ERIC BIBB

From his sweetly sonorous fingerpicking to his emotionally powerful vocals, Eric Bibb is one of the finest exponents of acoustic blues working today. A teenage interest in early blues recordings set him on a lifelong path of discovery, digging up the deepest roots of blues music and incorporating that powerful spirit into his work. He’s a fascinating scholar of blues history and a real gent to boot. Who better to give us a primer in what matters in blues guitar, looking back over the whole span of its history.

You’re a real student of early blues guitar – some of those recordings can sound quite other-worldly to the modern ear. What do you take from them as a player?

“One of the things that’s fascinating to me about early blues recordings… is that a lot of the people who were good didn’t necessarily just play for a living, or travel around like Bukka White or somebody. A lot of them were farmers who basically played part-time, maybe for neighbours. John Hurt really wasn’t a juke-joint kind of guy;