First, a word of explanation:
"History of the Blues" was originally produced as a quasi-documentary for an  interactive portfolio. It included about 10 minutes of sound clips, something simply impossible to include in this web-edited version. The title is meant to be a facetious reference to the Mel Brooks movie "History of the World, Part I." A better name would have been "A Brief Overview of the Blues."
   There's lots of information on the blues out on the web -- the blue highway is a great place to start, as well as the links of the blues WebRing.
   I tried to write straight from the heart about the blues, after 30 years of listening, loving, playing, and sometimes, living the blues.
   I played guitar for 6 years before hearing any real blues. I just simply wasn't exposed to it, and it wasn't "popular" on the radio. But once I heard the blues, and good blues guitar playing, I was hooked. Like many others, what I responded to was the emotional depth of the blues, something I call the "deep blue well" of emotion. For years I thought of the blues as "simple" music, until I heard Eric Clapton's comment that the blues has rules as strict as any classical music. I thought that was an apt observation. Certainly, simplicity is part of the appeal, though...

   A note: I've tried to balance the need for speed and quality for the web. The pages are best viewed sequentially -- enjoy.