Fird Eaglin Jr. aka Snooks Eaglin is almost synonymous with his hometown of New Orleans. He was born there in 1936 and he died there in 2009. In between, he became a true legend there before his fame reached out to the world. Blind before he was two due to glaucoma, he made up for his handicap by developing an extraordinary musical ear, a fantastic memory (famous for knowing some 2 500 songs, he received the title of "Human Jukebox" ! *) and becoming a guitar picking virtuoso.
In 1952, he joined pianist Allen Toussaint's Flamingos, a local seven-piece band. Snooks Eaglin once explained that the Flamingos did not have a bass player, so he played both the guitar and the bass parts simultaneously on his guitar. "He played with a certain finger style that was highly unusual," said Allen Toussaint one time. "He was unlimited on the guitar. It was extraordinary."
Later, after the end of the Flamingos, between occasional gigs in local bars and clubs, Eaglin used to busk in the French Quarter streets. One day of late 1957 or early 1958, a musicologist from Louisiana State University, Harry Oster **, fell upon the street playing guitarist-singer, and decided to record this amazing musician singing a range of classic blues, folk and popular songs, from “Careless Love” to “St. James Infirmary” and “Everyday I Have the Blues.” These recordings, made in March 1958, were released as "New Orleans Street Singer" on Folkways Records in 1959 and later reissued on the Smithsonian label with additional material. It's this reissue that we're talking about here ***.
Eaglin plays 25 rather sorrowful titles in a folk blues style, on acoustic guitar, without any band, displaying an exceptional work, both virtuosic and down-home. In a song like "High Society", you can almost ear Django Reinhardt ! Eaglin even demonstrate his craft by showing two slightly different ways to play the same song on "Careless Love" 1 & 2, "Drifting Blues" 1 & 2 and "The Lonesome Road"/"Look Down That Lonesome Road".
If you want to ear what Snooks Eaglin sounded like alone and unplugged, this is THE album. Especially because his original solo discography is rather slim for a man whose career lasted for about 60 years !
* In a 1989 interview, Eaglin explained : "The reason I cover so much ground is that when you play music, you have to keep moving. If you don't, you're like the amateur musicians who play the same thing every night, which is a drag. That's not the point of music."
** Harry Oster had recorded inmates at the sinister Angola State Penitentiary, in particular Louisiana bluesman Robert Pete Williams.
*** Recorded and produced in New Orleans, in March 1958, the vinyl LP album was originally issued in 1959 by Moses Asch on the Folkways label as "Snooks Eaglin : New Orleans Street Singer" and featured only 16 tracks. The album presented here is the 2005 reissue, on Smithsonian Folkways Recordings, featuring 25 songs, including 8 previously unreleased tracks : #2, #8, #12, #13, #14, #16, #23 & #25.
A few videos
> One of the rare full set video of Snooks Eaglin, here live at Storyville Jazz Hall, New Orleans, in 1985 (42 mn) : https://youtu.be/HuOSUROFUWM [Song List : 1.Intro 0:01 / 2.Mustang Sally 2:20 / 3.Let the Four Winds Blow 8:52 / 4.Guess Who? 11:22 / 5.Drop The Bomb15:15 / 6.Money 18:28 / 7.St Pete Florida Blues 21:53 / 8.San-Ho-Zay 26:53 / 9.Country Boy Down in New Orleans 30:23 / 10.Hideaway 32:51 / 11.Johnny B Goode 35:39 / 12.Talk to Your Daughter 39:20-41:48]
> Snooks Eaglin with George Porter Jr. (6 part playlist) : https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL767E41629668AB71
> The New Orleans jazz funeral service for Snooks Eaglin after his death in 2009 : https://youtu.be/a1jiG66DVaM
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