DELTA BLUES PILGRIMAGE

Photographs of the Mississippi Delta by Scott Ainslie

Delta Blues Pilgrimage was first displayed at the Acadiana Center for the Arts in Lafayette, Louisiana in 2011 and moved from there to the 1911 Historic City Hall Arts and Cultural Center in Lake Charles, Louisiana. The photographs in this exhibit were taken in April, 2010, as Blues musician Scott Ainslie was touring through the Mississippi Delta.

The collection includes Ainslie's images of the Tutwiler railroad tracks where W.C. Handy, the man billed as 'the Father of the Blues,’  first heard a slide guitarist in 1902; Dockery's Plantation where Charley Patton influenced three generations of Bluesmen; the black river town of Friars Point mentioned in Robert Johnson’s Travelin’ Riverside Blues; Johnson's gravestone, and the towns of Robert Johnson's birth, and death.

Blues musician, songwriter, and scholar Scott Ainslie first took up the guitar after hearing Virginia Bluesman John Jackson at a local high school in 1967. A long love affair with the people and music of the Blues began.

Ainslie is the author of Robert Johnson: At The Crossroads, a book of transcriptions of Johnson's recordings with complete annotated lyrics, an overview of Johnson's biography, and historical notes. He has also produced an instructional DVD on Johnson's guitar techniques and arrangements.

Ainslie has released five solo recordings and produced Care For All, a benefit CD for the Healthcare Is A Human Right campaign in Vermont. His latest CD, Thunder’s Mouth, features both traditional and original songs and showcases the playing of Ainslie, Eugene Friesen, Sam Broussard and the late T-Bone Wolk.

Find Scott's music and a wealth of information for blues lovers and guitar players at CattailMusic.com