"That Black Snake Moan" is a song written and recorded by American

country blues Country blues (also folk blues, rural blues, backwoods blues, or downhome blues) is one of the earliest forms of blues music. The mainly solo vocal with acoustic fingerstyle guitar accompaniment developed in the rural Southern United States in t ...

musician

Blind Lemon Jefferson Lemon Henry "Blind Lemon" Jefferson (September 24, 1893 – December 19, 1929) was an American blues and gospel singer-songwriter and musician. He was one of the most popular and successful blues singers of the 1920s and has been called the "Fat ...

. Inspired by singer

Victoria Spivey Victoria Regina Spivey (October 15, 1906 – October 3, 1976), sometimes known as Queen Victoria, was an American blues singer, songwriter, and record company founder. During a recording career that spanned 40 years, from 1926 to the mid-1960s, s ...

's "Black Snake Blues", the song was released on

Paramount Records Paramount Records was an American record label known for its recordings of jazz and blues in the 1920s and early 1930s, including such artists as Ma Rainey, Tommy Johnson (guitarist), Tommy Johnson and Blind Lemon Jefferson. Early years Paramoun ...

in 1926, and has since become recognized as a signature composition which exemplifies Jefferson's unconventional melodic style and utilization of

double entendres A double entendre (plural double entendres) is a figure of speech or a particular way of wording that is devised to have a double meaning, one of which is typically obvious, and the other often conveys a message that would be too socially unacc ...

. The song was re-recorded a year later as "Black Snake Moan" for

Okeh Records OKeh Records () is an American record label founded by the Otto Heinemann Phonograph Corporation, a phonograph supplier established in 1916, which branched out into phonograph records in 1918. The name originally was spelled "OkeH" from the init ...

, and both versions have remained accessible through the availability of several

compilation albums A compilation album comprises tracks, which may be previously released or unreleased, usually from several separate recordings by either one performer or by several performers. If the recordings are from one artist, then generally the tracks we ...

Background

During the 1920s,

were in-demand for customers of genuine

recordings. Blind Lemon Jefferson had been performing across

Texas Texas ( , ; or ) is the most populous U.S. state, state in the South Central United States, South Central region of the United States. It borders Louisiana to the east, Arkansas to the northeast, Oklahoma to the north, New Mexico to the we ...

and the

Mississippi Delta The Mississippi Delta, also known as the Yazoo–Mississippi Delta, or simply the Delta, is the distinctive northwest section of the U.S. state of Mississippi (and portions of Arkansas and Louisiana) that lies between the Mississippi and Yazo ...

since 1912 and garnered a considerable following. Jefferson was signed to Paramount in 1925 as a result of one of two proposed scenarios:

pianist A pianist ( , ) is a musician who plays the piano. A pianist's repertoire may include music from a diverse variety of styles, such as traditional classical music, jazz piano, jazz, blues piano, blues, and popular music, including rock music, ...

Sammy Price Samuel Blythe Price (October 6, 1908 – April 14, 1992) was an American jazz, boogie-woogie and jump blues pianist and bandleader. Price's playing is dark, mellow, and relaxed rather than percussive, and he was a specialist at creating the ...

recommended him to the label or Paramount music director Arthur C. Laibly discovered Jefferson performing on Dallas streets. Regardless, a talent scout recorded demos with Jefferson and the singer traveled to Chicago to record his first official sides: a pair of

gospel Gospel originally meant the Christianity, Christian message ("the gospel"), but in the second century Anno domino, AD the term (, from which the English word originated as a calque) came to be used also for the books in which the message w ...

tunes under the pseudonym Deacon L. J. Bates. Sales were strong, prompting further sessions with Jefferson in 1926. In his third session for Paramount, Jefferson recorded "That Black Snake Moan", along with "Black Horse Blues", "Corina Blues", and " Jack O' Diamond Blues". Riddled with sexual nuances, lyrically "That Black Snake Moan" was explicit with its intentions, with lines such as "Mmm, black snake crawlin' in my room / And some pretty mama had better come and get this black snake soon".

Record producer A record producer or music producer is a music creating project's overall supervisor whose responsibilities can involve a range of creative and technical leadership roles. Typically the job involves hands-on oversight of recording sessions; ensu ...

J. Mayo Williams Jay Mayo "Ink" Williams (September 25, 1894 – January 2, 1980) was a pioneering African Americans, African-American producer of recorded blues music. Some historians have claimed that Ink Williams earned his nickname by his ability to get ...

recalled Jefferson was "just as cool and collected as any artist I've ever seen" as they carried out the session. Indeed, Jefferson's calm and collected persona coupled with high-pitched howls added to the song's sexual innuendo. Jefferson was inspired to compose the song after singer

enjoyed success with "Black Snake Blues", a tune that Spivey insists was not intended to have the same sexual innuendo as Jefferson's "That Black Snake Moan". "That Black Snake Moan" was first released on Paramount in October 1926. Jefferson re-recorded another version of the song for

, which was closely related to the original rendition, but also had superior sound quality. This version, titled simply "Black Snake Moan", was released in March 1927 along with another well-known Jefferson tune " Matchbox Blues". The composition has remained relatively accessible throughout the years, appearing on Jefferson

compilation album A compilation album comprises Album#Tracks, tracks, which may be previously released or unreleased, usually from several separate recordings by either one Performing arts#Performers, performer or by several performers. If the recordings are from ...

s such as ''The Immortal Blind Lemon'', ''Black Snake Moan'', and ''King of the Blues''.

References

{{Authority control 1926 songs Hokum blues songs United States National Recording Registry recordings Paramount Records singles Okeh Records singles Blues songs