King Solomon Hill facts for kids

King Solomon Hill was a blues singer and guitarist. He recorded a few songs in 1932. His music is known for its unique guitar playing and haunting voice. For a long time, people didn't know who he really was.

But after a lot of research, he was identified as Joe Holmes. He was born on July 18, 1897, and passed away on August 13, 1940. Joe Holmes was a self-taught guitarist from Mississippi.

Who Was King Solomon Hill?

For many years, the true identity of King Solomon Hill was a mystery. Another blues artist named Big Joe Williams once claimed he was King Solomon Hill. He even told people that these recordings were his first ones.

This story was published in a famous book about the blues. But many experts doubted it. King Solomon Hill's singing and guitar style were very different from Big Joe Williams's.

Later, a blues expert named Gayle Dean Wardlow found the truth. He discovered that King Solomon Hill was actually Joe Holmes. Wardlow talked to four people who knew Joe Holmes. They recognized his voice on the records.

One person lived in a place called King Solomon Hill in Sibley, Louisiana. This community was named after a church there. Wardlow believed that Paramount Records, the company that recorded his music, used his address as his stage name.

Joe Holmes's Life Story

Joe Holmes was born near McComb, Mississippi, in 1897. In 1915, he moved to northern Louisiana with his brother. There, he married Roberta Allums.

In 1920, Joe, Roberta, and their child, Essie, moved back to McComb. Joe played music with a famous local blues musician named Sam Collins. Roberta remembered seeing her husband play with Collins.

A year later, Roberta and Essie went back to Sibley. Joe continued his music career. He traveled around, playing in different towns. He often visited Sibley, Louisiana.

In 1928, Joe met Blind Lemon Jefferson in Minden, Louisiana. Holmes and Jefferson traveled together for a short time. Joe later sang about this friendship in his song "My Buddy Papa Lemon." He also became good friends with Willard Thomas, another musician. Joe often went to Shreveport, Louisiana, to play with Thomas.

Joe Holmes passed away in Louisiana in 1940. He died from a stroke.

Recording His Music

In 1932, Joe Holmes was playing music in Minden. He was then invited to record for Paramount Records. Someone from Paramount took Holmes to Birmingham, Alabama.

There, he met other musicians. They all traveled to the Paramount recording studio in Grafton, Wisconsin. Holmes recorded six songs under the name King Solomon Hill.

Paramount Records was having money problems at the time. They only made and shipped a small number of records. Holmes took three records with plain white labels back home. His friends and family never saw any records with the Paramount label.

For a long time, one of his records, "My Buddy Papa Lemon" and "Times Has Done Got Hard," was thought to be lost forever. But in 2002, a copy of this rare record was finally found!

His Musical Legacy

As of 2022, we know of eight recordings by King Solomon Hill:

• "Down on My Bended Knee" (Take 1)
• "Down on My Bended Knee" (Take 2)
• "The Gone Dead Train"
• "My Buddy Blind Papa Lemon"
• "Tell Me Baby"
• "Times Has Done Got Hard"
• "Whoopee Blues" (Take 1)
• "Whoopee Blues" (Take 2)

One of his songs, "The Gone Dead Train," was used in a TV show. It was featured in an episode of CSI: Crime Scene Investigation. A part of the song was played, and King Solomon Hill was mentioned as the artist.

A movie from 1969 called Performance also had a song named "The Gone Dead Train." This song was performed by Randy Newman. It was a new version of the song and was different from King Solomon Hill's original. In Hill's song, the "dead train" seems to be about an actual train, perhaps a "death train."

See also

• List of Delta blues musicians
• List of nicknames of blues musicians
• Solomon, a king in the Bible

Images for kids

• 

  A record label from 1932 for "Times Has Done Got Hard" by King Solomon Hill.

• 

  A train in McComb, Mississippi, Hill's hometown. One of his songs was "The Gone Dead Train."