Big Muddy Folk Festival
Boonville, Missouri
April 2—3, 2004

Mississippi blues artist Steve Cheseborough (pronounced CHEZZ-bro) brings to life the acoustic country blues of the 1920s and ’30s, live and wailing in the 21st century. He might have traded with Jim Nelson for some of his old 78s of Blind Boy Fuller, Memphis Minnie, Charley Patton, Robert Johnson and Bo Carter. Listening through the scratches and surface noise unknown to today’s CD owners, Steve can re-create the music loud, clear, here and now, preserving the spirit and intricacies of the original while making it his own. Singing from the heart, he accompanies himself on a shiny steel resonator guitar. He also adds a bit of harmonica and percussion to his one-man act.

"Steve did such a good job capturing the emotions associated with southern blues, I was tempted to ask him if the CD came with collard greens," one of his concert reviewers said.

An authority and “gazetteer of the blues,” Steve writes for Living Blues, Blues Access, Oxford Town and Mississippi magazines. He also wrote and photographed the guidebook Blues Traveling, published by University Press of Mississippi. He holds a master’s in Southern Studies from the University of Mississippi, and has lectured on blues topics at academic conferences.