Charlie Musselwhite - Swaps the Harmonica for A Guitar on New Album 'Mississippi Son'

THE AMERICAN MUSICIAN TAKES US BEHIND THE MAKING OF HIS NEW 14-TRACK RECORD, REMINISCES T ABOUT INDIA, AND MORE

- David Britto

IN 2019, MUMBAI was blessed with the bright harmonica playing and raspy vocals of American musician Charlie Musselwhite at the Mahindra Blues Festival. Three years on, and the now 78-year-old Musselwhite is out with his latest body of work - the 14-track album Mississippi Son, out via Alligator Records. While the record does feature plenty of harmonica playing, Musselwhite has also tracked a lot of the guitar parts on his own to bring out a smooth blues sound.

In this interview with Rolling Stone India, Musselwhite talks to us about how Mississippi Son came together, recalls his India trip, what he has in store next and more.

When did Mississippi Son begin to take shape?

Well, I'm living in Clarksdale, Mississippi, and just a couple of blocks away, a friend of mine has a studio. He's a musician and a guitar player. We spent time just fooling around in the studio, we started recording tunes, just for fun, really. Along the way we realized, other people might want to hear this. So, we had a whole album's worth. Alligator was interested in it. In fact, they really lit up over it, so they put it out. We're really excited about it. I'm happy that they're so excited.

You're known for your harmonica playing and you do bring some of it on the record too. But you also showcase a lot of your guitar playing this time. Why did you decide to venture in that direction?

Well, I always did play guitar; I just became known as a harmonica player because there already were tons of guitar players. So, I always played for myself and friends. And that's what we were doing in the studio. We didn't start out thinking about an album, we were just recording tunes for fun. Well, we kind of liked the way they sounded, and we thought maybe other people would like it too, and turned out we were right [laughs].