Let's Get High: The-Man-About Music From Memphis

Rosco Gordon occupies a special place in the hearts of those who revel in the music he made in Memphis during the early 1950s. The songs he recorded for Sam Phillips were finished masters with a full band, horns and a rhythm section. Phillips was sure he had a star on his hands. Rosco Gordon was born in Memphis on April 10, 1928. His twin sister Ella Mae, took piano lessons and practiced at home. He taught himself to play by copying her. One Wednesday night in 1949, he and a couple of friends were sitting upstairs in the Palace Theatre on Beale Street, watching Rufus Thomas emcee amateur night. 'They coaxed me to go up onstage to make the wine money. So I go up and sing a song....'. He won first prize. Following that win, he was interviewed on station WDIA. Rosco proved so popular that he was invited back. With a drummer and alto player he became a regular. Sam Phillips heard him and made him an offer Phillips had opened his Memphis Recording Service in 1950. A year on, it was still something of a shoestring operation, but he had a deal with RPM Records for sessions recorded between February and July 1951, and it was RPM that issued Roscoe's Boogie and Saddled The Cow (And Milked The Horse) in June and August. Rosco then went out on the road, exploiting his radio and recording success. He recorded for various labels in the 1950s, always returning to Sam Phillips and Sun Records. This collection is a priceless record of the years when popular music was reinventing itself. Gordon was one of the major influences on that evolutionary process, who has, until recently, received too little credit. In later years, Rosco went on to record for Vee-Jay, ABC and Old Town and ended up running his own Bab-Roc label. Towards the end of his life, he revived his career and made a couple of well-regarded albums. Happily, in 2000 he was honored at the Handy awards.