Date: September 20, 2011
Category: News
Artwork courtesy of Lennie Jones
The term crossroads has many different points of origin. When used in the blues, it is not only a physical place, but a metaphorical one as well. When one must make a tough decision in their lives, they are at “the crossroads”.
Speaking in terms of The Blues, the crossroads was the intersection of Highways 49 & 61 where many of bluesmen allegedly “sold their souls” to the devil in exchange for extraordinary playing ability and fame. The blues figure that is synonymous with this archetype in popular culture is Robert Johnson, though it is actually the lesser-known artist, Tommy Johnson, who is the one that is first credited with the whole crossroads story.
“If you want to learn how to make songs yourself, you take your guitar and you go to where the road crosses that way, where a crossroads is. Get there, be sure to get there just a little ‘fore 12 that night so you know you’ll be there. You have your guitar and be playing a piece there by yourself…A big black man will walk up there and take your guitar and he’ll tune it. And then he’ll play a piece and hand it back to you. That’s the way I learned to play anything I want.”
Those who are new to the blues subculture always ask about The Crossroads. Is the story real? Do the old blues legends speak of the crossroads and believe the story? That’s another story, for another day.
I can tell you that when I first got heavy into the blues, Robert Lockwood, Jr. spoke of the story of the Crossroads, followed by a few sentences that amounted to the story being a crock of you know what. Since he was one of the closest contemporaries of Robert Johnson, Mr. Lockwood would be one of our must trusted resources on the matter.
The concept of the Crossroads predates the blues and what you make of it depends on how far down the rabbit hole you choose to travel.
In conclusion, the short answer is that The Crossroads is the intersection of Highway’s 49 & 61 in Clarksdale, Mississippi. If you wan’t to make a deal with the devil in exchange for extraordinary talents, your best bet would be to camp out around midnight and see what happens, otherwise start practicin’ those chords!
