'High Water Recording Company is proud to introduce the first record by Waynell Jones, an artist with a truly distinctive sound. His music is downhome blues flavored with country and wester, modern rhythm and blues, and old-time songster material. It is a sound forged by years of performing music for a living on the streets of his home town of Henderson, Tennessee, playing for every kind of audience, black and white, young and old. Waynell was born in 1926 near Henderseon in rural Chester County and had lived there and in nearby Humboldt, Tennessee, his entire life. All of his thirty-nine aunts and uncles played instruments, and by the age of fifteen Waynell was playing guitar. He played for house parties and country picnics before becoming a street musician. For the past eighteen years he has been employed at Freed-Hardeman College in Henderson and now plays blues mostly for students and at special programs at the college. He is also the guitarist for the Gospel Travelers, a local community singing group. His years of performing in the community and at the college have made him one of Henderson's best known and best loved citizens. Both songs on this record are ones that he put together himself. "Jaybird Boogie" is the first song he ever made up. He was sitting on a country store porch playing his guitar, and the owner offered him a soft drink if he would make up a piece called "jaybird Boogie." When Waynell finished, the man gave him a whole case of drinks!' (David Evans, cover notes)
Waynell Jones -- The Chicken Song & Jaybird Boogie (1984 *High Water 424)
Produced by Dr. David Evans for the High Water Recording Company at Memphis State University in Memphis, TN.
