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Johnny Jones
Biography
Guitarist and singer/songwriter Johnny Jones writes and sings about thoroughly modern themes in a tradition-based blues style. The Nashville-based Jones is one of a handful of veteran, virtuoso bluesmen who are local heroes on the Nashville blues scene, which is surprisingly healthy given Nashville's legacy as a home for country music.

Jones was born in 1936 and moved to Memphis at age 13. He moved with his mother to Chicago in the early '50s, in time to learn from and share stages with the likes of Muddy Waters and Howlin' Wolf. For a time, Jones shared an apartment with harmonica player Walter McCollum, and together, the pair formed a small group that worked regularly with harmonica player Junior Wells and guitarist Freddie King.

After tiring of long Chicago winters, Jones moved south again, this time to Nashville, to pursue a career as a studio guitarist. He formed a band in the early '60s, the Imperial Seven. That band worked regularly at the famous New Era Club in Nashville. While working in studios with the Imperial Seven, blues-rock master Jimi Hendrix would come sit in from time to time. Also in the 1960s, Jones played rhythm guitar along with Clarence "Gatemouth" Brown in the house band for a Dallas TV show, The Beat.
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