Jubilee Jam in Jackson is a good place to be. It's a festival where on 5 stages a wide bevy of music entertainment makes it sometimes difficult to catch all you want to. Little Milton supersedes that notion. When he's performing nobody else matters. A career lasting 6 decades hasn't slowed him down much. Constant touring and about to release his 15th on Malaco Records still to be named-Mr. C-[for Campbell] manages to mix it all up and keep it going in an art form that's joyful-sorrowful-and all the gray areas in between. Winner of two 2002 WC Handy awards in Memphis for Best Soul and Blues Artist and Best Soul and Blues Record for Feel It-Milton as an entertainer is keeping alive a style of Blues he and his ilk helped invent-making his mark over earlier legendary labels like Chess and Stax. The back of his tour bus where he conducted this interview is custom painted "The Blues is Alright" after his hit record that's become an anthem to blues purist. Little Milton's expressive command of the electric guitar with a voice so powerful and heartfelt that combined with his infectious rhythm section-you'd have to comatose not to enjoy it-but it would help you if you were. At 68, he can still move the audience like when he says "this one is for my favorite species of the human race-the ladies." The woman in the audience scream.  What makes Little Milton tick? He speaks for himself.

PT Quinn:   When and where were you born?   Little Milton:  I was born in 1934 in a little town north of Jackson Mississippi called Inverness. This is where I was born-however, my mother moved away from there when I was a baby in her arms up into the delta to a community called Greenville and Leland Mississippi-that's where I was raised up there.

PT:   Were you close to your parents?  LM:   I loved my mother very dearly and was raised by a stepfather. They were very good to me and were wonderful people. Unfortunately, both of them are deceased.

PT:   When did you start getting into music?  LM:  At a very early age to tell you the truth. Being of the Baptist faith, I was automatically into the church programs-I guess that's where you could say my talent was discovered. Back then we called them speeches-singing speeches in the church singing a song or 2. Now we call them poems.

PT:   It's gospel music?   LM:  Of course! [laughs] I remember distinctively one Sunday they took up a collection.. it must have been 4 or 5 dollars-being a kid that was all the money in the world. I could eat junk food the whole week when the rolling store came through and what have you. I knew right then that being an entertainer was what I wanted to be.

PT:   How did it feel making a few dollars?   LM:   It felt great! Because up in the delta-especially back in that era-you had sharecroppers and certainly we were. The wages were extremely low and I remember working all day for a dollar. For me to get up on the stage in a building and sing a song or 2 and make 4 or 5 dollars doing it man-and enjoying it too was the greatest thing that happened to me at that time.

PT:   Who were your early influences?   LM:   Without a doubt the most influential person was the late T-Bone Walker. I loved people like Nat King Cole, Frank Sinatra, Big Joe Turner, and Roy Brown just to name a few. Later came BB King who of course we are still the best of friends. You had so many back then who could influence you so very easily because they were such great talent.

PT:   So you liked some of the great crooners.   LM:    Nobody ever did it any better than Nat King Cole with the smooth voice and the diction. It was so clear you didn't have to wonder what he was saying.

PT:   A lot music these days, you can't understand the words.   LM:    If you can call it music! But they're making a lot of money-way more than those guys were making back then.

PT:   When did you pick up your first guitar?   LM:   I had to be about 10. I ordered it from a Walter Fields catalog. They don't have that anymore. You had 2 major catalogs back then - Sears and Roebuck and Walter Fields. Walter Fields was a little less expensive. So I scuffled and sacrificed and schemed and saved up enough money-about 14 dollars and 50 cents. Back then that was considered a lot when when you don't have anything.

PT:   Tell us something about your first recording.   LM:    Had to be about 1951 or 2. My good friend then and still is-the legendary Ike Turner. Ike was a guy who knew everybody in the business.  He was familiar and associated somewhat with Sam Phillips and Sun Records. [in Memphis] He took me into Sun Records where I recorded for the very first time. Ike Turner played on my first recording-played piano and used his little band.

PT:   Can you remember the title of your first record? LM:   Not really. It was so long ago. But it probably was a take off on a BB King thing because he was coming into prominence at that time with lots of hits. Fats Domino-Chuck Willis....

PT:   The New Orleans sound.....  LM:   I don't know but one Fats Domino - do you know another one?  That's the only one I know - the one from New Orleans. These guys were extremely popular then so we would do melodies comparing to the ones playing on the jukebox. Of course we used different words. So probably it was something of that nature. It might have been a thing on BB's "Woke up this Morning".

PT:   Didn't you break out in the 60's?   LM:   Yeah, it actually started around 1961. We did a few little things around 1959. I had moved from Mississippi by then and moved to East St. Louis again listening to our good friend Ike Turner. It was a great decision. He was already up there - this was way before the Tina Turner thing.  He was doing great and would come back down-his hometown is Clarksdale [Mississippi] and mine being Greenville which is about 70 miles apart - Greenville further south - you come down Highway 61 to Highway 82, and then you go west. Anyway I had moved to East St. Louis on his advice and encouragement. And it worked out fine. Within a very short time, he and I had the whole area sewed up as far as popularity and working gigs.  It was predominately a jazz oriented area at that time. That was just a wee bit before the Chuck Barry thing-the hard rock and roll as they call it. So that was a good move and it went on from there.

PT:   Any stories?   LM:   In those early days there wasn't too many people who had busses - we were lucky to have a car - and if you had a station wagon you were really flying high. You had smaller amplifiers you could fit in the trunk. The people who had the big amps always were the well known people-sometimes if it was a local group - they might have one station wagon but every else's cars with the drums in the trunk-in the rain you'd put a canvas over it to keep it from getting wet - you know-whenever's there's a will-there's a way. It hadn't always been people that just sat on the bus being comfortable to go where you want to go with a chauffeur - what have you.  But I plan on writing a book. Some of it is worth telling - some of it I can't tell.

PT:   You can tell - you just may not want to.  LM:   I don't want to. [laughs]

PT:   Who are some of the people you've played with over the years?   LM:   The late Sonny Boy Williamson - the late Willie Love. I hate to say all of these late people but unfortunately they are no longer with us. I worked on shows with the late Elmo James-Roosevelt Sykes - Big Joe Turner-and my idol - T Bone Walker. One of the greatest experiences of my life was to meet my idol - get to know him-perform with him-and before he passed we got to be very decent friends.

PT:   The first time you performed with T Bone, it must have been a great thrill for you.    LM:   Certainly. It very rarely happens when you idolize somebody-especially in the capacity that he was-very famous, but he was not a guy who had his nose in the air. He was down to earth-he showed me quite a few things. It was a great thrill. 

PT:   How did you get involved with Stax Records?   LM:   I had been on Chess Records-and after the untimely death of Leonard Chess I needed a recording company to go to because things had changed tremendously at Chess without Leonard. The late Dave Clark was hooked into Stax in Memphis. He suggested I come in with him and I did. It was in the early 70's.

PT:   So now days you're on the road working a lot - recording - toured Europe.   LM:   Is there anything you haven't done that you'd like to?  Not really. I just want to keep doing what I've been doing.  And hopefully keep people interested in what I'm doing and the way I do it.

PT:   Do you have any advice for a young blues musician that may be of value?   LM:   Well, some people without knowing what they are saying put a brand on the music they call blues. I think blues have to do with an individual's feeling and attitude. I don't think any one individual can give you any one definition that would stand for everybody when you say the word blues. There's so many different kinds of blues-and so many different kinds of ways you can perform the music. I would say to any musician playing the so called blues-soul-what have you-I would say to them if you're still in school-get an education and try to learn as much as you possibly can because of all the modern technology and different stuff. Getting a good education is like having a bank account.

PT:   Security?   LM:    Certainly, that's what a bank account means doesn't it? In other words everybody's not going to make it in the music business. Everybody's not going to be a successful recording artist. If you get an education and put your soul and heart into what you know is happening around the world and possibly parts of the universe-just in case you don't make it as an entertainer-you can always go back to what you really know and get paid and earn a decent living. The next thing I would say for the young folk is stay away from the drugs-stay away from the gangs, and be yourself. If you get blessed enough to make it as a popular person in the business-keep your nose level and don't put it in the air-it's going to rain. In other words the people are the stars and you're not. You can stir their emotions, but you are no bigger than the people who support you.

PT:   Whether anybody makes it or not, there's a lot of joy to be had in playing music.   LM:   First of all you shouldn't get into it if you're not enjoying what you're doing. Because if you don't you're being a phony. When you have somebody being an entertainer, you have somebody who's observing that person. They can tell if you're really into what you're doing or not-or if you are just going through the motions. I respect any professional person that gets locked into what they're doing-because once they're into what they're doing-they can project that feeling to you. That's my thing-that's what I try to do. I observe my audience just like they observe me.

PT:   What makes a great guitar player?   LM:   As long as you play what you feel. You don't try to exaggerate anything because nobody can play something they don't know. As long as you play what you feel-you can be headed to being a great guitarist. You explore as you go-you follow your heart and your emotions. You can have a sensible attitude and not expect the world to bow on its knees in front of you-or you can be completely foolish and blow your thing. You can have your head in the air and think that you're God's greatest gift to the world, and that's not going to work. People are with you as long as you are hot. But unless you can lay that foundation where you can survive without a hit record-unless you do that I think you're headed for disaster and possibly a very short term career. You have to remember it's good to leave some friends behind. You may not always have a hot record but you can come into a town and people will remember you for what you did do the last time. You can tell the performers who are doing it the right way because they have longevity-and if you don't have that you can be so easily forgotten. You always want to leave a good impression behind.

PT:   How do you manage family and touring?    LM:    You must have a dedicated family especially your wife-she must be very understanding-tolerant-patient-and most of all she must believe in you in what you're doing. There's a song on my current CD Feel It that says-"a man makes his music but the love of a woman keeps him going."

PT:   Speaking of Feel It-how did you come up with the number Juke Joint in my House?   LM:  George Johnson who's one of the great writers of the era that we're living in now-he's the one who wrote Down Home Blues and Anna Mae's Cafe-and so many more. He wrote Juke Joint in my House, and when I heard it I liked it.

PT:   On Gov't Mule's record The Deep End, you're singing on the Warren Haynes song Soulshine. How did that come about?   PT:   Through the assistance of Greg Preston from Malaco Records. Greg hooked it up for Warren and [now deceased bassist] Allen Woody to work on Welcome to Little Milton. We also had Peter Wolf-Lucinda Williams-Delbert McClinton, and Keb Mo'. I did a couple of shows Warren does every year in North Carolina. It helped them too though because it got them involved on the other side of the track where I am-and it took me to where they are. It was a good little thing. We did a festival up in Kansas City and those kind of things. Unfortunately Al Woody died and I felt it was imperative I attend the funeral. They were playing that song Soulshine and I heard it. I really liked that song. When Warren came out I told him "man, this is a hell of a song." He requested I come to New York to do the song and I did.

PT:   Tell us something about the "Chitlin' Circuit."   LM:   They were predominately black. You know you had segregation back then-it was in full force. You might have a few whites who would trickle down into the black areas. Everybody who went was for one purpose-to have fun. We were integrating - especially musicians - when people didn't know what the hell the fuss was about-living next door to each other all happy,when all of a sudden the movements of different organizations got in power-you had black and white neighbors who thought nothing about it-when all of a sudden someone said "what,I'm living by a black person? - what,I'm living by a white person?" - I think what happened was the mind caused a change of heart. Unfortunately when somebody who has been your friend-who you've been getting along fine all this time-then you realize you don't like them any more. Something is wrong with that.

PT:   One of the great things about music is that it brings people together though.   LM:   Music does-yeah. It's one of the most powerful tools as far as getting people together. They'll come out and have fun at the festivals-and they might not do it again until there's another festival.

PT:   What's next for Little Milton?  LM:   Well, I'm just going to do what I've been doing. We've got a new CD hopefully coming out in a few months. And after that one another one-as long as the man upstairs grants me the blessings of being here on this earth in good health with the will to do what I enjoy doing.

PT:   How would Little Milton like to be remembered?   LM:   As someone who was very serious about his music and was appreciative to the people who supported him. That's me.

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