When writing a review of Skip James’ 1931 groundbreaking Paramount Records recordings (see below in the “Essential Blues Recording” section), I immediately began thinking about one of his contemporaries in the Bentonia school of blues, Jack Owens.  Knowing that I have not written a brief overview of the life and career of Owens, now seems the ideal time to do so.

He was born L.F. Nelson in mid-November, 1917 to George Nelson and Celia Owens in Bentonia, Mississippi, a small town in Yazoo County, a region in the mid-central portion of the state.  In his early single years, his biological father left the family, and he was then reared by the sizeable Owens family (eventually ten children in all on his maternal grandfather’s side).  He did ultimately end up taking the Owens surname as his own. 

As is often the case, explicit details of Owens’ developmental years are quite scant, though it is generally accepted that Owens was introduced to the guitar, and received initial instruction on it, via certain members of the Owens family.  However, Owens was something of a musically gifted and inquiring mind, as he also dabbled with the fife (similar to the piccolo, usually handmade out of cane), piano, and fiddle while young, though obviously at some point he chose the guitar as his main instrument.  His interests in the other instruments were certainly a result of the wealth of musical talent he grew up around, and the many social events where he was exposed to them and their musicmaking capabilities.

What is noteworthy about Owens’ blues career arc is that unlike his more famous and aforementioned Bentonia blues peer Skip James who set out to market his talent and form a recording career, rambling, if you will, wherever his music could take him, Owens was content to remain in his home area farming, becoming a bootlegger, and being the proprietor of a country blues joint, three endeavors that stayed with him the bulk of his life.  Owens did not seek the limelight, rather, he was often found performing his brand of blues right from his home’s front porch; he in no way sought a recording career.  It has been indicated that Owens played to thousands of interested blues fans from his front porch.  This avenue to unfurl his artistry ideally suited him.

As has been often written about on these pages, the 1960s brought about the folk blues revival as young Caucasians discovered the blues and firmly embraced it.  It was during this time, in 1966 to be exact, that the notable music researcher David Evans found Owens.  It remains unclear as to who exactly steered Evans to Owens.  Certainly, it could have been Skip James, but there were others in the Bentonia area who were also quite adept in that region’s music who could’ve provided the introduction.  Cornelius Bright, an unsung blues artist of great esteem and influence on Skip James may have also provided the warm handoff of Owens to Evans.  No matter, as Owens and his broad talents were revealed.

One of the keys of the Bentonia school of guitar playing is that artists deploy the D-minor tuning, meaning that it is a minor tuning that is rather somber in sound, where one is allowed to play the D-minor chord when all six guitar strings are thrummed in the open position, with the guitar strings tuned to D-A-D-F-A-D beginning with the low E string.  However, Owens did not solely subscribe to this tuning, and often deployed others, many of which folks who understand guitar tunings better than I have said seem to be of his own constructs.  Owens too used a percussive component within his music, often pounding his feet in a heavy manner to provide a rhythmic auditory component; think John Lee Hooker’s conspicuous use of his feet on recordings.

Whereas someone like James supplied a tremendous falsetto aspect to his singing while also being rather restrained in volume, Owens’ vocals were rough and booming, no doubt as a result of playing all his life for noisy social events around his home base region.

Delighted by his discovery of Owens, Evans ensured that he appeared on a compilation entitled Goin’ Up The Country, a 1968 15-cut LP on the Decca Records label that included the aforementioned Cornelius Bright along with others.  Owens had two selections on this LP.

Though now being a recorded bluesman, Owens still played mostly in his birth region.  Owens was very much, it is said, a lifelong superstitious person, and even after his discovery those elements of his being did not change.  He continued to work his farm with a mule do the plowing, eschewing modern machinery, warding evil spirits away from his domicile by way of hanging bottles around his property from trees, and even secreting his money into the ground as a way to avoid banks.  Clearly, he was very set in his ways.  And, due to his bootlegging operation, it was whispered that Owens kept multiple pieces of weaponry on his property.  He was said to have onetime inferred that he hadn’t had to shoot anybody in “…recent memory.”   And this was supposedly Owens saying this around the age of 90!

In the last 15-20 years of his life, Owens did begin to play the major U.S. blues festivals (actually first playing outside of his home state of Mississippi in 1988), obviously riding high on his 1979 release (see below), most often with his fellow Mississippi bluesman and friend Bud Spires, himself a quite worthy harmonica player.  This blogger remembers an Owens performance in Chicago with tremendous fondness.

Owens appeared in two blues documentaries, one by Alan Lomax entitled Land Where The Blues Began, and one by Robert Mugge entitled Deep Blues.  Such was his notoriety in blues circles.  “Why wasn’t Owens better known?” is what I often ask.

Owens also received the greatest of artistic achievements in 1992 when he was bestowed The National Heritage Fellowship by The National Endowment For The Arts.  It was a crowning recognition.

At the age of 92, in early February, 1997 in Yazoo City, Mississippi, Owens passed away. 

If you’re one who holds the Bentonia school of blues to your liking, you need to consider the grand music of Jack Owens.  He needs to be on your blues radar.

Below are some places to start to hear the phenomenal work of Jack Owens.

Recordings And Appearances

Jack Owens & Bud Spires – It Must Have Been The Devil – Mississippi Country Blues By Jack Owens & Bud Spires – Testament Records T-2222 – Released in 1971

Jack Owens – Bentonia Country Blues – Albatros Records VPA 8443 – Released in 1979

Skip James And Jack Owens – 50 Years Mississippi Blues In Bentonia Skip James And Jack Owens 1931-1981 – Wolf Records WBJ-CD-009 – Release date N/A

Jack Owens & Eugene Powell – The Last Giants Of Mississippi Blues – Wolf Records 120-931 CD – Release date N/A

Various Artists – Goin’ Up The Country – Decca Records – Released in 1968