Pink Anderson

Pink Anderson

Anderson and his son "Little Pink" Anderson
in the 1960s
Background information
Birth name Pinkney Anderson
Born (1900-02-12)February 12, 1900
Laurens, South Carolina, U.S.
Died October 12, 1974(1974-10-12) (aged 74)
Spartanburg, South Carolina, U.S.
Genres
Instruments
Years active 1930s - 1960s
Associated acts

Pinkney "Pink" Anderson (February 12, 1900 – October 12, 1974)[1] was an American blues singer and guitarist.

Life and career

Anderson was born in Laurens, South Carolina, and raised in nearby Greenville and Spartanburg. He joined Dr. William R. Kerr of the Indian Remedy Company in 1914 to entertain the crowds while Kerr tried to sell a concoction purported to have medicinal qualities.[2] He also toured with Leo "Chief Thundercloud" Kahdot and his medicine show, often with the harmonica player Arthur "Peg Leg Sam" Jackson, who was based in Jonesville, South Carolina.

cemetery marker for Pink Anderson in Spartanburg, SC.
Cemetery marker for Anderson in Lincoln Memorial Garden, with a Gibson J-50 guitar and a harmonica

Anderson was recorded by the folklorist Paul Clayton at the Virginia State Fair in May 1950. He recorded an album in the early 1960s and performed at some live venues.[3] He appeared in the 1963 film The Bluesmen. He reduced his activities in the late 1960s after a stroke.[4] Attempts by the folklorist Peter B. Lowry to record Anderson in 1970 were not successful, although apparently he could occasionally summon up some of his past abilities. A final tour took place in the early 1970s with the aid of Roy Book Binder, one of his "students", taking him to Boston and New York.

He died in October 1974 of a heart attack, at the age of 74. He is interred at Lincoln Memorial Gardens, in Spartanburg.[1]

Anderson's son, known as Little Pink Anderson (b. July 13, 1954[5]), is a bluesman living in Vermillion, South Dakota.[6]

The Pink in Pink Floyd

Syd Barrett, of English progressive rock band Pink Floyd, created the band's name by juxtaposing the first names of Anderson and North Carolina bluesman Floyd Council,[3] having noticed the names in the liner notes of a 1962 album by Blind Boy Fuller (Philips BBL-7512), written by the blues historian Paul Oliver: "Curley Weaver and Fred McMullen, ... Pink Anderson or Floyd Council—these were a few amongst the many blues singers that were to be heard in the rolling hills of the Piedmont, or meandering with the streams through the wooded valleys."

Discography

Singles

Albums

Carolina street ballads: "John Henry", "Everyday in the Week", "The Ship Titanic", "Greasy Greens", "Wreck of the Old 97", "I've Got Mine", "He's in the Jailhouse Now", Pink Anderson, recorded May 29, 1950, by Paul Clayton

"My Baby Left Me This Morning", "Baby, Please Don't Go", "Mama Where Did You Stay Last Night", "Big House Blues", "Meet Me in the Bottom", "Weeping Willow Blues", "Baby I'm Going Away", "Thousand Woman Blues", "I Had My Fun", "Every Day in the Week", "Try Some of That"

"You Don't Know My Mind", "That's No Way to Do", "Weeping Willow Blues", "Meet Me in the Bottom", "I Got a Woman 'Cross Town", "Greasy Greens", "Boweevil", "Chicken", "He's in the Jailhouse Now", "The Titanic", "The Boys of Your Uncle Sam", "Baby Tate", "See What You Done Done", recorded live in Spartanburg, 1961–1962, by Samuel Charters

"I Got Mine", "Greasy Greens", "I Got a Woman 'Way Cross Town", "Travelin' Man", "Ain't Nobody Home but Me", "That's No Way to Do", "In the Jailhouse Now", "South Forest Boogie", "Chicken", "I'm Going to Walk Through the Streets of..."

"The Titanic", "Boweevil", "John Henry", "Betty and Dupree", "Sugar Babe", "The Wreck of the Old 97", "I Will Fly Away", "The Kaiser", "In the Evening"

See also

References

  1. 1 2 Dead Rock Stars website - accessed February 2008
  2. ↑ Komara, Edward, ed. (October 28, 2005). The Routledge Encyclopedia of the Blues. New York: Routledge. ISBN 978-0-415-92699-7. OL 7496252M.
  3. 1 2 Allmusic biography
  4. ↑ Russell, Tony (1997). The Blues: From Robert Johnson to Robert Cray. Dubai: Carlton Books. pp. 88–89. ISBN 1-85868-255-X.
  5. ↑ Bio on the CD Sittin' Here Singing the Blues.
  6. ↑ "National Music Museum Photo, National Music Museum Pictures, Stills, Alvin "Little Pink" Anderson, a Carolina bluesman now living in". Newshopper.sulekha.com. Retrieved 2011-12-30.
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