Frank Hutchison

The first white bluesman to record, Frank Hutchison recorded for a brief three years. But the 32 tunes that he recorded between 1926 and 1929 influenced everyone from Leo Kottke and Spider John Koerner to Bob Dylan and Paul Geremia. Doc Watson covered both sides of Hutchinson's first single, "Worried Blues"/"The Train That Carried the Girl Back Home," recorded in New York in October 1926. Cowboy Copas rewrote Hutchison's tune "Coney Isle," renamed it "Alabam'," and had a country hit in 1960. An ex-miner, Hutchison reportedly learned to play the blues by watching Bill Hurt, a disabled black man, as a youngster. Best known for his slide guitar playing, Hutchison held his guitar on his lap, in the style popularized in Hawaii. On September 24 and 25, 1929, Hutchison recorded in Atlanta, along with Emmett Miller, Fiddlin' John Carson, Namour & Smith, Moonshine Kate, Bud Blue, the Black Brothers and Martin Molloy, a three-disc album of music and comedy entitled The Medicine Show. Following his last recording session in September 1929, Hutchison worked as a steamboat entertainer and a store owner.