Willie Lofton

An obscure Delta blues player from Mississippi, Willie "Poor Boy" Lofton falls loosely into the Charley Patton/Tommy Johnson blues camp. His voice was eerily similar to Johnson's, and his most striking song was a version of Johnson's "Big Road Blues," called "Dark Road Blues," which featured Lofton's staccato guitar style, which again appears to have been drawn at least partially from Johnson. Lofton may have been born in Jackson, MS; at least that is the town he left when he traveled north to Chicago in the mid-'30s. He had two recording sessions in Chicago in August of 1934 and November of 1935 that yielded eight sides for Decca Records, including "Dark Road Blues." No other sessions have been uncovered, and Lofton returned to Jackson in 1942, where he reportedly died 20 years later. ~ Steve Leggett