ROBERT LOCKWOOD

Biography

Robert Lockwood Jr. (also known as Robert Junior Lockwood) was born on March 27, 1915, in the rural community of Turkey Scratch, near Helena, Arkansas, and became one of the most important links between Delta blues and the modern urban blues tradition.[3][5] His mother had a long relationship with the legendary Robert Johnson, who lived with the family at times, and Johnson personally taught the young Lockwood guitar, making him the only guitarist known to have learned directly from Johnson.[1][3][5] As a teenager, Lockwood played at fish fries, dances, and on the streets around Helena, gradually developing a style that fused Johnson’s Delta vocabulary with a more harmonically sophisticated, jazz-like approach.[3][6] By 1941 he was recording for Bluebird Records in Aurora, Illinois, cutting sides under his own name such as “Take a Little Walk with Me” and “Little Boy Blue,” while also working as a sideman.[5][7]

Lockwood’s career traced the path of the Great Migration, moving from the rural South into the urban North.[1][3] In the 1940s he gained wide exposure playing live on the influential “King Biscuit Time” radio show in Helena with harmonica star Sonny Boy Williamson II, then relocated to Chicago around 1950, where he spent roughly 17 years as a studio and backing guitarist for Chess Records.[3][6] There he worked with a who’s who of postwar blues, including Muddy Waters, Little Walter, Sunnyland Slim, and Eddie Boyd, joining Little Walter’s band the Aces and helping shape the driving, amplified “Chicago Shuffle” that underpinned early rock and roll.[3][4] In 1960 he settled in Cleveland, Ohio, where he led his own groups in clubs, toured internationally, and recorded acclaimed albums such as “Plays Robert and Robert,” “I Got to Find Me a Woman,” and “Delta Crossroads,” the latter two earning Grammy nominations.[3][5] Known for his command of 12‑string electric guitar and his refusal to simply imitate Johnson, Lockwood developed a highly individual, jazz-tinged blues style that influenced generations of serious blues guitarists and preserved a direct living connection to the Delta tradition until his death in Cleveland on November 21, 2006.[1][3][4][5]

Over nearly seven decades, Lockwood’s legacy was recognized with major honors. He was inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame in 1989, received the National Heritage Fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts in 1995, and entered the Delta Blues Hall of Fame in Cleveland, Mississippi, in 1998.[1][3][6] Cleveland State University awarded him an honorary doctorate in 2002, and a street in downtown Cleveland was named Robert Lockwood Jr. Drive/Way in his honor.[1][3] A late-career live recording with Henry “Mule” Townsend, Pinetop Perkins, and David “Honeyboy” Edwards, “Last of the Great Mississippi Delta Bluesmen: Live in Dallas,” won the 2008 Grammy Award for Best Traditional Blues Album, giving Lockwood a posthumous Grammy that underscored his stature as one of the last great exponents of classic Delta blues and a bridge to the modern electric era.[1][3][5]

Fun Facts

• Lockwood was widely known as the “stepson” of Robert Johnson because Johnson lived with his mother for years and functioned as a de facto stepfather as well as his guitar teacher.[3][7]
• He was a regular fixture on the long‑running “King Biscuit Time” radio show out of Helena, Arkansas, one of the most influential blues broadcasts in history, which helped make his guitar playing known across the Mississippi Delta in the early 1940s.[3][7]
• Unlike many Delta contemporaries, Lockwood favored a 12‑string semi‑hollow electric guitar in his later years; that instrument is now on display at the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland.[1]
• Cleveland honored him by renaming a street in the city’s Flats entertainment district Robert Lockwood Junior Drive (also known as Robert Lockwood Jr. Way), reflecting his central role in the city’s blues scene.[1][3]

Musical Connections

Mentors/Influences

• Robert Johnson - Johnson lived with Lockwood’s mother in Arkansas and personally taught him guitar, making Lockwood the only guitarist known to have learned directly from Johnson. (Foundational guitar tutoring that informed Lockwood’s later work, including his album “Plays Robert and Robert,” where he interprets Johnson’s material.) [Mid–late 1930s in and around Helena, Arkansas[1][3][5]]

Key Collaborators

• Sonny Boy Williamson II (Rice Miller) - Longtime partner on live radio and in the studio; Lockwood served as Williamson’s primary guitarist and accompanist. (Regular performances on the “King Biscuit Time” radio show; numerous Chess/Trumpet sessions in the 1950s.[3][4][7]) [Early 1940s in Helena (radio), then 1950s studio work[3][7]]
• Little Walter - Lockwood joined Little Walter’s band the Aces in Chicago and became a key guitarist in Walter’s classic electric blues period. (Played on Little Walter’s 1955 #1 R&B hit “My Babe” and other Chess sessions.[3][4][5]) [Mid‑1950s, primarily Chicago sessions and touring[3][4]]
• Muddy Waters - Session and backing guitarist for Chess, contributing to Waters’s electric Chicago blues sound. (Various Chess Records sessions as part of the house/backup band (often uncredited on original releases).) [1950s during Lockwood’s Chess Records tenure[1][3][6]]
• Otis Spann - Collaborated in a small‑group setting highlighting piano–guitar interplay. (Albums “Otis Spann Is the Blues” and “Walking the Blues,” recorded in 1960 for Candid.[5]) [Circa 1960 Chicago/New York sessions[5]]
• Johnny Shines - Frequent touring and recording partner later in life, both drawing on the Delta tradition while pursuing their own directions. (Two LPs for Rounder Records as co‑leaders; extensive concert work.[4][6]) [Primarily 1970s–1980s[4][6]]
• The Aces (Louis Myers, Dave Myers, Fred Below) - Lockwood joined this seminal Chicago blues rhythm section, helping define the electric ensemble sound. (Backing band for Little Walter on numerous Chess sides, central to the development of the Chicago Shuffle.[3][4]) [Early–mid‑1950s in Chicago[3][4]]

Artists Influenced

• B.B. King - King cited Lockwood among the musicians he worked with early on; Lockwood’s sophisticated, jazz‑inflected blues guitar contributed to the broader vocabulary King and his generation drew from. (Early club work in Memphis with King’s band; influence reflected broadly in King’s mature phrasing and harmonic choices (inferred from documented collaboration).) [Late 1940s–early 1950s Memphis and touring collaboration[4][6]]
• Modern blues guitarists and Delta blues revivalists - Lockwood’s unique position as Robert Johnson’s direct student and his later jazz‑tinted style made him a touchstone for serious blues players seeking an authentic yet progressive approach. (Influence heard in later reinterpretations of Johnson’s repertoire and in contemporary electric blues that incorporates extended harmonies (generalized, drawn from critical assessments of his style).) [1960s onward, especially through albums like “Plays Robert and Robert,” “I Got to Find Me a Woman,” and “Delta Crossroads.”[1][3][5]]

Discography

Albums

Top Tracks

1. Little Boy Blue (Little Boy Blue)
2. Sweet Woman from Maine (Little Boy Blue)
3. Dust My Broom (Johnny Shines and Robert Lockwood)
4. Take a Little Walk with Me (Little Boy Blue)
5. Aw Aw Baby (Sweet Home Chicago) (Little Boy Blue)
6. Pearly B (Johnny Shines and Robert Lockwood)
7. Aw Aw Baby (Johnny Shines and Robert Lockwood)
8. Sweet Woman from Maine (Johnny Shines and Robert Lockwood)
9. Leaving Your Town (Johnny Shines and Robert Lockwood)
10. Pearly (Little Boy Blue)

External Links

• Spotify
• Wikipedia