Page 74 - Blues Festival Guide Magazine 2012

We Juke Up in Here

The Do Drop Inn in Shelby,
MS Photo by Lou Bopp

... for now

by roger Stolle Today, these worn-out looking structures (and the quasi-legal
businesses inside) fi nd themselves at a crossroads. Once packed
Hard to believe it’s been a decade since I wrote my fi rst piece for with loud, local crowds dancing to hot, happening blues bands on
a fl edgling Blues Festival Guide magazine.Happily, during those ten a Saturday night, many of these jukes have fallen down (sometimes
years, many new and wonderful blues festivals have been added to literally) on hard times.
the global listing. The historically African-American audience that once supported
Sadly, however, many of the pioneers and elders of blues music jukes en masse is aging, just like the buildings and musicians
itself have passed into history. themselves. Some folks have passed on.
And that’s not all. Time has also taken a toll on Mississippi’s Others have moved on to North Mississippi’s bustling casinos.
original home of the blues — the Delta juke joint. Still others have gone back to the church, as Father Time reminds
The iconic juke was once a mainstay of the harsh Delta them of their own mortality in this land of “The Devil’s Music.”
landscape, operating as both an incubator and proving-ground for Meanwhile, younger crowds seem to value live bands less
Mississippi blues music and culture. and blues very little, if at all. Many would rather dance to deejays

Red Paden behind his bar at Red’s Lounge in Clarksdale, MS Photo by Lou Bopp Terry “Harmonica” Bean on stage at Red’s Lounge Photo by Lou Bopp

74 Blues Festival Guide 2012