Last night I sat down and pondered what blues or other music-related DVD to watch, as I was in no mood for network TV or streaming service programming.  And as I have a rather sizeable collection of VHS and DVD options, I sat there in front of all of them with no real direction of what would appeal to me.  All the video titles seemed to run together, and nothing really stuck out to me as the surefire answer to my search.  When I had walked into my blues room in the downstairs of my home where I keep my music videos, among many other things, I walked past a piece of jewelry made by Howard Armstrong, the American string band and country blues giant who also happened to be quite an accomplished visual artist, as well as a magnificent fiddle, mandolin, piano, and guitar player, as well as a superb singer.   The piece of jewelry is a colorful necklace made of differing materials of equally divergent materials.  I had the piece professionally framed years ago to protect and showcase it, and I consider it one of the high points of my music-related ephemera collection.  The thought of that Armstrong folk art jewelry I had just glanced at sealed my decision as to what video I was going to enjoy.

Louie Bluie, the 1985 60-minute production directed by Terry Zwigoff, centers around the life and times of Armstrong and his idiosyncratic way of navigating the world by examining his unique life and music career by introducing the audience to the cast of characters and places that made the man who he was.  For any blues fan, the film is an absolute joy, as Armstrong’s scampish ways, great musical skill sets, observations of the world around him (past and current), and personal alliances made his life story to-date a madly enjoyable event.

Of course, many blues fans know Armstrong for his work with Martin, Bogan, and the Armstrongs, a musical assemblage comprised of guitarist and violinist Carl Martin, guitar player and singer Ted Bogan, Armstrong himself with his proficiencies on fiddle, guitar, piano, mandolin, and vocally, and Tom Armstrong playing upright bass.  But there existed additional musical associates who ran within the circle of the last living links of the string band tradition once Howard Armstrong and Ted Bogan landed in Chicago in the later years of their lives, including Indianapolis, Indiana-based mandolin titan and vocalist Yank Rachel, and “Banjo Ikey” Robinson.  This remaining core of string band traditionalists became the darlings of the club circuit later in their lives, and young people and more seasoned blues and string band enthusiasts alike flocked to catch them in-performance, shows that indicated that time had virtually stood still for the musicians as their vast skill sets remained virtually undiminished.

Louie Bluie shows the world how Armstrong and Bogan made their inroads into Chicago by playing the music demanded by a certain ethnic group at venues within their unique Chicago enclaves.  If Armstrong and Bogan found a job in a Polish club, for example, they could not only play the music desired by that ethnic group, but they could also sing it in their own language.  Armstrong himself could speak seven languages fluently, and as Louie Bluie highlighted, Bogan was equally adept in singing in a language other than English.

The film also joyously brought forth the respect and playful love these musicians had for each other, showing in various scenes their mischievous ways with one another.  When they were together it was as if the hands of time were turned back and the viewer was watching young boys playfully ridiculing and insulting one another in merciless fashions.

But one musical inner circle member, “Banjo Ikey” Robinson, had always immensely captured my attention in Louie Bluie.  He is a dignified man sporting a meticulously groomed image, with his hair perfectly slicked back, wearing a small, well-trimmed mustache, and adorned in a fine suit of clothes.  In one scene with Armstrong, the conversation between Armstrong and Robinson is akin to watching the years melt away as they discuss a particular Robinson song, “My Four Reasons,” with Robinson and Armstrong good-naturedly discussing what Robinson was doing in jail when and where he wrote the song.  The two then take-off on a rendition of the song with Robinson ambitiously singing and playing his banjo while Armstrong accompanies him on the mandolin.  The scene appears to be shot in either Robinson’s or Armstrong’s living room (I’m betting it was Armstrong’s given the artwork seen), adding a sense of warmth to the joyful proceedings.  What is interesting about this meeting is that the two had never formally met before, and Robinson was initially unsure over playing with Armstrong as he felt their brands of music were too opposed.

But I never have delved very deeply into Robinson’s background, and though there isn’t a lot of information available about his life and times, an overview, as best I can piece it together, is in order.

He was born Isaac Robinson in late July, 1904 in Dublin, Virginia, a small 1.4 square mile-sized town in Pulaski County in the state’s southwestern area.  As I unfortunately state about so many of the blues and related genre musicians who operated on the fringes of the music world, very little is known of Robinson’s formative years.

However Robinson became interested in the banjo, or whatever his initial influences were, it is known that he became proficient enough to be able to play paying gigs in his Virginia locale at a relatively early age.  It is also known that at the age of 22, Robinson moved to Chicago, Illinois, where his considerably developed banjo skills made him highly in-demand.  Such was Robinson’s prowess that within two years he was performing and recording with some of the biggest musical names in Chicago including the boogie woogie blues piano man Clarence Williams, ragtime and jazz piano stylist Jelly Roll Morton, and jazz trumpeting great Jabbo Smith.  These initial 1928-1929 experiences established Robinson’s reputation on the pulsating Chicago music scene.

Also in 1929, Robinson had the opportunity to record with Georgia Tom Dorsey (Thomas Andrew Dorsey), the author of in excess of 3,000 tunes that sold millions of copies, a great many of them gospel, as he was a piano playing Christian evangelist who honed his skills in the barrelhouse environments of Atlanta, as well as being so highly influential in early blues.   Dorsey authored the gospel standards “Take My Hand, Precious Lord” and “Peace In The Valley,” among so many others.  But Dorsey’s world walked both sides of the lines of gospel and blues, and with Robinson the sides they recorded were attributed to The Hokum Boys, the word “hokum” generally ascribed to a bawdy, suggestive form of blues with extended broad parallels and not-too-veiled sexual insinuations.  But Dorsey perceived no definite difference between blues and gospel, and thought of the blues as being complementary to his preaching.  The song Robinson and Dorsey recorded was “I Had To Give Up The Gym,” and it was indeed of the hokum variety.

Robinson continued in his role as an in-demand featured performer and a bandmate on the Chicago blues and jazz circuits, working with Wilbur Sweatman, Noble Sissie, Carroll Dickinson, Erskine Tate, and Georgia White.  Also, during the period of 1929-1935, Robinson enjoyed his own recording sessions. 

Never one to rest on his past successes, Robinson continued to play the club circuit, fronting his own groups of various names going forward into the 1940s including Ikey Robinson and his Band (one that included Jabbo Smith), The Pods of Pepper, Sloke & Ike, The Windy City Five, and The Hokum Trio.  He also played in The State Street Ramblers, Richard Jones And His Jazz Wizards, Ivory Chittison & Banjo Joe, and Williams’ Washboard Band, among others.

Robinson played on, and by the 1960s he was aligned with Franz Jackson, the jazz saxophone and clarinet artist.  It wasn’t until the 1970s that Robinson’s awareness was heightened via his rediscovery among blues and jazz enthusiasts and he enjoyed the benefits of touring Europe with Jabbo Smith to ardently hailing audiences.  This was the beginning of something of a revival for Robinson.

Louie Bluie has a tremendous scene with the musicians playing a club in the 1980s, and it is like watching the clock and calendar roll back to a time when string band, blues, and jazz musical forms were all “in bed” with one another.  And there in the middle of this mid-1980s musical beauty is “Banjo Ikey” Robinson, vital, animated, and as musically sharp as ever.

Over the course of his career, Robinson recorded for the Brunswick, Decca, Columbia, Vocalion, Paramount, OKeh, Clarion, Bluebird, and Champion labels either under his own name or in support of others, and today his music is available, if one searches well, on any number of compilations.  Robinson was immensely important to the development of Chicago’s blues and jazz worlds, and his impact is of a grand stature.

If you’re fortunate enough to be able to find either a VHS or DVD copy of Louie Bluie, you will revel in Robinson’s antics.  His competencies across the blues and jazz spaces are not as well-known as they should be.  Perhaps in some small measure, this brief outline assists in turning that lack of awareness around.

Robinson passed away in Chicago in late 1990.