Like indigenous (folk) music and country, blues is one of those musical styles whose strength is primarily in the story being told, by both the music and lyrics, as well as the performer’s presentation. It relies on a simpler musical structure and a less expansive vocabulary of chords and voicings, than, say, jazz. And yet, jazz was born of the blues as it assimilated Afro, Cuban and European elements throughout the early 20th century.R&b, rock ‘n’ roll, soul music — these are all grateful children of the blues. Don’t overlook the musical challenge in crafting solid blues music just because the chord progressions are basic; ask the painters Miro and Chagall how easy it is to express yourself on a canvas when you purposely limit your color choices and use only two different brushes. It’s difficult, as their thoughtful attempts at “reductionist” painting proved, and requires tremendous focus and unassailable sincerity. The blues is similarly reliant on the character, tenacity and potent personality of the musician.
Fruteland Jackson is such a potent personality. He has the vocal chops and a sufficient mastery of the 
guitar, too, but the real muscle of his music is in the stories he tells and the gut-wrenching emotion with which he injects them. I listened to several tracks — at his own site, his record company (Electro-Fi Records) site and Amazon.com — that covered most of the territory that Jackson inhabits which, despite his first name, I hesitate to label “Fruteland.” Let’s call it Bluesville.“Blues 2.0” is a cleverly updated title to a standard, a cappella“call and response” blues tune; you get an unidentifiable thwack of a kick drum and a set of hand claps to delineate a slow tempo in common time. In addition, fortunately, you get Jackson’s smoothly plaintive voice telling the age-old tale of a bad “boss man” and a life of low-wage drudgery. Jackson is completely convincing as a blues singer, notwithstanding the fact that success in the genre requires less in the way of melodic and mechanical dexterity than the ability to cry and sing at the same time (which Billie Holiday perfected, too).
“Laura Marie,” on the other hand, is what you might call a “jump” blues, with striding piano and an insistent 2/4 rhythm stroke on the guitar. The chord progression, of course, is the same as always; musicians call it i/iv/v (1, 4, 5) with the numbers representing, in the key of E, for example, the chords E, A and B. This is the standard blues progression, which, along with the blues and pentatonic scales, pretty much charts the entire blues landscape; a song may end up slow or fast, major or minor, but this is the basis of every one. Again, it is not any inventiveness or sophistication in the composition that makes for “good blues” – it is entirely up to the artist.
Jackson is not only a singer and songwriter, but an educator who performs at festivals, cultural centers and schools worldwide. He calls himself a “blues activist” and an“oral historian,” and builds awareness through his “Blues in the Schools programs,” activities which resulted in the Blues Foundation awarding him the “Keeping the Blues Alive” award.
Jackson signed with Electro-Fi Records in 1999 and has released two well-received CDs, with “I Claim Nothing but the Blues” coming first, in 2000.“Blues 2.0” arrived three years later, and was nominated for a W.C. Handy Award as “Acoustic Blues Album of the Year”. Publications such as “Blues Revue” magazine and “Blues in Britain,” along with old-line artists Henry “Mule” Townsend and Bill Boy Arnold have given Jackson the highest praises; Townsend went so far as to call Jackson and his fellow bluesman Alvin Youngblood Hart “the future sound of acoustic blues.”
It is perfectly appropriate that the “future” of the blues is in the hands of someone whose feet are planted firmly in the past. That would be Fruteland Jackson, and he’s coming down the road right now, carrying a fresh batch of old blues to any audience of any size willing to give a listen. 
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February 16th, 2007 at 12:51 am
nice words. I could not get the download to work!