It was as though the man’s voice and harmonica were one.  He pilfered his performing and recording name from one of the pioneers of Chicago blues harmonica, a truly innovative blues artist who revolutionized the use of harmonica in modern blues, the renowned John Lee Williamson (Sonny Boy Williamson I).  Without any shred of doubt, Sonny Boy II tried to leverage the fame of his earlier peer, Sonny Boy I, to his best advantage.  However, there was absolutely no need for such mimicry name-wise, as Sonny Boy II proficiently used his gravely, weathered vocal inflections, and melancholic stories, to provide a picture of the state of his human circumstances that can only be described as wholly precise, given his documented tales of travel, rambling, personal slights, and relationship issues.  Sonny Boy II’s ability to impart the consequences of his life’s meanderings were triumphantly strengthened by his aptitude for melding his voice and harmonica into one element, utilizing each as a direct foil to the other, no matter the subject matter.  His blues orchestrations emphasize the responsive echoes of each musical talent, vocal and instrumental, upon the other, and his singular ability to coin a phrase, form symbolism, and author poignant songs of the frailties of the human being made his compositions and shows blues art of the highest categorization.

So, who was Sonny Boy Williamson II?  First, it must be stated that Sonny Boy II is a man still shrouded in mystery.  Even his birth date is suspect; was it 1897, 1899, 1907, 1909, or 1912?  The weight of what is fact and what is fiction regarding him is immense.  Regarding his given name, Aleck Miller, Alex Miller, or Willie Miller have all been proffered, and even two diverging locations of his birth have been suggested, Greenwood, Mississippi and Glendora, Mississippi.  Stepping-back into the swirl regarding Sonny Boy II’s name conundrum, his born surname was Ford (his mother was Lillie Ford), but he took to surname of his step-father, Jim Miller.  He also used the names Rice Miller and Little Boy Blue before settling on Sonny Boy Williamson II.

As a youngster, Sonny Boy II worked with his sharecropper family.  In the 1930s, Sonny Boy II began to travel throughout Mississippi and Arkansas, journeys that allowed him to come in contact with bluesmen Big Joe Williams, Elmore James, Robert Lockwood, Jr., and the famed blues artist Robert Johnson.  Sonny Boy II saw these blues artists as means to an end, a supply of bluesmen he could work with at the various venues where he could ply his trade; the picnics, fish fries, suppers, juke joints, and even at ball games.

In the early part of the 1940s, Sonny Boy II gained a slot on KFFA’s show King Biscuit Time, in what was the first live radio show to present blues.  The sponsor of the radio show was King Biscuit Flour, and what they did with Sonny Boy II was atrocious.  They presented Sonny Boy II in their advertising as Sonny Boy I (a blatant lie) in an attempt to capitalize on his fame.  But Sonny Boy II went along with this subterfuge as part of his plan to leave the south for the north and become famous.

The radio show was immensely successful, and a company introduced the Sonny Boy Cornmeal brand in an effort to exploit his popularity.  Though he was of great local and regional fame, Sonny Boy II was not especially interested in recording.  However, Lillian McMurtry, the owner of Trumpet Records, a business located in Jackson, Mississippi, located Sonny Boy II in a boarding house located in Belzoni, Mississippi and convinced hm that it was in his best interest to record his brand of blues.  She recognized his broad blues skill set and believed that he could be successful.

Sonny Boy II recorded for McMurtry’s Trumpet label from 1951-1954.  There is no doubt that during this period he was in superb form in all aspects of his musical skills, including songwriting.  Of particular success to Sonny Boy II during his Trumpet label years was his composition “Eyesight To The Blind”, a song he would later also have released on Chicago’s famed Chess Records.  During his tenure with McMurtry, he brought blues slide guitar master Elmore James into the studio to record the very first adaptation of the Robert Johnson timeless blues song “Dust My Broom.”  As an aside, a collection entitled Sonny Boy Williamson – King Biscuit Time is available on Arhoolie Records (as provided by Smithsonian Folk Ways Recordings) as a digital download, and it includes the referenced Elmore James cut.

During this period, Sonny Boy II was married to Howlin’ Wolf’s sister, but divorced her, and subsequently remarried a woman named Mattie Gordon.  It should be noted that Mattie was to become Sonny Boy II’s most long-lived personal relationship, as she was able to put up with his nomadic ways, even when Sonny Boy II went north to Detroit to work with Baby Boy Warren in 1954, and during his protracted period in Chicago.

1955 was a turning point in Sonny Boy II’s life.  McMurtry leased one of his singles to the Ace label which was owned by Johnny Vincent.  Then, McMurtry sold his contract to a Memphis music man, who then sold it to Chess Records.  It was finally all beginning to come together for Sonny Boy II, and he moved north to Chicago.  In August, 1955, he entered the Chess studio for the first time to exemplary results.  His “Don’t Start Me To Talkin’” was a hit.  For his next studio visit, he was reunited with his old traveling and playing partner from the south, Robert Lockwood, Jr., and this was to Sonny Boy II’s great benefit, as Lockwood, Jr.’s familiarity with his musical style and the ability to provide the ideal guitar patterns to Sonny Boy II’s music yielded great results.  Lockwood, Jr. was at this point in his own career one of Chess Records’ house guitarists.

Sonny Boy II recorded prolifically for Chess Records, 70 songs total, and was an in-demand artist.  However, given his ingrained rambling ways, whenever things slowed in Chicago, Sonny Boy II was likely to return south where he would again broadcast over the radio.  His penchant for wandering never left him.

1963would also prove to be a major year for Sonny Boy II.  He was slated to perform in Europe as part of the American Folk Blues Festival packaged blues tour.  By this time, many young British musicians had discovered American blues, and were rabid fans of it.  As such, Sonny Boy II really put on a show during his time in the European limelight, and when the tour ended, he stayed there while his tour partners returned back to America.  Sonny Boy II found Europe very much to his liking.

Sonny Boy II was in high demand on the European club circuit, and the young British fans couldn’t get enough of his music, manner, and hijinks.  He even took to wearing proper British suits of clothes, complete with a bowler hat, briefcase, and umbrella.  While in Europe, he toured and recorded with The Yardbirds and Eric Clapton.  By this time, his fine cut “Help Me” was out, and it was a smash hit in Britain among the young people.  Things got so good in Europe for Sonny Boy II that he seriously thought about moving there.

But Sonny Boy II headed back to America, where he again went into the studio to record.  By now he was in his sixties, yet he decided to make a triumphant return to Britain, and the reception he received was overwhelming.  While there, he recorded a cut with Jimmy Page, then a seasoned studio guitarist, a musician who would be a founding member of the rock super group Led Zeppelin.

In 1965, Sonny Boy II again returned to the south, where he yet again took to performing on the radio, all the while boasting of his European stays with anyone he could corner, oftentimes wearing the ensembles he purchased in Britain.  Some who knew Sonny Boy II were accepting of his stories, others were hesitant to believe him or anything he said.  But there was something else that drove Sonny Boy II to the south, and that was his notion that his time was short.

He reunited with old friends and fellow bluesmen Peck Curtis and Houston Stackhouse, and together they visited places from Sonny Boy II’s past, spent time with his old friends, and sometimes he just went fishing.

As it would happen, the group of musicians that was Ronnie Hawkins’ band, The Hawks (who would go on to become famous as The Band), were in the area and decided to find Sonny Boy II.  Sonny Boy II used the group as his band for a local gig.

On a day in May, 1965, both Curtis and Stackhouse became concerned when Sonny Boy II didn’t show for his daily radio show.  They went looking for him, and found him in his boarding house bed dead.

I have made much here of Sonny Boy II’s chronological movements.  So, what kind of person was he?

By all accounts, Sonny Boy II was suspicious, a notorious drinker, a noted liar, and slippery.  His moods could veer quickly, and his distrust of others was high.  He was extremely self-focused.  He played the role of a cunning, malicious, and jaded person easily because it all was in his nature.

All that said, Sonny Boy II’s blues were structured with brief harmonica surges, and in the next moments, he was blowing the most mighty, exciting solos.  Sonny Boy II’s blues songs were brimmed with sarcastic cleverness, and full of lyrics that were culled from his own life experiences.  Sonny Boy II sung his life to the world.

Sonny Boy II was elected to The Blues Hall Of Fame in 1980.

2014 saw Sonny Boy II honored with a marker on the Mississippi Blues Trail, his being located in Helena, Arkansas.

Below is a CD I recommend as essential for any blues fan interested in the work of Sonny Boy Williamson II.  It is a great beginning point in consideration of his blues.

Sonny Boy Williamson II – More Real Folk Blues – MCA CHD-9277

Song Titles

• Help Me
• Bye Bye Bird
• Nine Below Zero
• The Hunt
• Stop Right Now
• She’s My Baby
• The Goat
• Decoration Day
• Trying To Get Back On My Feet
• My Younger Days
• Close To Me
• Somebody Help Me