Page 58 - Blues Festival Guide Magazine 2024 Digital Edition

recording director at OKeh, who set up an audition. Rockwell
signed young Helen Humes, launching her long musical career
with swing and jazz bands, including Count Basie. After a
recording session in November 1927, a misunderstanding
between Weaver and a representative of OKeh Records
ended the relationship; Weaver never recorded again.
Sylvester Weaver is buried in Louisville Cemetery, heralded
by an historical marker at the entrance. The Kentuckiana Blues
Society memorialized his previously unmarked gravesite with
a simple headstone in 1992, and enhanced the site in 2015
with a larger, laser-engraved headstone bearing his image
and a brief history of “The Man With the Talking Guitar,” as
OKeh Records promoted this guitar hero.
Louisville’s second significant event was the Victor Records
recording session in June 1931. To obtain material for
“race records,” as they were called, companies would set
up temporary studios in various cities to do field recordings.
When Ralph Peer, a field recording agent for Victor, assembled
a diverse group of regional musicians, the nine-day session
was held in a warehouse on Main Street in Louisville. Present
to record were popular hillbilly, jug band, gospel and blues
musicians. Blues singer and pianist Walter Davis brought
in a group from St. Louis that included Roosevelt Sykes,
Clifford Gibson, J.D. Short and Henry Townsend. Young
local bluesman Bill Gaither recorded two songs, but they
Sara Martin and Sylvester Weaver. Photo courtesy of the Kentuckiana Blues Society were never released. Gaither would later become successful,
recording over 100 sides for Decca and OKeh from 1935-
continues this Louisville tradition, and they host the annual 1942. This historic event was the only pre-war field recording
National Jug Band Jubilee on Louisville’s waterfront. session held in Kentucky.
Louisville boasts two momentous events that influenced the
history of the blues. Born July 25, 1896, Sylvester Weaver was
a pioneering guitarist who grew up in Louisville’s Smoketown
neighborhood. He honed his guitar skills playing ragtime and
slide guitar in saloons and with local jug bands.
Weaver was invited by Louisville’s Sara Martin, a successful
classic vaudeville singer, to record with her in New York.
On October 24, 1923, they recorded “Longing For Daddy
Blues” and “I’ve Got to Go and Leave My Daddy Behind”
for OKeh Records. This milestone event was the first time a
blues singer was recorded accompanied by only a guitar.
Previously, female vocalists had jazz bands backing them. On
November 2, 1923, Weaver recorded the first-ever solo guitar
instrumentals, “Guitar Blues” and “Guitar Rag.” “Guitar Rag”
went on to become a western swing hit known as “Steel Guitar
Rag,” performed by Leon McAuliffe with Bob Wills in 1936.
Earl Hooker recorded a bluesier version in 1953.
Weaver continued to back Sara Martin, recording in New
York, St. Louis and Atlanta until 1927. That year, he recorded
his first vocals on “True Love Blues” and “Poor Baby Blues.”
When Weaver and Martin were touring together in 1925,
a young Lonnie Johnson was impressed and influenced by
Weaver’s guitar technique of sliding a knife on the strings
while picking with his other hand.
Sylvester Weaver also worked as a talent scout for OKeh
Records. When he heard a 17-year-old girl singing at the Henry Townsend at the MeX Theater, Kentucky Center for The Performing Arts,
Palace Theater in Louisville, he contacted T. G. Rockwell, the December 17, 1993. Photo by Keith Clements

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