Blues Before Sunrise: The Radio Interviews

Little Hudson

Little Hudson Hudson Shower, aka Little Hudson, was a guitar player and vocalist who in the early 1950s recorded a handful of highly regarded blues sides for Joe Brown’s J.O.B. label. His recordings of “rough treatment” and “Looking for a woman” were classics of the era. Hudson was active on the Chicago club scene for many years—both before and after his J.O.B. sessions—but he never had another record. Perhaps there were just too many aspiring artists on the scene for Hudson to capture the attention of the major labels, little Hudson. Photo courtesy of mike rowe/Blues Unlimited. or perhaps it was the changing style in blues or the arrival of rock ’n’ roll. whatever the reason, Hudson Shower never was able to attain major blues star status, but he takes his place among the ranks of the lesser lights who managed—with limited opportunity—to make classic recordings. In this accomplishment he joins such notable bluesmen as Blue Smitty, Little willie Foster, Moody Jones, and Big Boy Spires. Another claim to fame for Little Hudson was his association with John Lee williamson—Sonny Boy I. He played and ran with Sonny Boy on a regular basis and was with him earlier on the night that Sonny Boy was murdered. I have absolutely no recollection of how this interview took place. I assume that it may have come about after talking with Jim O’Neal. I would often ask him who was still alive and might make a good interview. I know that I never ran across Hudson on the music scene. If he was in the clubs at all, they were not the same clubs I was working. I believe I called Hudson at home and made arrangements to do the interview at the radio station. we managed to stay in touch from time to time after the interview was broadcast . During one of our telephone calls several years later, I was surprised to learn that Hudson had quit the blues to join the church. He had become the rev. Hudson Shower and was operating a small storefront church. He came by my home studio one year to record a prayer for my annual Christmas program. with this book project under way, we managed to talk again just recently. Hudson is now retired from both the blues and the church and is living comfortably on Chicago’s South Side.this interview took place in September 1985. ■ ■ ■ I was born on a plantation called Long Rise, Mississippi, 1919—September the sixth. My mother was named Ida Belle Shower and my daddy was named Elijah Shower. I got several brothers and sisters—Henry, Leo, Willie, Gert, and May Lou. One died here lately—Willie, the youngest girl, died about six months ago. And the fact of business where I got started from, practically all my people can play music, you know. So I started when I was about, say, eight or nine years old, because there was always a guitar around—because my uncles, my mother, my grandmother, my father. I got a brother, now, that play piano and guitar. He moved back down to West Memphis. And my father, he passed away in ’75, but he was eighty-two years old and he could still play. It was practically old-time blues just like you’re playing today—everybody get around the camplit tle hudson 143 fire, the log fire, whatever you want to call it, and sit around and start playing. And the thing about it, my grandmother raised me, because my mother died at an early age. I was raised by a grandmother and so that was her husband, and that would be something like my grand-stepfather, but it still was a stepfather because my grandmother raised me. That man was so mean! Now, I hate to tell this, but this is true. I could be sitting down eating, he probably wouldn’t even allow us at the table anyway when most of [the] time we have to sit on the floor and eat. He would just as soon come over and kick the plate out from under us, you know. So I had another brother, but he died when he was about ten or eleven years old. Now, he liked him because he was one of them mischievous child, he didn’t take nothing serious. See, I...