Negro Folk Songs as Sung by Lead Belly.: King of the Twelve-String Guitar Players of the World," Long-Time Convict in the Penitentiaries of Texas and Louisiana. Transcribed, Selected and Edited by...

New York: The Macmillan Company,, 1936. The "Birth of the Blues" in the wider American consciousness - the Charlie Watts copy First edition, first printing, boldly signed by Lead Belly on the front free endpaper, "Huddie Ledbetter", and scarce thus. From the collection of Rolling Stones drummer Charlie Watts, with his posthumous bookplate. Charlie was famously a jazz man at heart, but by reason of the universality of their influence and sheer presence, some blues artists gained admittance to the collection. Father-and-son folklorists John and Alan Lomax first encountered Huddie William Ledbetter (1888-1949) at Louisiana's Angola Prison Farm - "arguably the worst prison in America" (ANB) - in the summer of 1933. The musician was serving a six- to ten-year term for the knifing of a prominent white citizen in Shreveport. The pair recorded the 12-string guitarist as part of the Library of Congress project to preserve American folklore, and, deeply impressed, returned a year later with better equipment, recording hundreds of his songs. After his release in 1934, Lead Belly "immediately sought out Lomax and took a job as his driver and bodyguard. For the last months of 1934, he travelled with Lomax as he made the rounds of southern prisons. During this time he learned a lot about folk music and added dozens of new songs to his own considerable repertoire … [following the publication of Negro Folk Songs] for three months money and offers poured in, but complex tensions stemming in part from Lomax's attempts to mould Lead Belly's repertoire in a way that fit the classic folk music image of the day led to an estrangement between Lomax and Lead Belly, and before long the singer returned to Shreveport" (ibid.). Lead Belly's influence on the development of popular music and the wider culture has been extraordinary. In 1951, his "Irene" - retitled "Goodnight Irene" - was recorded by The Weavers with Peter Seeger, becoming the first folk song to get to No.1 in the charts at a time when the group was under investigation by the House Committee on Un-American Activities; in his Nobel Prize Lecture Bob Dylan described the first Lead Belly recording he heard as a "record that changed my life right then and there... like someone had laid hands on me"; Lonnie Donegan's cover of "Rock Island Line" begat the Skiffle Boom, which begat the British Beat Boom and all that followed, George Harrison having made the connection saying "Therefore no Lead Belly, no Beatles"; Nirvana included "In the Pines" - as "Where Did You Sleep Last Night" - in their Unplugged set, Kurt Cobain mentioning his attempts to buy Lead Belly's guitar, now on loan at the National Museum of African American History & Culture, Smithsonian Institution; and on Lead Belly's 125th anniversary both the Kennedy Center and the Library of Congress staged major celebrations of his work. Large octavo. Original light tan cloth, lettering in red to spine and front cover, top edge black. With custom dark blue quarter sheep solander box and brown paper jacket. Half-tone portrait frontispiece from photograph by Otto Hesse; musical notation throughout. Spine toned and lettering barely visible with just a touch of wear at extremities; New York Times clipping bearing announcement of Lead Belly's death mounted on front pastedown and causing offsetting to facing page. A very good copy.