Charley Patton - The Complete Recordings 1929-34 / 3CD set

2014 European CD collection.

Charley Patton is widely regarded as perhaps the archetypal early exponent of Mississippi Delta blues. He was a true original with a distinctive slide guitar technique, and he performed a range of blues, spirituals and ballads in a powerful, intense, even primitive, fashion which uniquely captures the style and spirit of the genre. His recording career was restricted to a few sessions between 1929 and 1934, from which around thirty double-sided '78s were released, first on Paramount and latterly on Vocalion, and that was the entirety of his recorded output before his premature death from a heart disorder in 1934 aged 45.

This collection comprises the entirety of that canon, including six tracks on which he played guitar, with Henry Sims and Bertha Lee erspectively performing the vocals. Anyone seriously interested in the blues and it's history needs to have heard Charley Patton, and this anthology provides a comprehensive overview of his work.