|
Earl Hooker (January 15, 1929 - April 21, 1970) was an American blues guitarist.
Born Earl Zebedee Hooker in Clarksdale, Mississippi, his impoverished family moved to Chicago, Illinois when he was still an
infant. Influenced by parents and relatives who played music, he was a cousin of John Lee Hooker and began playing guitar as a teenager.
An instrumentalist, within a few years Hooker put together a band that toured the United States and made some of his first recordings for
Sam Phillips at Sun Studios in Memphis, Tennessee. He eventually became an important part of the Chicago blues scene and although he never
received the public recognition to the same extent as some of his contemporaries, Jimi Hendrix proclaimed Earl Hooker as the "master of the
wah-wah" and his talent was greatly respected by other notable musicians such as B.B. King, Ike Turner, Junior Wells, and Buddy Guy.
Earl Hooker died at the age of 41 after a lifelong struggle against tuberculosis and was interred in the Restvale Cemetery in Alsip, Illinois.
His story was told in a 2001 book by author Sebastian Danchin titled Earl Hooker, Blues Master.
This article is licensed under the GNU Free Document License
It uses material from the Wikipedia article - Earl Hooker
|
