy Johnson. In 1942, Alan Lomax recorded 15 of Edwards' stories and songs for the Archive of Folk Song at the Library of Congress. By 1953, Edwards had moved to Chicago, where he quickly became part of the fertile urban blues scene, recording a minor classic Drop Down Mama for the Chess label. Since the 1960s, Edwards has toured widely, working with such artists as Walter Horton, Sonny Boy Williamson, Sunnyland Slim, Howlin' Wolf, and even Fleetwood Mac. In a review of a 1976 concert, New York Times critic Robert Palmer wrote that Edwards' performance was mesmerizing. "He sang in a strong, keening voice, and accompanied himself with dazzling guitar runs and a buoyant steady rhythm...the music had the audience of devotees in a state bordering on ecstasy." The blues can be understood as a cumulative art form in which the artists build their styles and repertoires based on their experiences and on what they have learned from other musicians. Honeyboy Edwards is a monumental figure in that rich, cultural history and a living link with the birth of the blues.

 
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NEA Heritage Fellows
1982-2012: 
BY YEAR | ALPHA