James Cotton, iconic blues harp player . By Bill Friskics-Warren New
York Times . NEW YORK - James Cotton, a pioneering harmonica player who
worked with Muddy Waters and Howlin' Wolf and helped establish his
instrument as an integral part of modern blues, died Thursday in
Austin, Texas. He was 81. Marc Lipkin, the director of publicity at
Alligator Records, Mr. Cotton's label, said the cause was pneumonia.
Many of Mr. Cotton's lasting early contributions came during his first
tenure with Waters, in Chicago, where from 1954 to 1966 he played in a
band that included guitarist Jimmy Rogers and pianist Otis Spann. Often
heard in close call and response with Waters's deep, declamatory
vocals, Mr. Cotton's squalling harmonica animated dozens of recordings
Waters made for the influential Chess label, including classics like
"Got My Mojo Working" and "Rock Me. Curiously enough, although Mr.
Cotton was hired in 1954, he did not begin to appear on Waters's
recordings until late 1956. Before that, Waters usually recruited
Little Walter Jacobs, Mr. Cotton's predecessor in his band, to work
with him in the studio. "I was there for a couple of years before I got
to be on the albums," Mr. Cotton explained in a 2001 interview for the
PBS documentary "American Roots Music. "Muddy wanted me to be just like
Little Walter. I told him, 'Hey, I'll never be Little Walter, but I can
play your music, so you've got to give me a chance. I guess he heard
that. Mr. Cotton embarked on a solo career in 1966 when he formed the
James Cotton Blues Band. He and his group spent much of the next decade
making records of their own and sharing bills with such popular rock
acts as Janis Joplin and Cream. Mr. Cotton's muscular, heavily
amplified harmonica - he typically played with a microphone 'cup'ped
tightly to his instrument - influenced the work of several major
blues-rock groups of the era, among them the Allman Brothers, the Paul
Butterfield Blues Band, and the Electric Flag. Mr. Cotton reunited with
Waters on the 1977 album "Hard Again," which included a raucous remake
of Waters's 1950s classic "Mannish Boy. Produced by guitarist Johnny
Winter, the album won a Grammy Award for best ethnic or traditional
recording and helped Chicago-style blues gain a wider audience. Before
his first stint with Waters, Mr. Cotton was one of two harmonica
players, along with Little Junior Parker, in the band of Howlin' Wolf,
appearing on some of the recordings he made with Sam Phillips at Sun
Records in Memphis in the early 1950s. In 1954, Mr. Cotton also made
four recordings under his own name for Sun. "Cotton Crop Blues," an
original that begins with the clarion pledge "I ain't gonna raise no
more cotton," was the most enduring of these, featuring Mr. Cotton's
rasping vocals and the slashing, distorted guitar of Pat Hare. James
Henry Cotton was born in 1935, in Tunica, Miss., the youngest of eight
brothers and sisters. His parents, Hattie and Mose, were sharecroppers.
His father was also the preacher at the local Baptist church. Mr.
Cotton was inspired to take up the harmonica by his mother, who liked
to use the instrument to mimic the squawking of chickens and the
whistles of freight trains. Before long he was playing to entertain the
other sharecroppers while hauling water to them in the fields; by age 7
he was performing for change on the streets of nearby towns in the
Mississippi Delta. Both of Mr. Cotton's parents had died by the time he
was 9, and an uncle took him to meet harmonica master Sonny Boy
Williamson after young James heard his radio show, "King Biscuit Time.
Williamson immediately took a liking to the boy, embracing him as a
member of his family and touring group. Although Mr. Cotton was
probably most celebrated for his work in the employ of others, his
career as a bandleader, and as a dynamic showman known to do back flips
onstage, proved to have greater longevity, spanning nearly half a
century. He began to slow down only in the mid-1990s, when doctors
found polyps on his vocal cords. Mr. Cotton, whose prowess on the
harmonica earned him the nickname Superharp (the term "harp" is common
parlance for the harmonica), released some two dozen albums, with small
and larger ensembles. His "Deep in the Blues" (Verve) won a Grammy for
best traditional blues album in 1997. His most recent album, "Cotton
Mouth Man," was released in 2013 and nominated for a Grammy. He was
inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame in 2006.
