People, Locations, Episodes

Josh White, Master of Folk/Blues born

Josh White 1945

*Josh White was born on this date in 1915. He was a Black Folk and Blues singer.

From Greenville, S.C., White started singing in churches as a child and left school at an early age to work in South Carolina, North Carolina, Chicago, and elsewhere as a guide and accompanist to blind street singers, including Blind John Henry Arnold, Blind Joe Taggart, Blind Blake, Blind Lemon Jefferson. In 1932, White moved to New York and became a professional guitarist and singer.

He made numerous blues recordings, including Lazy Black Snake Blues, in 1932. He also recorded many religious songs, such as Pure Religion Hallilu 1933, under the Singing Christian; a year later, he married Carol Carr. In the 1940s, a larger white audience that moved towards folk music and radical politics enjoyed White, who made no secret of his leftist politics. He played with Woody Guthrie, Leadbelly, Sonny Terry, and Brownie McGhee at hootenannies, rent parties, and lofts.

During this time, she recorded Get Thee Behind Me with Pete Seeger and Woody Guthrie, appeared on radio programs sponsored by the Office of War Information, and performed and recorded at the Library of Congress. In 1944, he performed with Paul Robeson in The Man Who Went To War, a radio operetta with a text by Langston Hughes. Other credits to him include playing at the inaugural ball for President Roosevelt in 1945.

After World War II, White became a prominent international entertainer. In 1950, he denied Communist sympathies before the House Un-American Activities Committee, and he made several tours worldwide. An auto accident in 1966 forced him into retirement. In 1969, Josh White died during open-heart surgery in Manhasset, New York.

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