Robert Shaw

February 20, 1981

S = Jim Standifer
RS = Robert Shaw
Mrs. RS = Mrs. Robert Shaw

S We're with Mr. Robert Shaw in Austin, Texas. We're at his home. He's a very famous blues singer, good blues pianist. Mr. Shaw, could you tell me where you were born?
RS I was born in a little town out from Houston just close to a line of the county. You see, Houston is in Harris County and the adjoining county on the Southwest side is Fuller Ben County. My daddy had a ranch out there.

S A ranch?
RS And farm.

S So you grew up as a ranch boy.
RS Yes, a ranch boy. Well, my mama was a city lady and that gave me a half and half boy. My mama would go back into the city two or three times a week.

S When did you start to get into music?
RS When I was a little boy about 7 or 8 years old or maybe 6, my mama bought a - she always had to have the best she thought - but she was fortunate enough to have a man that could buy for her, she bought a Steinway Baby Grand.

S When was this?
RS That was along about in 19-must have been about 1918 or 1917.

S Yes, Steinway Baby Grand then cost quite a few bucks.
RS Yes, but he could buy it. He had plenty cattle and he would run share croppers and all that kind of stuff. They cost money then, let alone now.

S I know. How many in your family. Did you have any brothers and sisters?
RS There were 6 of us in the last bunch. I came along in the last bunch. He had been married twice. I had 3 or 4 half sisters with his first wife, and I came along in the last bunch where there were 6 of us.

S Now is Shaw, is that part of the country typical or known for the Shaw name or the Shaw family? I know up in Itaska, Texas there's a Robert Shaw there.
RS Yes. There's some in Huntsville, some in San Antonio, but I ain't no relation to them.

S Well, Shaw is sort of a popular name, then.
RS Yeah. It was a different Shaw altogether. Of course, some people have asked me quite a bit about some of those people in Huntsville, Texas, but I don't know them. Of course, my ____ location is down around Fort Bend, Harris County, Brazoria County and Madagorda County.

S Now what towns or cities are located in those counties so that we can sort of ...
RS Houston and Stafford and then you get over in Brazoria County you come into Angelton and Shenango(?) and Sandy Point and you get over to Madagorda County you run into Bay City and West _____ and all that kind of stuff down there.

S Now as a boy, did you do blues singing? I talked to Little Brother Montgomery who you know and you said you may have played with him?
RS Yes. We went overseas together.

S I see. Now, as a boy how did you get your experience? How did you learn the piano?
RS I was learning to play pretty good but I hadn't got the way I thought I could trust it.

S What do you mean by that?
RS Is being good enough to make my living at it.

S Oh, I see.
RS So, I left around Fort Bend and Harris County and went to play in Galveston, and I stayed around there. I sat down at the piano one evening-I had been there 2 or 3 days-and I got to bouncing on that piano pretty good. And there were 2 real beautiful gals who were in this house. It was one of those sporting houses, and one came through the room where I was fooled with the piano and she tied into that music and come into popular singing and that turned me on, see?

S How old were you then?
RS I wasn't out of my teens. I was just around 19-18 or 19-maybe 20. Right in there. But I stayed around there a little while, but I never did like Galveston. I stayed down there 3 or 4 weeks and then I left. Then I went down to Sandy Point. That's in Brazoria County and I stayed around there about a week, and I came back up to Houston and that's the real big time in town.

S Did you know Sippy Wallace at the time? She was in Houston around those times.
RS No, I didn't get acquainted with her and I heard her. Do you know I haven't heard that name in a many year, but it's familiar with me. I didn't get acquainted with her, but I know that she was out there. There sure was some good ones going on that you didn't get no records of.

S I see that one of the big Texas Victoria Spidor was down here, too, wasn't she?
RS Who?

S Victoria Spidor.
RS I think so.

S She was one of the big Texas ones. Well, anyway I don't want to get you away from your story about how you got started.
RS So, it was ...

S You mentioned that you were at this sporting house and this woman came by.
RS Yeah. Oh, she was about 18 or 20 years old. Maybe 22. And man, when I hit that piano and had my little tune going, man, she got to rocking and popping her fingers, you know, and that kind of turned me on. And, look-a-here, you know, I'm fixing to get started here, and I never could get to operating. You notice that both of my hands you can tell how my hands were operation. You could understand both of them.

S In other words, you're not just a right-handed player?
RS That's right.

S I see.
RS Well, that's the kind of piano player I wanted to be and it took me a long time to learn that style and there were a lot of techniques in it.

S Even before you got to this place, you were a teenager, did you do any work in the church as a little boy?
RS Yeah. I was at the church. They couldn't open the door. Now, there was some times that the door wasn't open. There was Sunday School, Church and I stayed around church a long time until I grew up and grew up and grew up and around where I lived, I got a little bit afraid.

S Why?
RS It was-everybody knew me. I was one of the top kids that was around there. My daddy run the market, he run the Bar-B-Q pit, all that was combined and everything he'd have to hire somebody to do a special thing, he'd put me with them. Well, he hired a fellow to do the Bar-B-Q'ing and he'd get it ready on a, say, a Thursday morning where my mama would take over on Friday morning. The fellow done cooked the meat and got it just about everything ready and I was with this fellow. He'd always put me with somebody like that all the time and after so long a time, I learned how to do it. So he was without a job.

S Was this the Texas Bar-B-Q you're talking about.
RS Yes. Oh, man, that's some good stuff when you run across somebody that knows what to do. A lot of them scorch it, but they can't do it. They try, but that's some good eating if it's done right. So, I run the meat route. I cut meat for 3 meat wagons. I started to cut them at about 3 o'clock in the morning on a Saturday and I'd have meat for 3 wagons. Just any cut of meat you'd want, it was on the wagons. It was on a cotton belt down in there. There's big farmers down there. A lot of them. Lots of wealthy black people was in that area.

S Now, how does this relate to your music, though?
RS Well, I'm coming on back to the music.

S Okay.
RS And so, I would sell meat a little while and when I'd get caught up then I would go and rehearse the piano and try to learn how to play. Well, there was a guy around there. He was a real good friend of mine. His name was Harold Holliday. I wish you could have heard him. He was something.

S This was a singer?
RS What?

S Was he a singer?
RS Yeah. He didn't sing a whole lot, but he let you know he could fix you up. He was something. So, I think I got one of his records up there, when he was recording. Didn't get much of it, and we had another one named Will, but he was a one-legged guy and they called him Peg Leg Will. He was just about your color, but he was a much heavier man than you-stout of built. He laid around those sporting houses all the time. He would do them poor women so bad. He loved to shoot dice. If he got into a crap game when it was going on and didn't get hold of any money he would go in there and if he done got hungry late in the night he would go in there where they was eating and drinking going on, and if he didn't beg somebody out of 50 or 60 cents, you know you've got enough food to feed 7 people with 50 or 60 cents in those days. And them women said, " ____ come on and play my piece. Come on and play my piece." He said, "Aw, get away from here." And she'd say, "Come on here and play that piece." And he'd say "get away from here you goddamned cow, you." Man, that man was so pissed, and they just loved him to death because he could sure play ___.

S Why was this sporting house so popular for men and blues performers? Now, you mentioned you used to play in this sporting house and Peg-Leg played in the sporting houses. I remember Hubie Blake told me he played in sporting houses.
RS Man, them women, there be a whole of them hanging in and out of there, going and coming all the time, one is liable to have a big night and she would make a bunch of money. She would give you $10 or $20 to play one piece.

S I see. Did the clientele, the men that were coming, did they like to hear a lot of blues?
RS Oh, yeah. Man, they'd eat up anything if you could find somebody to play them. Them things, they'd upset you because you know, we'd been depressed all our lives and it gets you shook up.

S Are you saying that just because being Black helped you be a better blues singer than...
RS I ain't said it was because of that, but depressed is one of the things that makes you have that feeling. Or either you would have a misunderstanding with your girlfriend or your girlfriend have a misunderstanding with you of what she thinking may not be true or it could be true and you just can't get her to see your side of it and she can't get you to see her side. That's what they call the blues when you get low in spirit.

S You notice most of the big blues singers seems to have been women. Why do you suppose is that? You know, you hear about the Sippy Wallaces, the Alberta Hunters. I just talked to Alberta, Bessie Smith, Ma Rainy.
RS Now, that was my gal. Bessie Smith, Mavey Smith, Ida Cox.

S Right. Ida Cox.
RS Ma Rainy.

S Well, did you play with them?
RS No. They were a little older than I was. I was a kid like when... Bessie Smith hit the market along about 1918 or 1919.

S And you would listen to it?
RS Yes, and I was playing-I went over to one of my sister's houses-my half sister's houses who was older than I was and she put that record on the Victrola - that's when they had the ones that you would crank with your hands. And she called me in there. That's what got me started. When I was listening to a song that Bessie Smith come up with -- the very first song she had on the market was "Trouble, Trouble, I've had them All of My Days".

S How did that go? Do you know?
RS Yeah. She turned this entire United States upside down. (he sings it for Dr. Standifer) Man, I'm telling you she'd ____ this country. And the next morning, people were going to work in Houston and it was kind of weather like it is now. It was in the fall of the year, I believe, or spring, but anyway I knew it was either the fall or the spring. I went upon the streets and all the people were just ganged up where the people would catch the streetcar by the hundreds, and the people were playing these records all up and down the streets. This very particular record and they were standing there listening at it and would say, "wait, I'm going to catch the next car". Man, that Bessie Smith was really something, I'm telling you for sure.

S Do you think Bessie Smith made any money out of all those records?
RS I'll tell you what. That's something you've got to wonder. I don't believe she did get too much. Just like Joe Louis-a deal like Joe Louis' deal-he made plenty money, too, but he didn't get much.

S Just went to his agents?
RS Yeah.

S Have you ever had an agent?
RS No. I never did stop long enough. I just made it the best I could. But I have had a little help, but I never could tangle up with Black and White too much, because I always fed them and I got some pretty raw deals in there, but I cut for a guy here a few years ago.

S Here in Texas?
RS Yeah. I didn't only get out there and get it. The way they'd do you, they would get you to cut an album for them and they'd keep this album as long as it's hot and then after it gets hot after it kind of levels off, they'll take and mix a song off of your album and take another song off of another album and put it over here with this song and they'd make an album of their own from the company. Do you understand?

S I see.
RS And then they've got another album.

S So it becomes their own and that way they don't have to give you the money for it.
RS No. They don't have to give you nothing.

S Well, you shouldn't have to watch those... What are some of the big names besides you Texans blues black musicians? At least you know Alex Moore up in Dallas.
RS Yeah, I know Alex.

S Can you think of some others? He mentioned a Cadillac in which I had never heard of.
RS What?

S He mentioned someone by the name of Cadillac.
RS I didn't know Cadillac either.

S Was that a woman?
RS No. I think it was a man. I kind of heard of him. We had another one but he's dead, too. His name was Willie Pickett.

S Where was he from? In this general area, too?
RS Down here at Hempstead.

S Was he a guitar player or piano player?
RS No, he was a piano player.

S Is Texas or was Texas good to the black musicians in the old days? In the '20s?
RS Right in this area in here was about the best that I know and further down around Houston and Beaumont and Galveston, Bay City, Wharten(?), Glen Floria, Sandy Point...

S Is that where most of the blues singers were?
RS Yeah, they hung up and down that Gulf Coast.

S Why weren't they up in Dallas and Ft. Worth?
RS They never did go there. I'm the only one that pulled out. Like I told you, how come I pulled out is that I got scared, but I never did finish telling you about it. I could ride bucking horses, I could ride them old bulls you see them ride in the rodeo, I liked all that stuff.

S Right.
RS And people knew me-a world of people from that angle. And I could rope real good. So, everybody knew me and the people down would ask me to do anything and sometimes it was wrong and sometimes it may be-what I mean is sometimes it may be the wrong thing to do and it might be the right thing. And them boys around there was 2 years younger than I, 2 years older than I, and my age and I get to imagine there's 25 or 30 of them. And some of them boys some of them commenced coming up dead.

S Why?
RS What?

S Why? You mean accidentally? Or...
RS Well, that's what makes you wonder. You don't know. Well, some of them was kind of mean. They didn't stand for you to mess with them. If you would fool them too much, you would get him up and he'll fight you for sure.

S Well, now, were they musicians that you're talking about?
RS Some of them were musicians and some of them weren't.

S Well, maybe, you know, blues singers have a notorious reputation for being womanizers, drinkers. Is that just a reputation or is that really true?
RS That's the reputation of them. They just like make you like that and you get in bad if you don't watch yourself.

S Are you saying then that reputation is true?
RS What?

S Is this something that blues singers like to make people believe? Or is it really true?
RS It's just like a ______ _____ like _____. Some people can't help from bothering and some don't belong to them. Right?

S Now wait a minute. Repeat that again.
RS It's a disease something like a rogue. He can't help from bothering something that don't belong to him.

S A rogue in a way is a rogue as a rogue. He has to be what he has to be.
RS Yeah. That's right.

S So you're saying then that blues singers are just typically into all of those things?
RS Some of them were like that. Some of them not.

S Were you like that?
RS No. I made it on pretty good. And I was around them people all the time.

S Did you drink a lot when you were younger?
RS No. I sure didn't.

S Did you womanize?
RS Well, yeah, I run them ___ and raised, yeah, I'd get. That was the game. You see, a hustling woman, she has to have her man to have to have his success because he got to look out for her. They make plenty money alright, but most of them gamble it all.

S The blues singers make plenty money, or the women?
RS The women make plenty money, yeah, and they _____ ____,

S Well, now you hear Bessie Smith who had many different love affairs and she seemed to feel that she gave her money away to no-count men.
RS Well, that's the way most of those kind of women do.

S They don't pick men very well, huh?
RS No. They don't. They pick the sorriest men in the world.

S Somebody would do them wrong and they'd still hang around, huh?
RS Yeah, and some of them you had to beat her every day to get along with them. Then you'd send her to the hospital and everything and no sooner she hit the ground she won't stop until get to you.

S Well, what are some of the tunes that you wrote for yourself that you still sing today?
RS That was one of the first that I played a while ago.

S What was the name of that one?
RS That one was "It's a Low-down Dirty Shame", I got a brand new baby but I'm afraid to call her name.

S You want to sing a couple of versions of that and I'll follow you over with the camera if you'd like. Now, we've been just talking about the song you played for us earlier. What's the name of it again?
RS "A Low Down Dirty Shame"?

S And you wrote that. When did you write it.
RS I can't remember now. I had to sure do a lot of work to get it.

S Did you write it in your younger days?
RS Oh, yeah, I wrote it in my younger days.

S How old are you now, Mr. Shaw?
RS I'll be 73 in August.

S 73? When were you born?
RS 1908.

S 1908. Now that you are 73 years old, are you retired?
RS No. Just semi.

S When you say semi, for example, you said today you were out performing. What kind of work were you doing?
RS Oh, I was playing for the city schools.

S City schools? What did you play for them?
RS Oh, I played jazz and blues.

S I see. Is that some type of contract you have or did they invite you to come out.
RS Well, that's what they call Black History Month.

S Oh, that's right. And you were contacted to do some work for them in the schools with the kids? Was this for elementary, junior high, and senior high?
RS And at the colleges.

S Oh, at the colleges, too? Where, Houston Tellison maybe?
RS No. The Community College.

S Oh, there's a Community College here. I see. Did you have a good audience?
RS Yeah. Oh, Lord, yeah.

S What are some of the other pieces besides the one you just named that you played for them?
RS Oh, man, I was doing all kinds of stuff.

S Did they ask you any questions about... Did you have to give a talk?
RS No. I can kind of upset them a little bit. I can switch tunes. You know, some musicians, they never make their music whether it's up or down, and you watch your audience and you know how close you're getting to them in your phrases, well you can step down or step up and get them.

S In your performance, especially when you're performing in night clubs, can you handle hecklers? You know sometimes you have this drunk bum that comes in and he heckles a lot.
RS Oh, I know all about those.

S How do you handle them?
RS Just agree with everything they say.

S And keep on playing?
RS Yeah.

S I guess the trick is not to let them get you so
RS No, get you all out of line and worked up there, you see, and then they got you. But, if you agree with them, that's just like talking to yourself.

S How do you feel about getting older? One of the things that Lil Brother Montgomery and I talked about, he said, "well, Jim, you know I'm getting older now." So, I'd like to ask you, now that you're getting older, do you feel you're just as good now as you were when you were younger?
RS No, and nobody else.

S Why?
RS The stuff ain't there. What you had a whole lot of has done left you.

S Do you think you can awaken it to bring it back?
RS No. No. There are some skills about yourself ongoing if they hold out pretty good, but you can't even think as good as you used to.

S Do you fingers do whatever you want them to do?
RS Yeah. My fingers do all right. I have a sense I can roll that music and it keeps my fingers in top shape.

S Well, what would you say... Did you prepare for your old age? In other words, did you say "okay, I know I'm going to be 70 some day and I'm not going to be able to do everything that I can do now.
RS Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah.

S How did you prepare?
RS Well, I'll tell you, you know this, just because you get everything you need to live, there's no use to take the rest of it and throwing it away, so you use some and save some.

S Oh, maybe you're saying that since you're older you don't try to...
RS No, you start that way before that time. You know you're going to get older if you keep on living. You're going to slow down; you may not be old but you're surely going to slow down if you keep on living.

S And so now, you're doing the same thing but you're doing less of it.
RS Yeah. Doing less of it. Yeah, I don't do as much.

S Do you think old people-when I say old people I mean people in their 60s and 70s-stop performing and stop doing things because they're old or do they stop because they don't have the power anymore.
RS Some people can't stand the idea of being a senior citizen. It kind of insults them a little bit.

S Why do you think that's so?
RS I don't know but they get kind of _____ that if you stay here, you're sure going to get that way.

S So the best thing to do is prepare for it, huh?
RS Prepare for it. Now, it's just like if you were standing out there in the yard and it goes to raining, you're going to stand out there and get wet and talk about it after you done got wet. No, you'd come up on the gallery, wouldn't you?

S Right. I see. Well, tell me some of the big names. You mentioned you did know and work with Lil Brother Montgomery. Can you think of any other big names or groups that you used to listen to or worked with.
RS Old Sachmo was my main, time and type of person, and I was crazy about his music, and that's old Louie.

S Did you ever meet him?
RS Not personally. I would always come in town and he was leaving town.

S You know Lil Brother Montgomery gave me a letter that Satchmo wrote him just about a week before he died.
RS Is that right?

S And he and Satch, as you know, were very close. But what do you think about his singing? Satchmo's singing?
RS Satchmo's singing?

S Yeah.
RS His speech wasn't too good, but when he got in a tight spot, he'd mumble it out there some kind of way, but he'd get to going. I like him.

S Why do you suppose he was so popular?
RS You see, he was so popular, you see, Satchmo could make these people clown and he could clown some himself and people like that when you're drinking. Now, the clowning they do now in these modern days, they do this rock, but you see, they added another beat to the jazz timing and knocked it all up further and they call it rock, but the jazz wrote that timing. That emotions timing? You know, that double time? Old Louis started that stuff.

S And they just added a few things to it today?
RS Yeah. Just another beat, you know, they got 5 beats where he got 4.

S Can you communicate with the young kids today since they'll listen to all the disco?
RS Oh, yeah, I have love for younger people.

S Do you think the young kids like the blues and the kind of music you play?
RS Some of them like it, but you know you'll never get 100 percent. And some of them don't like it. You take some people that can't dance, they like anything, but people what can dance knows a balanced type of music when they hear it.

S So you feel the dance or the person that can move, but all Black folks can dance, can't they?
RS No. Well, one this place here can't dance a lick.

S Well, you get them in church, they get happy and they're dancing all over the floor.
RS Yeah, they cut up like that, but I can't dance to nothing. Some people can't dance to a time a thing.

S Just can't keep that time, huh? Why do you suppose that? They just can't hear?
RS Well if you never kind of get a hold to yourself and settle down and reason with yourself on the timing-1, 2, 3, 4; 1, 2, 3, 4, you'll never do it.

S What about race relations and racism in Texas? Texas is not known to be the best place for a Black person to live, even in the old days, but have you had any racial problems when you were growing up, especially in the music business?
RS No, it is pretty good. It's just hard to beat.

S It's gotten better, but I'm thinking about when you were 40...
RS It ain't been as bad as they say it is. It ain't never been like that. Now, you can find some places where there ain't none of us there. You know, you can find a stupid person most anywhere. You can just get a bunch of people together and you're going to get a crackpot there as sure as the _____. Now, that's the way that goes. Now you take some of that old town where they've been farming and there's a cotton belt and they've been beating the unlearned people all they lives and that's the way they got what they did was by beating them out of what they had and they're kind of funny around them kind of places. You'll find a lot of some of that stuff around there.

S For example, where? There are some things like that in Texas?
RS In Navasota down there.

S Navasota?
RS It's bad country.

S What about Corpus Christi?
RS Corpus Christi is pretty good. I never was around Corpus Christi too much.

S But Navasota is pretty tough, huh?
RS Ahhh, that's bad country down there. It's bad country and you'll find if you go on down there below San Antone, you'll find some towns down there just as white Lilly like it's been all the time.

S Well, as you were singing in these different places at these sporting houses, were these sporting houses Black sporting houses or White houses, or were they mixed?
RS They were mixed.

S Do you mean they would actually have sporting houses where there were White women and they would let Black men come in and buy what they wanted in Texas?
RS How'd you say that?

S There were actually sporting houses in Texas where a Black man could go in and...
RS Now, who was the operator?

S Well, let's say you'd have a sporting house in the 1930s and 1940s operated by a white madam.
RS No, they didn't fool around with that too much in them days. Whites only had clubs-fancy clubs. Now you take the

S Then who had the sporting houses? Blacks?
RS The Blacks. The low income Whites didn't have nowhere to go in the prohibition time and what few that did go out, they'd have to go to the Black's place.

S Well, did those Blacks madams have both White women and Black women in those houses?
RS Oh, yeah. Yeah, sometimes they were like that. You'd run into a place like that.

S The places where you worked were they mostly Black women or White women?
RS No, sometimes they were mixed and sometimes they were Black. They got a town down here just a little below Houston down there and in those years there wasn't a White woman in town.

S They were all Black?
RS They were all Black. But there was 2 White men there though in that whole town and it turned out to be the lightest thing there was lighter than me.

S Well, tell me a little bit more about your singing and then I want you to move over to the piano. I'm still not too clear as to how you learned. Can you read music?
RS Yeah.

S Where did you learn? Did you teach yourself?
RS No

S Did your wife teach you?
RS No, another lady. Her name was ...

S You think it's important to read music, then, obviously?
RS I'll tell you all about it.

S Clara Brown taught you to read music. She taught you piano lessons?
RS Yeah.

S What kind of techniques would she use to get you to read music? Scales?
RS She mostly used spiritual lessons or either she goes to the music store and get the kind of music that she wanted me to have.

S Was this a Black woman?
RS Yeah.

S Did you ever play in church for a choir?
RS No, I never did like that.

S For the Blues singing, did you listen to other singers and try to imitate the style?
RS You can always get something for a sound you got somewhere and you probably could use it somewhere with your music, and that's just the thing you've been trying to get your hands on but you couldn't come up with it yourself. A musician always listens to other music.

S Can you hear something and then play it?
RS I can play at it, but it would take me a day or two before I really get it like balanced like I'd want it to be. Now, I could play it, but it would be like putting a left shoe on the right foot.

S But, still I'm trying, you play by ear, you can also hear something and play it.
RS Oh, yeah, you can get that down.

S Pick it out.
RS Pick it out pretty good.

S Are you making any money now or did you make money when you were younger as a performer?
RS Yeah. I'm making plenty money right now.

S Now, when you say plenty money, what do you mean?
RS Oh, whenever I feel good and go out and feel that way I be playing 4 or 5 years to make the money I make in one night now as I made in them days ___ ____

S Yeah, but that money doesn't go as far.
RS What?

S You just said that 50 cents in the old days you could buy at least ___ ____
RS Right

S But now you've got $10 and she has maybe one bag.
RS That's right. That's the way it is so far.
Music here
RS The name of it is Sandy Feet.

S Why would they call blues like that Barrel Hell?
RS I don't know.

S Why is it called Barrel Hell?
RS Well, I can easily explain that to you in just a minute. I'm going to play the same piece again.
Music here

S Now that was two different ways playing the same piece, huh?
RS Same piece, yeah. You see, that was old Peg Leg Will. Now this here is what them women would give him the devil about.

<Music here>

RS That was about 3:30 in the morning. Now, this is the Texas special, here, and that's the reason nobody would come down that Gulf Coast-this number here.

<Music here>

RS You know, it wasn't no use to going on that Gulf Coast if couldn't play that number. Sure enough he was something.

S Is that-would you say that that's sort of...
RS That's what you call the Mawgranders. That's what those ____ people called it. Them women there. We had a gal down there. She was very good looking, and she was bright and they named her Mary Mawgrander. You couldn't hold her when that piece would start.

S Let me see if I'm getting this word right. Mawgrander. I see. Where did they get a term like that? How did that term come out?
RS Oh man, them places, I'll tell you you'd be surprised.

S Does the Texas blues pianists have a style that is special to Texas? If you heard a pianist you'd say, "Look, I know he's from Texas."
RS Yes, they sure do. You see how I cut them keys there you heard that day you got to me?

S Right. It was very unique. So you can tell that if you hear a Texas performance, you'll know that he's a Texas performer. That's his style.
RS Yeah. Now, here's another piece you haven't heard, and it's been here a long time and that's "The Boogie Woogie".

S Yeah, I want to see what you've got.
RS You heard them do that but this is the way you do it (he plays it on piano). I want all of ya'll to pay attention like I tell you. When I say "hold yourself" I want all of ya'll to stop. Don't move. Get ready to hold yourself. Now stop. Don't move ____ until I tell you. ___ _____. I don't mind playing the blues when I'm getting drunk. ____, he's sober now. I've playing down here for the whole night through. Ain't had a decent thing in about an hour or two. Weather is growing cold outside. I need one good drink to make me warm inside. ___ ___ ___ with a jug of whiskey ___ ___ cannot understand what he's saying here because piano gets louder! Now, that's the "Boogie Woogie" for you.

S What did you say, that's a ___?
RS That's the "Boogie Woogie"

S I notice one other thing when you play the boogie now, I've heard Lil Brother play the Boogie Woogie, I've heard Marylou Williams play the Boogie Woogie and each of you have your own style. Marylou Williams someone playing piano here. You know how the Boogie Woogie got here. What do you mean you originated it?
RS Yeah. And I know how it's supposed to go. I learned it off the record. And Ole Boy, he was about your size. I got him in there.

S Who is this?
RS Ole Pine Top Smith.

S Now, Pine Top Smith is a Texas original?
RS No, no. He's an Alabama.

S But he's a Black pianist who used to do it and you imitated some of his style?
RS Yeah. That Boogie Woogie, he started that stuff. He's the one started it.

S Well, how did you make it yours? What did you put to it that...
RS I ain't put nothing to it. I just play it like he did.

S You play it just like he played it.
RS Yeah. That's the way he played it. The way I play it.

S Well, now, you said you could understand or you can tell when a Texas person is playing it.
RS They all got that slur(?) in their music like I was playing that in the music. All of them you'll find with a brogue like that.

S I like that term-a brogue. It's sort of a Texas brogue that you put on the piano, huh? Well, when you were playing the piano-I notice you mentioned that you have both hands working pretty effectively. Now, I saw a lot of right-handed work there, though, this time.
RS Huh?

S I saw a lot of right-hand work.
RS Yeah.

S But you said you think that your piano playing you have a sort of an equal ...
RS Yeah. I can even it out, sometimes when I don't feel like it, I don't get up in that high cotton.

S In that high cotton (laughing).
RS Right.

S Well, getting into the high cotton is a little bit more difficult than ...
RS Yeah, that's right.

S Do you find you play a little better as the night wears on? Let's say, if you're playing in a club and ...
RS Yeah, it gets late in the night.

S Yeah. Now, this is a little personal, but two things: some blues performers say they play better after they've had a couple of drinks. Do you drink?
RS Not too much.

S Do you think that you need it in order to ...?
RS Oh, yeah, you're going to get that feeling when you've been doing it a long time.

S Why is that, though? I mean if you're good you're good and you don't need any liquor.
RS No, but you just ain't got it. You ever been walking and you're steadily walking and you weren't getting nowhere?

S Yeah.
RS Huh? And you're walking the same speed that you was but you've got a little timing that you ain't used like you did. Well, that's the way that does, and you should take a little drink and it'll start you to thinking swift.

S Well, now that you-you told me that you were 72. 72 or 73?
RS I'll be 73 in August.

S All right, I'm going to get back to that again because what do you want to do with your music from this point out? Just play when you want to play?
RS Yeah. That's what I do now.

S In other words, if some gig comes along you'll do it, and if you don't feel like it you'll stay at home and relax. Okay. Why don't we get your wife in here. I'd like to tell her... Would you move your chair over, Mrs. Shaw, and we'll talk a little with you. Mrs. Shaw, we're in your home and it's a lovely home. Could you tell us a little bit about yourself and how long you've been married?
Mrs. RS I've been married 40 years.

S 40 years. Now, when you get to 50, what is that? What kind of anniversary is it? Golden?
Mrs. RS Yeah. I believe it's golden. I believe it is.

S When you first married Mr. Shaw was he involved very much in music?
Mrs. RS Yes. That was during World War II. During those years he played the classics.

S Oh, really?
Mrs. RS He only played the classics, especially the "Bells of Moscow". It was just beautiful. And we have tried to order that music and find it so he could play it again but we haven't been able to get it.

S So, he was as much in the blues as he is now? In those years?
Mrs. RS At that particular time, he didn't play the blues at all. At that particular time.

S Is it hard being married to a blues singer performer, pianist?
Mrs. RS No.

S It's easy?
Mrs. RS It's easy for me.

S When he was younger and you were younger did you ever get sort of jealous or green-eyed when he was out there playing in the _____?
Mrs. RS No. No, because I knew he'd be home.

S I guess that's what real love is. If you really love a man or love a woman, you trust him, huh?
Mrs. RS Oh, yeah, they'll be home. That's one thing, they're coming home. So that didn't bother me at all.

S Do you have children?
Mrs. RS I have one stepson.

S Where is he now?
Mrs. RS In Englewood, California.

S Oh, he's out there in the ______.
Mrs. RS We had a daughter but she died in 1974.

S I see. Where are you originally from? Are you originally from Texas?
Mrs. RS Oklahoma.

S Oklahoma?
Mrs. RS Yeah, I was born in Oklahoma.

S My mother is from Oklahoma, down near Tulsa and that part of the country.
Mrs. RS My relatives live up there, that is, I have some cousins, you know.

S How did you get to Texas? You found him and he brought you here?
Mrs. RS No, my father brought me to Texas at the close of World War I.

S I see.
Mrs. RS Yeah.

S I see, how old were you then?
Mrs. RS I don't know, I guess I must have been....

S Were you a teenager?
Mrs. RS Oh, no. I was about 9 when I came to Texas.

S Would you have considered yourself-how should I put this-a young woman who was really into... Well, for you to get hooked up with a blues performer, most of the women said they were already involved. They were worldly. In other words they were going to a variety of places, some of the women were in theater, some were in film. Were you on the peripheral of show business at all?
Mrs. RS No.

S Well, how did you happen to meet this man?
Mrs. RS Well, it was just an accident. I was getting my hair fixed. In those days, you know, you didn't have to go to the beauty shop, I was at a friend of mine's house getting my hair fixed is when I met him.

S Okay. And when you met him the first time, did you know, "Hey, look, this is it." You knew that he was the man? Or did you like him at first?
Mrs. RS Well, yes, I did. I liked him. Then I guess that was, because we've been together 40 years.

S And that's remarkable.
Mrs. RS And it ain't no breaking down now, we're there for good.

S In other words, for good or for worse, you've got each other, huh?
Mrs. RS That's right.

S How long have you been in this house?
Mrs. RS About 30 some odd years right here.

S My house up near Ft. Worth, we have a house something like this and we call it a shot-gun house because every time we had a brother or sister that was born, my daddy would put on another room to it. So when you come in the front door and you can see all the way back to the back. So, we have a big house, but it's a typical, had the garret, and we used to have a swing out there and all that, but this is a - I like this big living room.
Mrs. RS This was the thing in particular about this house that I liked. In the morning, all you have to do is look out the door and you can see the sunrise, if it's a beautiful sunrise and there's some pretty ones. And in the evening, you look out the back door and see the sun set. I didn't know that until last year. I looked out the door and there was the most beautiful sunrise.

S So another thing, you're still discovering beautiful things about this house.
Mrs. RS Beautiful things.

S After how many years again?
Mrs. RS 30 some odd years.

S 30 some odd years. Well, we're going to put Mr. Shaw back in if I can get a good picture of him. We're nearing to the end. Mr. Shaw, after 40 years, is it getting better or is it getting slower?
RS Oh, I've got the big one now. Well, you have to kind of take your time.
All laughing
RS It's well fixed when you get along now.

S I see. Do you take vacations together? Do you go anywhere?
RS We mostly go to church. We go to church more than we do anywhere.

S What church denomination are you?
RS Baptist.

S Baptist? Do you perform into the church choirs or doing any music in church?
RS No, I'm just a church goer.

S Do they know you play music?
RS Yeah. They know ____ ____.

S What do they think about you playing the blues? That's not exactly...
RS That's my personal business.

S And they shouldn't mix that, that's not their business.
RS That's my personal business.
Mrs. RS But he's going to play the blues Sunday.

S In church?
Mrs. RS Yeah.

S Great. Well, Mr. Thomas Dorsey, I don't know if you know him got Georgia Tom, the father of Gospel Music, he and James Cleveland. I was just talking with him in Chicago. He's 80 some years old and he was saying that when he played the blues for Maw Rainy, they kind of didn't like it very much because they thought it was unchristian, but he said the same thing, that was his business and what he did in his business world shouldn't have anything to do with what he did in church. But, now, of course, he's into Gospel music. You've heard "Precious Lord Take My Hand" of course. He wrote that and "There Will be Peace in the Valley", and he and Sippy Wallace did a show together just a few weeks ago at Michigan. So, he doesn't like to talk about his time when he wrote the blues very much for some reason. Mrs. Shaw, are you very active in church?
Mrs. RS Yes.
RS You can't find the blues in the Bible.

S That's because you, thank God, wrote it. You went back there. That's the beautiful thing about the blues is people like you made it happen and it happened when we got here from Africa. That's why we Black folks say, "Hey, look, that's our music." And all the White folks are imitating it.
RS They sure do, don't they?

S You see that?
Mrs. RS Well, this is a special program Sunday. That's what that's all about.

S Oh, I see.
Mrs. RS A special program celebrating Negro history for a week or a month, whatever it is.

S Do you get cable television?
Mrs. RS No. We don't have cable.

S All right, because I have a series of 13 half-hour programs on. I want to tell both of you and Mr. Shaw that it's been a wonderful experience being in your home and it's very good for me to be in Texas because with this project I have been looking for a solid year to get some Texas on here. I've been to Oslows, Norway, I've been to Paris, I've been to Chicago, New York, all over, getting Black musicians, as you saw in the binder, but my mother kept saying, "Can't you find anybody in Texas? That's where our family is from." She's not in Texas, she's in Detroit now. So, one of the reasons I'm in your home is because my parents felt that, she said "I couldn't finish this project unless I get somebody from Texas into this collection. This archives." And Michael Price in Texas, of the Fuller Star Telegram he helped me discover you and Mr. Alex Moore.
RS Who did you say?

S Michael Price. Do you know that news reporter. The White news reporter in Ft. Worth.
RS I think I do, yeah.

S Well anyway, it's been delightful being in your home, and we'll see if we can...
A skip in the tape here.

S Mr. Shaw, you were just telling me that you've discovered some books that had been written about you. Can you tell me something more about that? This book here over there for example you said Paul Oliver has written something in there and he didn't talk to you. What did you mean by that?
RS Well, all I know is that I ran into some students over at the University and there's a world of them over there that knows me, and they're the ones who told me about the book. That's all I know about it.

S So you looked in there. Could you bring that book over and ..... The Story of the Blues by Paul Oliver and on page-what page is your picture on there? Do they have page numbers on there? Anyway, but in that book is your picture. And he never came to talk to you about it all?
RS Nobody.

S He didn't get your permission?
RS Nobody.

S The publishers didn't?
RS No.

S And under your picture he writes about you? What does he say about you in there?
RS Oh, he got a long story here.

S About where you were born and the kind of music you played?
RS Yeah.

S Your wife mentioned another man-Lipscomb, you say?
Mrs. RS Yeah.
RS Yeah. And Lighting Hops.

S Lighting Hops. What's Lipscomb's first name.
Mrs. RS Mance
RS Mance

S Mance Lipscomb. Now, Mance Lipscomb is from Texas, too, isn't he?
RS Yeah.

S When did he die? About? Was it about 10 years ago?
RS & MRS It hadn't been that long.
RS Well, have they closed the store?
Mrs. RS Oh, yes.
RS He died in 1973 or 1974.

S Where did he live?
RS Navasota. He must have died-no, he didn't die in '73-either '74 or '75. When I went to Europe, it was in the fall of '74, wasn't it?

S And he died right after that?
RS He did before I went to Europe, didn't he? I think he did.

S When he died did he leave-was he making records when he was younger?
RS No. He never made no records until, oh, I guess it was around 1965.

S Was he a piano player also?
RS No, he was a guitar player.

S Guitar player? And singer?
RS He was singing in 1955 I believe.

S What was he performing?
RS He could soar up them tunes on that guitar. And I mean, he didn't leave no holes in it. He just soared it up.

S And he's known as one of the Texas pickers, huh?
RS Oh, I'm telling you.

S Does he mention any other Texas people in that book that you remember?
Mrs. RS Lightening Hopkins.

S Oh, is Lightening Hopkins from Texas?
RS Yeah.
Mrs. RS Yeah.

S Lightening Hopkins is still living, isn't he?
RS Yeah. Hopkins grew up down there in Tig(?), Texas.

S Oh. How old is Lightening Hopkins?
RS He ought to be around 74 or 75 years old.

S Oh, is he that old?
RS Yeah.
Mrs. RS Oh, yes.
RS Oh, yes. Didn't you recognize him when you looked at him in this book a while ago?

S Yeah. Just a few moments ago.
RS Yeah. Well that's him.

S He actually talked to him, then. Where is he living now, do you know?
RS He lives in Houston in the Third Ward.

S He does? Because I have a sister living in Third Ward, maybe she can contact him.
RS Yeah, oh yeah, they know he's around there.

S Now, I'd love to talk to him. Maybe before I leave Texas I should call down there. He's probably on the road traveling now, I bet.
RS He might be and you might catch him in Houston, because he goes to Dallas a lot. Dallas gets people from Houston a lot. But if you run into him, you break it down to get to him, because he's very peculiar. He can pick that guitar. He picks that guitar and man he gets to it.
Mrs. RS Have you ever heard him?

S Yes. Oh, have we ever. In fact, this is a picture of Lightning Hopkins. Okay. From Teag, Texas.
RS That's down below Conroe.

S Right. Conroe. I know that area. I know that very well. Well, I'll have to try to get in touch with him before I leave here.
RS You'll find him right down there in the Third Ward.

S Well, I want to put on this tape also that again the tape or the material is not to be used for anything but educational purposes, and this means that this tape will be in the collection.

END OF INTERVIEW