Lonnie Johnson - Another Night To Cry B r e v e m e n t e: Alonzo "Lonnie" Johnson was born on February 8, 1899, in New Orleans and is considered the progenitor of all jazz and blues guitarists for his revolutionary style.
He inspired (just to name a few) musicians like Robert Johnson, Django Reinhardt, T-Bone Walker, B.B. King, Elvis Presley, and even Bob Dylan. Besides singing, he played the guitar, banjo, piano, and violin.
He began his career performing in various venues in New Orleans, and at eighteen he took a tour in England that led him to play for American military camps.
When he returned to the States in 1919, he found that all his family had died from an influenza epidemic, except for his brother James "Steady Roll" Johnson.
Two years later, the Johnson brothers decided to move to St. Louis, where they performed as a musical duo.
In '25, he married the singer Mary Johnson, with whom he had 6 children, before divorcing in '32 (practically one a year, due to the lack of TV, I believe...).
In the '30s, during the "Great Depression," Lonnie first moved to Cleveland, Ohio, where he played with the "Putney Dandridge Orchestra," and in '37 to Chicago, Illinois, where he played with other musicians and also worked as a laborer in a steel mill in Peoria, Illinois, for a brief period.
In the '50s, he began a slow decline, working at the "Ben Franklin Hotel" in Philadelphia as an elevator operator... before being reassessed in the '60s as he rightly deserved, playing with people of the caliber of Muddy Waters, Sonny Boy Williamson II, and Big Joe Williams.
Five years before saying goodbye, he settled in Toronto, Canada, where he opened the Home of the Blues, his club.
In '69, he was the victim of a car accident that subsequently caused him various difficulties even in playing; then his health gradually worsened, and in '70 he died of a heart attack... and that's it.
