Champion Jack Dupree standing next to a van

 

A person standing NeXT to a van.
Description automatically generated with medium confidence

In the category of something completely different. I found this picture of New Orleans piano great Jack Dupree yesterday, and I thought it was cool to pick up on. I never saw Jack, but I have a few of his records, which show he belongs in the pantheon of piano professors. The pic showed up in a Twitter feed that asked people to cite American blues players that went to Europe and more or less stayed there (Memphis Slim, Eddie Boyd, Luther Allison are just some of those listed along with Jack). I like the picture cause, well, he has a simple kind of car but he has pride enough to stand with it. Maybe he’d have liked a Cadillac, but this one would save on gas, and it looks like it could haul equipment too.  Does it make him look shorter or taller than he would in front of a Cadillac? (Your call.) And sign says it all: Champion Jack Dupree, Blues Pianist of New Orleans, LA.U.S.A." {Little Brother Montgomery told me the ‘Champion’ was a bit of irony. Yes, he’d been a prize fighter, but no, he didn’t do too well at it.} That he is wearing medals- well that is kind of a New Orleans thing. But I am sure he was proud of them, received perhaps on the European continent, where there  was more appreciation for the art of the blues than there was in the U.S.A. In fact we owe it to Brits like the Rolling Stones and Animals for hipping us to what was right here at home. - Jack Vaughan