The 1990 Chicago Blues Festival ran from June 8-10, and the lineup was amazingly strong.  Scheduled to appear were Fenton Robinson, Sunnyland Slim, Billy Branch, Carey Bell, Charlie Musselwhite, Floyd McDaniel, Lonnie Pitchford, Otis Clay, Otis Rush, Lowell Fulson, Jimmy Dawkins, Luther Allison and Bernard Allison, Cephas and Wiggins, Ruth Brown, Nappy Brown, Smokey Smothers, Honeyboy Edwards, and John Lee Hooker, among so many other top-tier blues artists. 

I’ve written about the golden days of the Chicago Blues Festival here before, lost in fond reminiscences about the breadth of eminent talent that had graced what used to be the three stages at the event; the Petrillo Bandshell, the Crossroads Stage, and the Front Porch Stage.  When you’re as rabid about the blues as I am, seeing Johnny Shine up close, hearing Albert King wail on his guitar Lucy, basking in the shade of Grant Park’s trees while watching Jimmy Rogers school everyone on classic Chicago blues, and falling into a deep melancholy while Etta James sang “At Last”, leaves weighty impressions that lasts forever. 

I honestly don’t remember if it was a Friday, Saturday, or Sunday in 1990, but I do recollect that I had been at the Crossroads Stage basking in the performance of a blues artists whose name now after all these years escapes me, and I decided to head back west down E. Jackson toward the shaded area where the Front Porch Stage had always been situated.  Once I got to the intersection of E. Jackson and S. Columbus Dr., a frenzied commotion could be heard from the area of the Front Porch Stage some fifty yards or so away.  It was frenzied, it was chaotic, and it was certainly blues, but it elicited senses of anticipation and thrill in me that quickened my pace.  It was Lefty Dizz plying his trademark harried brand of blues to an eager, enthusiastic, and wanting crowd.

As I grew closer to the Front Porch Stage (and I did muscle myself up to the front of the fence that separated the stage area form the audience), I saw that Dizz was in full regalia, a blues peacock in full plumage.  He was festooned in the reddest of reds three-piece suit, accessorized in a crisp brilliantly white dress shirt with a black, red, and white tie, black pocket square, and while fedora with a black ribbon encircling it.  He chose, of course, a correspondingly resplendent red Fender guitar, befitting of a man looking to leave a lasting impression.

I also recall that the ex-Muddy Waters and Magic Slim & the Teardrops guitarist John Primer was supporting Dizz, with his white shirt and hat only making Dizz’s ensemble that much more announced.  The remainder of Dizz’s band that day remain a blur to me now.

Dizz was in the middle of some hard-charging, emotionally frenetic blues, cocking his left leg aloft a la Brewer Phillips, completely lost in his passion for the music.  For the next hour or so I bore witness to Lefty Dizz and his wild man blues visions.  It was, and remains, one of the most uniquely satisfying sets of blues that I have ever witnessed anywhere.  Period. 

Hailing from Osceola, Arkansas in the Arkansas Delta region located in the mid-eastern area of the state, Dizz was born in 1937.  His birth name was Walter Williams.  We’ll approach for discussion the stage name he adopted a bit later. 

The account of Dizz beginning his guitar playing seems to be universally recognized as a result of him going into the United States Air Force, during which he learned to play the instrument.  However, being left-handed, the guitars that he had access to were for right-handed players, and like others confronted with this situation, he taught himself to play guitar on a right-hand guitar with obviously the strings strung backwards from what conventionally would be required for a left-handed player.  Think Otis Rush in this scenario. 

Dizz was discharged from the service in 1956, and he initially made his way to Detroit, but eventually he made Chicago his home.  This move to Chicago during arguably the height of the blues’ popularity was to serve Dizz very well.  He met and made friends with blues guitar great Earl Hooker, and also blues guitar great Lacy Gibson.  These relationships allowed Dizz to further his guitar schooling and to play his first formal shows.  By 1958, Dizz’s guitar skills had appreciably developed, and he joined Sonny Thompson, the R&B pianist and bandleader, as part of his working group.

It was roughly six years later in 1964 when Dizz’s first break in the music business occurred.  He was recruited to join Junior Wells’ band, and he performed with the group, all over the world, for a period of seven years.  After his tenure with Wells, Dizz worked with Hound Dog Taylor and the HouseRockers, remaining with the band until Taylor’s death in 1975. 

Soon thereafter, Dizz formed Shock Treatment, and within this very popular band he began to hone his showy performing boldness.  He would drag himself through the audience on one hand while continuing to play with the other, provide self-effacing asides, and include off-color jokes as part of his performance; but be clear, the music mattered most, and Dizz’s arsenal of songs and his guitar attributes were always well thought-out and ingenious.  

Now, one can see how the adoption of the name Lefty Dizz came to be; Dizz’s left-handed guitar playing combined with his dizzying array of performing stunts.

Finally, in 1980, Dizz saw the release of the first album under his name on the Isabel label, an outing entitled Somebody Stole My Christmas.  A 1979 release on Black And Blues label was a joint effort with Big Moose Walker.  Dizz went on to release collections on the Catwalk, JSP Records, The Blues Alliance, and Wolf Records labels.  But, as anyone who witnessed a Dizz performance can corroborate, no recording was ever able to capture, in any way whatsoever, the passion, drama, and excitement of a live Dizz performance, though his recordings are certainly quality efforts. 

It must also be noted that earlier in his career in 1968, as Walter Williams, he recorded for the Vanguard label in support of Junior Wells.

He also recorded a number of live albums with Shock Treatment. 

Something that is not known by many is that Dizz earned a Southern Illinois University degree in the field of economics.

Dizz was always an in-demand musician around Chicago, appearing frequently at The Checkerboard Lounge, Kingston Mines, and B.L.U.E.S., among many other venues.  In 1981 when The Rolling Stones visited The Checkerboard Lounge, during the evening of a Muddy Waters performance, Dizz performed with them and Waters, and he can be heard on the recording “Live At The Checkerboard Lounge, Chicago, 1981”, and seen on the accompanying video.  Dizz’s work was also appreciated by the rock group Foghat.

Perhaps the true shame surrounding Dizz was that for the most part, outside of Chicago, his immense guitar talent and flamboyancy on stage was little known.  At times, he would head-off on a tour with bluesmen such as Magic Slim or Louisiana Red, but his most fervent audience remained in Chicago. 

Early September, 1993 saw Dizz pass away from the consequences of esophageal cancer at Lakeside Veterans Hospital on Chicago’s near north side.  He was 56 years of age.

Dizz was a deep well of performing emotion, a spellbinding on-stage presence, one who entranced his fans with an endless supply of energy and a wealth of musical skills.  Simply, he was an unexpected and astonishing bluesman, one who was all but unknown to the greater blues realm outside Chicago. 

I am smiling as I write this artist profile because I don’t think I was ever so moved by a performance as that I beheld by Dizz at 1990’s Chicago Blues Festival.  It was all so unexpected.  It startled me.  It gripped me.  It riveted me to this well-dressed blues machine.  It was a blues experience unlike any other since.

Do yourself a favor, and if you can find a copy (check discogs.com) of the album Somebody Stole My Christmas on the Isabel label, or the JSP CD Ain’t It Nice To Be Loved (check bluebeatmusic.com), pick them up.  You won’t get the splendor of the live Dizz show, but you will hear some impressive blues.

Dizz was a blues original.