Interview with Big Bill Broonzy on why he loves the blues, reading and writing, pride, and black unity

Blues singer and guitarist Big Bill Broonzy (1893-1958) was a major figure in Chicago in the 1930s and \u2740s and brought his music to European audiences in the early 1950s. Alan Lomax, who held Broonzy in high esteem, as did many of his colleagues, spent time with him in Chicago and recorded him at the Decca studios in New York in 1946. In 1952 he and Big Bill met again in Paris, where Bill recorded two hours of songs and talk on numerous subjects, from race and pride to black culture in America. Born in Scott County, Mississippi, on the banks of the Mississippi River, William Lee Conley Broonzy learned the violin on a homemade instrument and was playing for social functions by the age of ten. He was briefly a travelling preacher and did a stint in the Army, after which he moved to Chicago and began playing guitar. His recording career, begun with Paramount in 1927, spanned three full decades, taking him from the heart of the Chicago blues scene to the folk revival of the 1950s. He died of throat cancer in 1958