Memphis Minnie: The Guitar Queen Who Beat the Boys at Their Own Game
In 1933, Big Bill Broonzy walked into a Chicago nightclub for a guitar contest against Memphis Minnie. The prize was a bottle of whiskey and a bottle of gin. Broonzy was Chicago’s reigning blues king, but when Minnie finished playing, the crowd made it clear who’d won. Years later, Broonzy wrote in his autobiography that she could “make a guitar speak words, make a guitar cry, moan, talk, and whistle the blues.” Coming from one of the era’s greatest guitarists, that meant something.
From Mississippi to Beale Street
Lizzie Douglas was born June 3, 1897, in Louisiana, though she later claimed New Orleans. She was the oldest of 13 children, and her family called her “Kid” – a nickname that stuck throughout her life. When she was seven, the family moved to Walls, Mississippi, south of Memphis. She got her first guitar at age eight, a Christmas present that changed everything.
At 13, she left home for good and headed to Memphis’s Beale Street. She played with jug bands and string groups, performing on street corners and at Church Park. It was hard work for a teenage girl on her own, but she built a reputation as both a skilled guitarist and someone who could handle herself. From 1916 to 1920, she toured with the Ringling Brothers Circus, which gave her experience performing for all kinds of audiences.
Her early partner was Willie Brown, who’s better known now for playing with Charlie Patton. Another guitarist, Willie Moore, later said Minnie was actually the better player – “She was a guitar king,” he recalled.
In 1929, a Columbia Records scout heard Minnie and her second husband Kansas Joe McCoy playing outside a Beale Street barbershop for tips. The scout brought them to New York to record, and Columbia gave them the stage names Memphis Minnie and Kansas Joe. Their song “Bumble Bee” became a hit – so much so that Minnie recorded it five times over her career. Muddy Waters later borrowed from it for his “Honey Bee.”
They also recorded “When the Levee Breaks” at that first session, a song about the 1927 Mississippi flood. Led Zeppelin made it famous in 1971, but Minnie’s original captured what it was like to watch everything wash away.
Making It in Chicago
Minnie and Joe moved to Chicago in 1930. She didn’t just survive there – she thrived. The cutting contest with Broonzy became the stuff of legend, though historians think Broonzy’s account might have combined several different contests. What matters is that Minnie regularly competed against the best male guitarists and won.
She had a reputation for toughness. Blues musician Johnny Shines remembered that if anyone gave her trouble, “Guitar, pocket knife, pistol, anything she get her hand on she’d use it.” She chewed tobacco while performing and kept a cup nearby to spit in between verses. But she also performed in expensive dresses and jewelry, looking glamorous while playing with the intensity of any man on stage.
After divorcing McCoy in 1935, Minnie experimented with different styles. She married guitarist Ernest “Little Son Joe” Lawlars in 1939, and they made some of her best recordings together. In 1941, she started playing electric guitar – one of the first blues musicians to make the switch, before even Muddy Waters.
“Me and My Chauffeur Blues,” recorded in May 1941, became her biggest hit. The dual guitar work with Little Son Joe and Minnie’s vocals made it a standout. Jefferson Airplane, Big Mama Thornton, and Nina Simone all covered it later.
A Pioneer Who Adapted
Minnie started in country blues with intricate fingerpicking, where one guitar handled bass, treble, and rhythm all at once. Her early recordings with Kansas Joe show both guitars working together, trading lead and rhythm parts in a way that sounds fresh even now.
When she moved to Chicago, she added piano, drums, and horns to her sound. When electric guitars became available, she embraced them immediately. She also stood while playing, which was unusual at the time, and commanded the stage completely.
Minnie recorded about 200 songs during her career from 1929 to the early 1950s. Her work influenced Muddy Waters, Howlin’ Wolf, and countless others. Bonnie Raitt and Big Mama Thornton both cited her as a major influence.
By the late 1950s, her health was failing. She and Little Son Joe returned to Memphis in 1957. She appeared occasionally on local radio and played at a 1958 tribute concert for Big Bill Broonzy. That was her last performance. After strokes in 1960 and following Little Son Joe’s death in 1961, she spent her final years in a nursing home, living on Social Security and donations from fans.
Memphis Minnie died August 6, 1973, at 76. She’s buried in New Hope Cemetery in Walls, Mississippi, where she grew up. The Blues Foundation inducted her into their Hall of Fame in 1980.
Suggested Listens:
- “Bumble Bee” (1929) – Her first hit shows the fingerpicking skill and playful style that made her famous in the acoustic era.
- “Me and My Chauffeur Blues” (1941) – Her biggest commercial success demonstrates her electric guitar work and confident vocal delivery.
- “When the Levee Breaks” (1929) – The original version of what became Led Zeppelin’s rock classic, capturing the 1927 Mississippi flood in vivid detail.
Published on Blues Chronicles
