Arhoolie Records is an American small

independent record label An independent record label (or indie label) is a record label that operates without the funding or distribution of major record labels; they are a type of small and medium-sized enterprise, small- to medium-sized enterprise, or SME. The labels ...

that was run by

Chris Strachwitz Christian Alexander Maria Graf Strachwitz von Groß-Zauche und Camminetz (; July 1, 1931 – May 5, 2023) was a German-born American record label executive and record producer. He was the founder and president of Arhoolie Records, which he esta ...

and is based in

El Cerrito, California El Cerrito (Spanish language, Spanish for "The Little Hill") is a city in Contra Costa County, California, United States, and forms part of the San Francisco Bay Area. It has a population of 25,962 according to the 2020 United States census, 2 ...

, United States (it is actually located in Richmond Annex but has an El Cerrito postal address.) The label was founded by Strachwitz in 1960 as a way for him to record and produce music by previously obscure "down-home blues" artists such as

Lightnin' Hopkins Samuel John "Lightnin'" Hopkins (March 15, 1912 – January 30, 1982) was an American country blues singer, songwriter, guitarist and occasional pianist from Centerville, Texas. In 2010, ''Rolling Stone'' magazine ranked him No. 71 on its li ...

Snooks Eaglin Fird Eaglin Jr. (January 21, 1936 or 1937 – February 18, 2009), known as Snooks Eaglin, was an American guitarist and singer based in New Orleans. In his early years he was sometimes credited under other names, including Blind Snooks Eaglin, ...

, and

Bill Gaither William James Gaither (born March 28, 1936) is an American singer and songwriter of Southern gospel and contemporary Christian music. He has written numerous popular Christian songs with his wife Gloria; he is also known for performing as par ...

. Strachwitz despised most commercial music as mouse music. Arhoolie still publishes

blues Blues is a music genre and musical form that originated among African Americans in the Deep South of the United States around the 1860s. Blues has incorporated spiritual (music), spirituals, work songs, field hollers, Ring shout, shouts, cha ...

and

folk music Folk music is a music genre that includes #Traditional folk music, traditional folk music and the Contemporary folk music, contemporary genre that evolved from the former during the 20th-century folk revival. Some types of folk music may be ca ...

Tejano Tejanos ( , ) are descendants of Texas Creoles and Mestizos who settled in Texas before its admission as an American state. The term is also sometimes applied to Texans of Mexican descent. Etymology The word ''Tejano'', with a ''J'' instead ...

music including

Lydia Mendoza Lydia Mendoza (May 31, 1916December 20, 2007) was a Mexican-American guitarist and singer of Tejano and traditional Mexican-American music. Historian Michael Joseph Corcoran has stated that she was "The Mother of Tejano Music", an art form that ...

, Los Alegres de Terán,

Flaco Jiménez Leonardo "Flaco" Jiménez (born March 11, 1939) is an American singer, songwriter and accordionist from San Antonio, Texas. He is known for playing Norteño, Tex Mex and Tejano music. Jiménez has been a solo performer and session musician, as ...

, regional Mexican music,

cajun The Cajuns (; French: ''les Cadjins'' or ''les Cadiens'' ), also known as Louisiana ''Acadians'' (French: ''les Acadiens''), are a Louisiana French ethnicity mainly found in the US state of Louisiana and surrounding Gulf Coast states. Whi ...

zydeco Zydeco ( ; ) is a music genre that was created in rural Southwest Louisiana by French speaking, Afro-Americans of Creole heritage. It blends African and Caribbean rhythms, blues and rhythm and blues with music indigenous to the Louisiana ...

, and bluegrass.

History

immigrated with his family from

Silesia Silesia (see names #Etymology, below) is a historical region of Central Europe that lies mostly within Poland, with small parts in the Czech Silesia, Czech Republic and Germany. Its area is approximately , and the population is estimated at 8, ...

in 1947, and became enamored with American regional music after seeing the film ''

New Orleans New Orleans (commonly known as NOLA or The Big Easy among other nicknames) is a Consolidated city-county, consolidated city-parish located along the Mississippi River in the U.S. state of Louisiana. With a population of 383,997 at the 2020 ...

''. He eventually settled in the San Francisco bay area, and in 1960 he headed to Texas to record bluesman

, but it turned out that Hopkins was in Berkeley for a performance engagement. He met up with historian Mack McCormick, and together they traveled to

Navasota, Texas Navasota is a city primarily in Grimes County, Texas, United States. The population was 7,643 at the 2020 census. In 2005, the Texas Legislature designated Navasota as the "Blues Capital of Texas" in honor of the late Mance Lipscomb, a Nava ...

where Strachwitz recorded

Mance Lipscomb Beau De Glen "Mance" Lipscomb (April 9, 1895 – January 30, 1976) was an American blues singer, guitarist and songster. Biography Lipscomb was born April 9, 1895, near Navasota, Texas. His father had been born into slavery in Alabama; his ...

for what would become the first Arhoolie LP, ''Texas Sharecropper and Songster''. The name "Arhoolie" was suggested by McCormick, deriving from a word for a

field holler The field holler or field call is mostly a historical type of vocal work song sung by field slaves in the United States (and later by African American forced laborers accused of violating vagrancy laws) to accompany their tasked work, to comm ...

. Strachwitz also recorded "Black Ace" Turner, "Li'l Son" Jackson and

Whistlin' Alex Moore Alexander Herman "Whistlin' Alex" Moore (November 22, 1899 – January 20, 1989), was an American blues pianist, singer and whistler. He is best remembered for his recordings of "Blue Bloomer Blues" (which he first recorded in 1929, as wel ...

on the same trip, and later in the year recorded

Big Joe Williams Joseph Lee Williams (October 16, 1903 – December 17, 1982) was an American Delta blues guitarist, singer, and songwriter, notable for the distinctive sound of his nine-string guitar. Performing over five decades, he recorded the songs "Baby, Pl ...

and

Mercy Dee Walton Mercy Dee Walton (born Mercy Davis Walton, August 3, 1915 – December 2, 1962) was an American jump blues pianist, singer and songwriter, whose compositions went from blues to R&B numbers. According to journalist Tony Russell in his book ''The ...

in California. He also began reissuing archive material, both of R&B singers such as

Big Joe Turner Joseph Vernon "Big Joe" Turner Jr. (May 18, 1911 – November 24, 1985) was an American blues shouter from Kansas City, Missouri. According to songwriter Doc Pomus, "Rock and roll would have never happened without him". Turner's greatest fa ...

(with Pete Johnson) and

Lowell Fulson Lowell Fulson (March 31, 1921March 7, 1999) was an American blues guitarist and songwriter, in the West Coast blues tradition. He also recorded for contractual reasons as Lowell Fullsom and Lowell Fulsom. After T-Bone Walker, he was the most i ...

who had recorded for the defunct

Swing Time In music, the term ''swing'' has two main uses. Colloquially, it is used to describe the propulsive quality or "feel" of a rhythm, especially when the music prompts a visceral response such as foot-tapping or head-nodding (see pulse). This sens ...

label in the 1940s, and old

country and western A country is a distinct part of the world, such as a state, nation, or other political entity. When referring to a specific polity, the term "country" may refer to a sovereign state, state with limited recognition, constituent country, or d ...

recordings on his Old Timey label, started in 1962. Strachwitz continued traveling to make field recordings of blues musicians, notably

Mississippi Fred McDowell Fred McDowell (January 12, 1904 – July 3, 1972), known by his stage name Mississippi Fred McDowell, was an American singer-songwriter and guitarist of hill country blues music. Career McDowell was born in Rossville, Tennessee. His parents we ...

(whom he first recorded in 1964),

Juke Boy Bonner Weldon H. Philip Bonner, better known as Juke Boy Bonner (March 22, 1932 – June 29, 1978) was an American blues singer, harmonica player, and guitarist. He was influenced by Lightnin' Hopkins, Jimmy Reed, and Slim Harpo. He accompanied himself ...

, and K. C. Douglas. From 1965, he also hosted a Sunday afternoon music program on

Pacifica Radio Pacifica may refer to: Art * ''Pacifica'' (statue), a 1938 statue by Ralph Stackpole for the Golden Gate International Exposition Places * Pacifica, California, a city in the United States ** Pacifica Pier, a fishing pier * Pacifica, a conce ...

KPFA KPFA (94.1 FM) is a public, listener-funded talk radio and music radio station located in Berkeley, California, broadcasting to the San Francisco Bay Area. KPFA airs public news, public affairs, talk, and music programming. The station signed o ...

-FM in

Berkeley, California Berkeley ( ) is a city on the eastern shore of San Francisco Bay in northern Alameda County, California, United States. It is named after the 18th-century Anglo-Irish bishop and philosopher George Berkeley. It borders the cities of Oakland, Cali ...

, which ran until 1995. In 1966, his friend Ed Denson introduced him to a local band,

Country Joe and the Fish Country Joe and the Fish was an American psychedelic rock band formed in Berkeley, California, in 1965. The band was among the influential groups in the San Francisco music scene during the mid-to-late 1960s. Much of the band's music was writ ...

, who were active in

anti-Vietnam war protests Protests against the Vietnam War took place in the 1960s and 1970s. The protests were part of a movement in opposition to United States involvement in the Vietnam War. The majority of the protests were in the United States, but some took place aro ...

at Berkeley. Strachwitz recorded the band singing "

I Feel Like I'm Fixin' To Die ''I-Feel-Like-I'm-Fixin'-to-Die'' is the second studio album by the influential San Francisco psychedelic rock band Country Joe and the Fish, released at the end of 1967. The album was released just six months after the debut and is another pri ...

", and gained a share of the song's publishing rights. Eventually, royalties from the song - particularly its appearance in the

Woodstock Festival The Woodstock Music and Art Fair, commonly referred to as Woodstock, was a music festival held from August 15 to 18, 1969, on Max Yasgur's dairy farm in Bethel, New York, southwest of the town of Woodstock, New York, Woodstock. Billed as "a ...

movie A film, also known as a movie or motion picture, is a work of visual art that simulates experiences and otherwise communicates ideas, stories, perceptions, emotions, or atmosphere through the use of moving images that are generally, sinc ...

and

soundtrack album A soundtrack album is any album that incorporates music directly recorded from the soundtrack of a particular feature film or television show. The first such album to be commercially released was Walt Disney's ''Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs ( ...

- helped subsidize the Arhoolie label, and enabled Strachwitz to buy a building in San Pablo Avenue,

as the label's headquarters. Strachwitz also won royalties for Fred McDowell from the

Rolling Stones The Rolling Stones are an English Rock music, rock band formed in London in 1962. Active for over six decades, they are one of the most popular, influential, and enduring bands of the Album era, rock era. In the early 1960s, the band pione ...

' performance of his song " You Gotta Move" on their ''

Sticky Fingers ''Sticky Fingers'' is the ninth studio album by the English rock band the Rolling Stones. It was released on 23 April 1971 on the Rolling Stones' new label, Rolling Stones Records. The Rolling Stones had been contracted by Decca Records an ...

'' album. During the 1970s, Strachwitz continued to record blues musicians, including Big Joe Duskin,

Charlie Musselwhite Charles Douglas Musselwhite (born January 31, 1944) is an American blues harmonica player and bandleader who came to prominence, along with Mike Bloomfield, Paul Butterfield, and Elvin Bishop, as a pivotal figure in helping to revive the Chicago ...

Big Mama Thornton Willie Mae "Big Mama" Thornton (December 11, 1926 – July 25, 1984), was an American singer and songwriter of blues and R&B. The ''Encyclopedia of Pop, Rock and Soul'' described Thornton by saying: "Her booming voice, sometimes 200-pound fra ...

Elizabeth Cotten Elizabeth "Libba" Cotten ( Nevills; January 5, 1893 – June 29, 1987) was an influential American folk and blues musician. She was a self-taught left-handed guitarist who played a guitar strung for a right-handed player, but played it upside do ...

, and

Robben Ford Robben Lee Ford (born December 16, 1951) is an American blues, jazz, and rock music, rock guitarist. He was a member of the L.A. Express and Yellowjackets (band), Yellowjackets and has collaborated with Miles Davis, Joni Mitchell, George Harriso ...

, as well as

Cajun The Cajuns (; French: ''les Cadjins'' or ''les Cadiens'' ), also known as Louisiana ''Acadians'' (French: ''les Acadiens''), are a Louisiana French ethnicity mainly found in the US state of Louisiana and surrounding Gulf Coast states. Whi ...

and

performers such as

Clifton Chenier Clifton Chenier (June 25, 1925 – December 12, 1987), was an American musician known as a pioneer of zydeco, a style of music that arose from Creole music, with R&B, blues, and Cajun influences. He sang and played the accordion. Chenier won ...

, Lawrence Ardoin and John Delafose. He also continued to secure the rights to release archive blues material such as that by

and

Robert Pete Williams Robert Pete Williams (March 14, 1914 – December 31, 1980) was an American Louisiana blues musician. His music characteristically employed unconventional structures and guitar tunings, and his songs are often about the time he served in pri ...

. In the 1980s and 1990s, he continued to develop Arhoolie as a distributor of smaller independent blues labels, and an importer of jazz and blues releases on European labels. Strachwitz increasingly focused attention on Mexican and, specifically, norteño music, which he had long admired, amassing what is believed to be the largest private collection of Mexican-American and Mexican music. He donated this collection, known as the Strachwitz Frontera Collection of Mexican and Mexican-American Music, to the

nonprofit organization A nonprofit organization (NPO), also known as a nonbusiness entity, nonprofit institution, not-for-profit organization, or simply a nonprofit, is a non-governmental (private) legal entity organized and operated for a collective, public, or so ...

Arhoolie Foundation. The first norteño album on Arhoolie was ''Conjuntos Norteños'', by Los Pinguinos del Norte, released in 1970, but one of his biggest successes came with

, whose album '' Ay Te Dejo en San Antonio'' won a

Grammy Award The Grammy Awards, stylized as GRAMMY, and often referred to as The Grammys, are awards presented by The Recording Academy of the United States to recognize outstanding achievements in music. They are regarded by many as the most prestigious ...

in 1986. With

cinematographer The cinematographer or director of photography (sometimes shortened to DP or DOP) is the person responsible for the recording of a film, television production, music video or other live-action piece. The cinematographer is the chief of the camera ...

Les Blank Les Blank (November 27, 1935 – April 7, 2013) was an American documentary filmmaker best known for his portraits of American traditional musicians. Life and career Leslie Harrod Blank Jr. was born November 27, 1935, in Tampa, Florida. He atten ...

, he also made two documentaries about the music in the mid 1970s, ''Chulas Fronteras'' and ''Del Mero Corazon''. He discovered and released the first two albums of seminal

klezmer revival Klezmer ( or ) is an instrumental musical tradition of the Ashkenazi Jews of Central and Eastern Europe. The essential elements of the tradition include dance tunes, ritual melodies, and virtuosic improvisations played for listening; these wou ...

band

The Klezmorim The Klezmorim, founded in Berkeley, California, in 1975, was the world's first klezmer revival band, widely credited with spearheading the global renaissance of klezmer (Eastern European Yiddish instrumental music) in the 1970s and 1980s.Thompson ...

. Another of Strachwitz's discoveries, and one of his biggest commercial successes, was Cajun musician

Michael Doucet Michael Louis Doucet (born February 14, 1951) is an American singer-songwriter and musician best known as the founder of the Cajun band BeauSoleil. Early life Doucet was born in Scott, Louisiana, to a Cajun family. Family parties in the 1950s ...

and his group

BeauSoleil Beausoleil, beau soleil or variants may refer to: * Beausoleil, Alpes-Maritimes, a town in southern France, adjoining the Principality of Monaco * Beausoleil, New Brunswick, a community in Canada * Beausoleil, a rural hamlet in the municipality of ...

. Artists who have recorded for the Arhoolie label include

Black Ace Babe Kyro Lemon Turner (December 21, 1905 – November 7, 1972) was an American Texas blues musician most frequently known by the stage name Black Ace. He was also known as B. K. Turner, Black Ace Turner, Babe Turner and Buck Turner. Biog ...

Big Walter Horton Walter Horton (April 6, 1921 – December 8, 1981), known as Big Walter (Horton) or Walter "Shakey" Horton, was an American blues harmonica player. A quiet, unassuming, shy man, he is remembered as one of the premier harmonica players in the hi ...

, George 'Bongo Joe' Coleman,

, Dave Alexander, Nathan Beauregard,

Sue Draheim Sue Draheim ( ; August 17, 1949 – April 11, 2013) The Mudcat Café''R.I.P. fiddler Sue Draheim''/ref> was an American fiddler, boasting a more than forty year musical career in the US and the UK. Growing up in North Oakland, Draheim began her ...

Jesse Fuller Jesse Fuller (March 12, 1896 – January 29, 1976) was an American one-man band musician, best known for his song "San Francisco Bay Blues". Early life Fuller was born in Jonesboro, Georgia, near Atlanta, United States. He was sent by his moth ...

Earl Hooker Earl Zebedee Hooker (January 15, 1930 – April 21, 1970) was a Chicago blues guitarist known for his slide guitar playing. Considered a "musician's musician", he performed with blues artists such as Sonny Boy Williamson II, Junior Wells, and ...

, John Jackson,

Guitar Slim Eddie Jones (December 10, 1926 – February 7, 1959), known as Guitar Slim, was an American guitarist in the 1940s and 1950s, best known for the million-selling song " The Things That I Used to Do", for Specialty Records. It is listed in the Roc ...

, Robert Shaw,

Doctor Ross Isaiah Ross (October 21, 1925 – May 28, 1993), known as Doctor Ross, was an American blues musician who usually performed as a one-man band, simultaneously singing and playing guitar, harmonica, and drums. Ross's primal style has been ...

Bukka White Booker T. Washington "Bukka" White (November 12, 1906 – February 26, 1977) was an American Delta blues guitarist and singer. His first full-length biography'', The Life and Music of Booker "Bukka" White: Recalling the Blues'' (2024), has been ...

, Silas Hogan,

The Campbell Brothers The Campbell Brothers are an American Sacred Steel gospel group from Rush, New York, composed of three brothers and one son. The ensemble features prominent pedal steel guitar and began as the house band for a House of God Keith Dominion cong ...

, Jerry Hahn, the

Pine Leaf Boys The Pine Leaf Boys is an American Cajun and Creole band from South Louisiana, United States. Members include Wilson Savoy (accordion, piano, vocals), Chris Segura (fiddle, vocals), Drew Simon (drums and vocals), Jean Bertrand (guitars), and Tho ...

, Los Cenzontles,

, Rose Maddox,

Rebirth Brass Band The Rebirth Brass Band is a New Orleans brass band. The group was founded in 1983 by Phillip "Tuba Phil" Frazier, his brother Keith Frazier, Kermit Ruffins,Skelly, RichardAllMusic Profile Retrieved 2013-02-9 and classmates from Joseph S. Cla ...

, and HowellDevine. In 2014, filmmakers Maureen Gosling and Chris Simon released a documentary film about Arhoolie Records entitled ''This Ain't No Mouse Music'', which is distributed by Argot Pictures. In May 2016, the

Smithsonian Institution The Smithsonian Institution ( ), or simply the Smithsonian, is a group of museums, Education center, education and Research institute, research centers, created by the Federal government of the United States, U.S. government "for the increase a ...

announced it had acquired Arhoolie Records from founder Chris Strachwitz and his business partner Tom Diamant for the

Smithsonian Folkways Recordings Smithsonian Folkways is the nonprofit record label of the Smithsonian Institution. It is a part of the Smithsonian's Smithsonian Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage, located at Capital Gallery in downtown Washington, D.C. The label was f ...

. In late 2023, the Arhoolie Foundation published the book ''Down Home Music: The Stories and Photographs of Chris Strachwitz'', by

Joel Selvin Joel Selvin (born February 14, 1950) is an American San Francisco-based music critic and author known for his weekly column in the ''San Francisco Chronicle'', which ran from 1972 to 2009. Selvin has written books covering various aspects of po ...

with Chris Strachwitz. According to Selvin, he was a longtime friend and disciple of Strachwitz, and when Strachwitz suggested publishing a book from his huge collection of digitized photographs, Selvin enthusiastically offered to help. They worked on the book in the last 18 months of Strachwitz's life, and Selvin finished it shortly after Strachwitz's death.

References

External links

Official site

* {{Authority control Blues record labels Record labels established in 1960 Reissue record labels Companies based in Contra Costa County, California El Cerrito, California 1960 establishments in California Music of the San Francisco Bay Area American independent record labels Folk record labels

History

See also

References

External links