Post by AlanB on Mar 10, 2016 7:36:03 GMT
In early 1960 Mack McCormick sent a tape to record shop owner Doug Dobell in London. These contained 1959 "field recordings" of Lightnin' Hopkins these went under the title of The Rooster Crowed In England. Shortly after Dobell released them on his 77 record label (http://www.wirz.de/music/77frm.htm)
One song, Blues For Queen Elizabeth, around which sprang a fiction concerning Hopkins meeting and playing for Her Mag!
In 2009 Alan Governar, when writing his LH biography asked if I would have a go at getting to the bottom of this. The lengthy results of which follow. Hope you all have the stamina to stick with it.
=====================================
Lightnin’ Hopkins and the evolution of : ‘I want to go to England so's I can meet the Queen’
July 7, 1959
Queen Elizabeth II arrives in Chicago for the formal opening of the Saint Lawrence Seaway, as part of the Chicago International Trade Fair. The royal visit makes headlines across the U.S.A.
“All Out in Chicago” (Time Magazine, Monday, July 20, 1959)
The royal visit to Chicago lasted only 14 hours, but it was the most lavish 14 hours of pageantry in Chicago's history, and the warmest reception Queen Elizabeth and Prince Philip have had so far on their North American tour.
More than a million Chicagoans lined the Lake Michigan shore front to watch the royal yacht Britannia steam into harbor, escorted by seven warships and saluted by more than 500 small craft, including two Chinese junks. U.S. Air Force and Navy jets thundered across the sky; aerial torpedoes exploded parachutes carrying the Stars and Stripes and Union Jacks.
The Sun-Times, irrevocably establishing Chicago's reputation as the Windy City, splashed the story all over Page One and plugged "other stories and pictures on pages 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, n, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 18, 19, 22, 24, 25." The once Anglophobic Tribune (whose late proprietor, Colonel Robert McCormick, suspected that Rhodes scholars were British agents in disguise) flew the Union Jack from its tower. As the royal couple acknowledged greetings from a welcoming party of seven Midwestern Governors and 40 mayors, pressing throngs surged forward, fairly overran the 2,000 city police who were assigned to guard the Queen. "That's a lovely billy—I'd like to borrow it some time," cracked Prince Philip to a Chicago cop as he eyed the yelling people. "Hi, Liz!" they cried. "Hey, Queen!" That night at a glittering dinner (with gold tablecloths, gold service, 50,000 roses) given by Mayor Richard Daley, the Queen confessed happily: "This has been an unforgettable day."
At midnight, her tiara sparkling in the blazing lights. Queen Elizabeth bade Chicago farewell. As sirens wailed and fireworks plumed above the lake, Queen and Prince boarded Britannia to sail on to Sault Ste. Marie and Port Arthur. In the harbor, a lone amateur trumpeter, on the deck of his cabin cruiser, touchingly sounded his own version of Pomp and Circumstance.
“Song Maker” by Charlotte Phelan (Houston Post, August 23, 1959):
“Lightning's incredible spontaneity is equal to any occasion, it seems. Told that Queen Elizabeth II was in Chicago, the minstrel immediately composed ‘Blues for Queen Elizabeth.’
" ‘Yeah, you know Baby, the whole world's in a tangle. It's just spinning 'round and 'round...’"
“Chided because he called the Queen of England ‘baby,’ Lightning flashed the gold teeth in a sheepish grin.
" ‘I wasn't talking just to her,’ he said.”
Mack McCormick (Jazz Monthly Oct. 1959):
“On a more recent session, with his thoughts directed at the British Isles, he impulsively decided on a ‘Blues for Queen Elizabeth’ (inspired by her recent visit to Chicago). In shaping up the song he used the line, ‘I want to go to England so's I can meet the Queen.’ During the actual recording however, his eye fell on a magazine cover photo of Her Majesty and Lightnin’ cunningly avoided misunderstanding by singing the line ‘l want to take my wife to England so's she can meet the Queen.’”
(July 16,1959: Lightnin’ records “Blues For Queen Elizabeth.” It appears on the UK-only release The Rooster Crowed in England [77 label].)
(Oct. 19-25,1964: Lightnin’ tours the UK as part of the American Folk Blues Festival. Tour does not include a “command performance for Queen Elizabeth.” This is the only time Lightnin’ ever plays England.)
Caption to photo on back of International Artists LP Free Form Patterns (1968):
"When I played the command Performance for the Queen of England. I said, QUEEN LADY, I'm sure glad to meet You, and if you'll just sit down over there you'll hear something you ain't never heard before, and I backed up and sit down on a stool and hit that first note so hard, you could hear it clean across the water" – Lightnin’.
Note: This could be a misquote, or otherwise garbled; IA is legendary for the typos, miscredits, and ridiculous drivel on the back covers of their albums. LH was possibly speaking in the future tense, but it was transcribed in past tense. A third possibility is that LH actually did say this exactly as he’s quoted.
"Saying Goodbye" (article on LH's funeral) by Bill Minutaglio
(Houston Chronicle, February 7, 1982)
"...he could claim that he had once been in the same room with the Queen of England -- and that she had actually been in that room just to see him, and not vice versa."
Handbook of Texas Music, Texas State Historical Association (2003), p. 142
Lightnin’ Hopkins entry.
“During a tour of Europe in the 1970s, he played for Queen Elizabeth II at a command performance.” – Alan Lee Haworth
Encyclopedia Of The Blues (Edward Komara, Editor), Routledge 2006, p. 462-463
Lightnin’ Hopkins entry
“In 1960 Hopkins performed for Queen Elizabeth II, and in Carnegie Hall with Pete Seeger and Joan Baez on the same bill.”—Wayne E. Goins
“100 Tall Texans” exhibit at the George Bush Presidential Library and Museum, College Station, Texas
September 30, 2006 to March 18, 2007
“Blues singer and guitarist Lightnin’ Hopkins played for Queen Elizabeth II at a command performance and once served time in the Houston County Jail in Texas. A native of Centerville, Hopkins made his first guitar out of a chicken box. He recorded under 20 labels, but his audience remained small until 1959, when he hit the big time. In the 1960s he performed at New York’s Carnegie Hall with Pete Seeger and Joan Baez. Hopkins also worked with such groups as the Grateful Dead and Jefferson Airplane. A prolific songwriter, he often wove his own life story and the plight of blacks into his compositions.” -- Anonymous
One song, Blues For Queen Elizabeth, around which sprang a fiction concerning Hopkins meeting and playing for Her Mag!
In 2009 Alan Governar, when writing his LH biography asked if I would have a go at getting to the bottom of this. The lengthy results of which follow. Hope you all have the stamina to stick with it.
=====================================
Lightnin’ Hopkins and the evolution of : ‘I want to go to England so's I can meet the Queen’
July 7, 1959
Queen Elizabeth II arrives in Chicago for the formal opening of the Saint Lawrence Seaway, as part of the Chicago International Trade Fair. The royal visit makes headlines across the U.S.A.
“All Out in Chicago” (Time Magazine, Monday, July 20, 1959)
The royal visit to Chicago lasted only 14 hours, but it was the most lavish 14 hours of pageantry in Chicago's history, and the warmest reception Queen Elizabeth and Prince Philip have had so far on their North American tour.
More than a million Chicagoans lined the Lake Michigan shore front to watch the royal yacht Britannia steam into harbor, escorted by seven warships and saluted by more than 500 small craft, including two Chinese junks. U.S. Air Force and Navy jets thundered across the sky; aerial torpedoes exploded parachutes carrying the Stars and Stripes and Union Jacks.
The Sun-Times, irrevocably establishing Chicago's reputation as the Windy City, splashed the story all over Page One and plugged "other stories and pictures on pages 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, n, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 18, 19, 22, 24, 25." The once Anglophobic Tribune (whose late proprietor, Colonel Robert McCormick, suspected that Rhodes scholars were British agents in disguise) flew the Union Jack from its tower. As the royal couple acknowledged greetings from a welcoming party of seven Midwestern Governors and 40 mayors, pressing throngs surged forward, fairly overran the 2,000 city police who were assigned to guard the Queen. "That's a lovely billy—I'd like to borrow it some time," cracked Prince Philip to a Chicago cop as he eyed the yelling people. "Hi, Liz!" they cried. "Hey, Queen!" That night at a glittering dinner (with gold tablecloths, gold service, 50,000 roses) given by Mayor Richard Daley, the Queen confessed happily: "This has been an unforgettable day."
At midnight, her tiara sparkling in the blazing lights. Queen Elizabeth bade Chicago farewell. As sirens wailed and fireworks plumed above the lake, Queen and Prince boarded Britannia to sail on to Sault Ste. Marie and Port Arthur. In the harbor, a lone amateur trumpeter, on the deck of his cabin cruiser, touchingly sounded his own version of Pomp and Circumstance.
“Song Maker” by Charlotte Phelan (Houston Post, August 23, 1959):
“Lightning's incredible spontaneity is equal to any occasion, it seems. Told that Queen Elizabeth II was in Chicago, the minstrel immediately composed ‘Blues for Queen Elizabeth.’
" ‘Yeah, you know Baby, the whole world's in a tangle. It's just spinning 'round and 'round...’"
“Chided because he called the Queen of England ‘baby,’ Lightning flashed the gold teeth in a sheepish grin.
" ‘I wasn't talking just to her,’ he said.”
Mack McCormick (Jazz Monthly Oct. 1959):
“On a more recent session, with his thoughts directed at the British Isles, he impulsively decided on a ‘Blues for Queen Elizabeth’ (inspired by her recent visit to Chicago). In shaping up the song he used the line, ‘I want to go to England so's I can meet the Queen.’ During the actual recording however, his eye fell on a magazine cover photo of Her Majesty and Lightnin’ cunningly avoided misunderstanding by singing the line ‘l want to take my wife to England so's she can meet the Queen.’”
(July 16,1959: Lightnin’ records “Blues For Queen Elizabeth.” It appears on the UK-only release The Rooster Crowed in England [77 label].)
(Oct. 19-25,1964: Lightnin’ tours the UK as part of the American Folk Blues Festival. Tour does not include a “command performance for Queen Elizabeth.” This is the only time Lightnin’ ever plays England.)
Caption to photo on back of International Artists LP Free Form Patterns (1968):
"When I played the command Performance for the Queen of England. I said, QUEEN LADY, I'm sure glad to meet You, and if you'll just sit down over there you'll hear something you ain't never heard before, and I backed up and sit down on a stool and hit that first note so hard, you could hear it clean across the water" – Lightnin’.
Note: This could be a misquote, or otherwise garbled; IA is legendary for the typos, miscredits, and ridiculous drivel on the back covers of their albums. LH was possibly speaking in the future tense, but it was transcribed in past tense. A third possibility is that LH actually did say this exactly as he’s quoted.
"Saying Goodbye" (article on LH's funeral) by Bill Minutaglio
(Houston Chronicle, February 7, 1982)
"...he could claim that he had once been in the same room with the Queen of England -- and that she had actually been in that room just to see him, and not vice versa."
Handbook of Texas Music, Texas State Historical Association (2003), p. 142
Lightnin’ Hopkins entry.
“During a tour of Europe in the 1970s, he played for Queen Elizabeth II at a command performance.” – Alan Lee Haworth
Encyclopedia Of The Blues (Edward Komara, Editor), Routledge 2006, p. 462-463
Lightnin’ Hopkins entry
“In 1960 Hopkins performed for Queen Elizabeth II, and in Carnegie Hall with Pete Seeger and Joan Baez on the same bill.”—Wayne E. Goins
“100 Tall Texans” exhibit at the George Bush Presidential Library and Museum, College Station, Texas
September 30, 2006 to March 18, 2007
“Blues singer and guitarist Lightnin’ Hopkins played for Queen Elizabeth II at a command performance and once served time in the Houston County Jail in Texas. A native of Centerville, Hopkins made his first guitar out of a chicken box. He recorded under 20 labels, but his audience remained small until 1959, when he hit the big time. In the 1960s he performed at New York’s Carnegie Hall with Pete Seeger and Joan Baez. Hopkins also worked with such groups as the Grateful Dead and Jefferson Airplane. A prolific songwriter, he often wove his own life story and the plight of blacks into his compositions.” -- Anonymous