The Memphis BluesVictor Military Band
The Memphis Blues
1914
Handy sold the rights and complained bitterly ever after; this July 1914 recording entered the National Recording Registry.
★ 2.9
The Songs canon
Sourced and sung.
Every song chosen by hand, with the recording to play it.
Browse all 2,393 songs or filter by genre, subject, artist, and year.
Browse all 2,393 songs or filter by genre, subject, artist, and year.
Spike Driver Blues (1928)Mississippi John Hurt
Spike Driver Blues (1928)
1928 · From 1928 Sessions
Okeh sent an Avalon sharecropper home after modest sales, leaving behind a fingerpicked John Henry that refuses the hammer.
★ 4.3
Give Me One Reason
1995 · From New Beginning
Chapman played it live for seven years before recording it, then a loose blues shuffle became her biggest hit.
★ 5.5
In The Jailhouse Now
1928
Recorded in Camden in February 1928, a vaudeville novelty from 1915 that Rodgers claimed forever with one yodel.
★ 5.5
Pine Top Boogie WoogiePinetop Smith
Pine Top Boogie Woogie
1928
Smith calls out the steps over a rolling left hand, on the first record to carry boogie woogie in its title.
★ 5.6
Please Send Me Someone to Love
1950
Cut for Art Rupe's Specialty in 1950, Mayfield's prayer for the world arrives before he asks anything for himself.
★ 6.2
Boogie Woogie Bugle BoyThe Andrews Sisters
Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy
1941
Raye and Prince wrote it for an Abbott and Costello comedy, and the sisters harmonize like a brass section.
★ 6.5
Back Door ManHowlin' Wolf
Back Door Man
1961 · From Howlin' Wolf
Dixon's title was blues code for adultery, cut by Wolf at Chess and reopened by the Doors in 1967.
★ 6.6
Pony Blues
1929
H.C. Speir set up the June 1929 session, and Patton's first Paramount release still sounds like the Delta's starting point.
★ 6.7
Crazy Blues
1920
Seventy-five thousand copies in two months, Perry Bradford's tune, and Smith's voice opening the record industry to Black audiences.
★ 6.8
Downhearted BluesBessie Smith
Downhearted Blues
1923 · From The Complete Recordings
Alberta Hunter and Lovie Austin wrote it; Smith's debut record sold 780,000 copies in six months, just voice and piano.
★ 6.9
Boom Boom
1962
A bartender's scolding at Detroit's Apex Bar became the hook, and Motown's future Funk Brothers played the session.
★ 7.0
Spoonful
1960 · From Howlin' Wolf
A Willie Dixon lyric about craving, drawn loosely from a 1929 Charley Patton side, and Wolf looming over one chord.
★ 7.2
I Put a Spell on You
1956
Intended as a blues ballad until the producer brought wine; Hawkins said he never remembered recording it.
★ 7.3
Got My Mojo Working
1957 · From The Anthology: 1947-1972
Waters heard Ann Cole sing it on tour, cut a single that flopped, then made it his signature at Newport.
★ 7.3
Dust My BroomElmore James
Dust My Broom
1951
Johnson's 1936 triplet figure run through an amplifier, Sonny Boy Williamson on harmonica, and a riff everybody stole.
★ 7.5
Ain't That a Shame
1955
Bartholomew and Domino wrote it, Pat Boone's cover took the number one, and Domino's rolling piano triplets outlasted it.
★ 7.5
I'll Take You ThereThe Staple Singers
I'll Take You There
1972
Al Bell lifted the bassline from a Jamaican instrumental, and Mavis Staples turned Muscle Shoals into a pulpit.
★ 7.5
Rolling in the Deep
2010 · From 21
Written with Paul Epworth in one afternoon after a breakup, and the credits list stiletto heels as percussion.
★ 7.5
St. Louis BluesBessie Smith
St. Louis Blues
1925 · From The Complete Recordings
Armstrong's cornet answering every line Smith sings, with only a wheezing harmonium underneath, cut in New York in 1925.
★ 7.5