© LE COMPTOIR GÉNÉRAL — 201480, QUAI DE JEMMAPES - 75010 PARIS +33 1 44 88 24 48 www.LECOMPTOIRGENERAL.COM
© LE COMPTOIR GÉNÉRAL — 201480, QUAI DE JEMMAPES - 75010 PARIS +33 1 44 88 24 48 www.LECOMPTOIRGENERAL.COM
EditorialFor this summer, Le Comptoir Général is planning a very special season, getting away from its dear African continent… but only in appearance.
It is taking a dive in Southern American Black culture, its mystical lands, ongoingly disrupted and often disrupting…
The Voices of Mississippi Blues are those of BB King, Willie Dixon, Otha Turner and many others -superstars or celebrated strangers – which
anthropologist William Ferris has spent his life immortalizing. His photos, movies, and recordings are breath-taking and few people know them.Knowing Le Comptoir Général’s primary mission – shedding a light on
“ghetto culture” – it would have been impossible to steer clear of what was often referred to as “the devil’s music”.
As so often before, the penny dropped when meeting a passionate collector: Benjamin Daussy. William Ferry’s book is the first to be published by
Benjamin’s young publishing house Papa Guédé Editions. This season could not have taken place without his expertise, passion and energy.
Rose Hill Community, Vicksburg, 1975.
© LE COMPTOIR GÉNÉRAL — 201480, QUAI DE JEMMAPES - 75010 PARIS +33 1 44 88 24 48 www.LECOMPTOIRGENERAL.COM
William Ferris“Blues and jazz are America’s most precious gift to the world. The captivating
tales of William Ferris allow us to look at Blues straight in the eye”Quincy Jones
In the early sixties folklorist William Ferris decided to wander Southern American cities and countrysides to record Mississippi-based blues artists.Armed with his tape recorder and a camera, he roamed the Delta’s churches, cotton farms, prisons and nightclubs. He collected testimonials from the black community for over two decades, in an ongoingly segregated America.
“This series of testimonials is absolutely irreplaceable. Its value grows with time”
Bertrand Tavernier.
Itta BenaIndianola
Lake Mary
Jackson
Leland
Clarksdale
M I S S I S S I P P I
TENNESSEE
ARKANSAS
LOUISIANE
Gravel Springs
Holly Springs
Lambert
Tutwiler
Parchman
Itta BenaIndianola
Eden
Yazoo City
Vicksburg
Rose Hill
Lorman
Centreville
Lake Mary
Jackson
Leland
Clarksdale
Memphis
HIGHWAY
61
Arkansas
Mis
siss
ip
pi
Yazo
o
Pearl
Ouachita
Big
Bla
ck R
iver
0 50 km
Ferris starts off his travel diary at Rose Hill, the town where he grew up.He wanders the Mississippi Delta regions : Indianola, Vicksburg, roaming through Clarksdale and Parchman penitentiary. He passes by small towns and big cities, crossing the invisible barrier of segregation, penetrating churches, house parties and exclusively black clubs.
© LE COMPTOIR GÉNÉRAL — 201480, QUAI DE JEMMAPES - 75010 PARIS +33 1 44 88 24 48 www.LECOMPTOIRGENERAL.COM
“We used to throw house parties up in the hills, in the sticks, in what we call jukes houses. They were these busted houses deep in the countryside. We only
had one night out of the week to have some fun. We used to stay up all night on Saturdays and we tryied to get some rest on Sundays. You could still hear
guitars strumming at the break of dawn. You could hear them for miles.”James « Son Ford » Thomas
Ferris’ positions as an author, film director, scholar and photographer, have served the task of documenting and sharing his passion for southern American folklore.Born in Vicksburg, Mississippi in 1942, he grew up at the core of racial segregation. Today, Ferris is an anthropology professor at Yale and teaches history at Chapel Hill University in North Carolina. He was nominated as one of the top ten professors in the US according to a study by Rolling Stone magazine.
Up until 1994, Ferris hosted Highway 61, a radio show dedicated to blues. He was a consultant for films such as Mississippi Blues, The Colour Purple and Crossroads. Author of various books dedicated to blues, he has also co-written the Encyclopaedia of southern culture, the bible of black American pop-culture, which was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize in 1989.
Bruce Payne, Jackson, 1974.
© LE COMPTOIR GÉNÉRAL — 201480, QUAI DE JEMMAPES - 75010 PARIS +33 1 44 88 24 48 www.LECOMPTOIRGENERAL.COM
ProgramMuSIC
Original recordings by William Ferris : traditional chants, gospel, Parchman penitentiary work chants,
Fife and Drum, chanted tales, interviews.
Soundtrack by Benjamin Daussy – collector and founder of Papa Guédé
Publishing.
Rob Armus René Miller Dédé Macchabée
LIVE CONCERTS :Sun. June 22nd : 7pm Sébastopol / Sun. June 29th : 6pm Rob Armus One Man Banned /Sun. June 6th : 16pm Phil Grim / Sun. July 13th : 6pm René Miller et Dédé Macchabée /
Sun. July 20th : 6pm Théo Lawrence / Sun. July 27th : 6pm John Matthews /Sun. August 31st : 6pm Théo Lawrence
© LE COMPTOIR GÉNÉRAL — 201480, QUAI DE JEMMAPES - 75010 PARIS +33 1 44 88 24 48 www.LECOMPTOIRGENERAL.COM
FILMS
6 documentary films directed by William Ferrissunday June 22nd
Black deltaWith Louis Dotson; Cleveland "Broom
Man» Jones; James «Son Ford» Thomas; Little Son Jefferson; Wade Walton; Jasper Love; Maudie Shirley; «Pine Top»Johnson; reverend Isaac Thomas the congregations
of Rose Hill Church in Vicksburg and Church of God in Christ in Clarksdale.
1968
Made in Mississipi : Black Folk Art and Crafts
With Richard Foster; Leon «Peck» Clark; Mary and Amanda Gordon; Louise
Williams and Esther Kriss; Otha Turner; Luster Willis; James «Son Ford» Thomas;
and Shelby «Poppa Jazz» Brown.
1975
Parchman PenitentiaryWith the convicts and staff of Parchman Penitenciary.
1968
Two Black ChurchesWith the congregations of Rose Hill Church in Vicksburg and St. James Church in New
Haven.
1975
Give my poor heart ease : Mississipi Delta Bluesmen
With Joe «Big Daddy» Louis; BB King; Wade Walton; Ben Gooch; James «Blood»
Shelby; James «Son Ford» Thomas; Shelby «Poppa Jazz» Brown; Joe Cooper;
Cleveland «Broom Man» Jones; Joe «Skeet» Skillet; Mary and Amanda Gordon,
and Isaac Thomas.
1975
Mississippi Bluesby Bertrand Tavernier & Robert Parrish
sunday July 13th
sunday August 10thsunday August 31th
The Soul of a Manby Wim Wenders
sunday August 3rd
sunday August 24th
Du Maliau Mississippiby Martin Scorsese
sunday July 20th
sunday August 17th
© LE COMPTOIR GÉNÉRAL — 201480, QUAI DE JEMMAPES - 75010 PARIS +33 1 44 88 24 48 www.LECOMPTOIRGENERAL.COM
FOODFor a whole season, Le Comptoir Général dedicates its Snack Local to Cajun cuisine. The aroma of an authentic chicken Jambalaya perfumes the Classroom. It will drag and initiate you to the joys of Cajun cuisine with its Po’ Boy sandwiches – a gustatory flashback to 1929 Louisiana, when workers on strike ate grilled shrimp sandwiches.
Close your eyes and end your meal in the bayou with a bite of home-made Cajun pie.
Cajun menu:Cajun salad
Jambalaya with shrimps and chickenPo boy sandwich with shrimps and chicken
Pecan Pie/Lemon pie
PHOTOSThis exhibition displays unavoidable figures such as BB King, Willie Dixon, James “Son Ford” Thomas, Lee Kizart, Otha Turner, Scott Dunbar and Wallace “Pine Top” Johnson, but also female healer Fannie Bell Chapman, convict Johnny Lee “Have Mercy” Thomas and Wade Walson, boogie-woogie enthusiast and barber.
There are only ten prints of of each photograph. The other nine prints can be found at Ogden Museul of Southern Arts, New Orleans; Misssissippi Museum of Art, Jackson, Mississippi; Delta Blues Museum, Clarksdale; Mississippi and B.B King Museum, Indianola, Mississippi ; North Carolina Univeristy, Chapel
Hill, North Carolina; University of Mississippi Blues Archive, Oxford, Mississippi; Davidson College Art Museum, Davidson, North Carolina; Brooks School Art Museum, North Andover, Massachusetts; and Douchy Les Mines Media Library; France.Out of all these prints, the series displayed at Le Comptoir Général is the only one that is being put up for sale and each numbered picture is signed by Wiliam Ferris.
Size : 279 x 420 mm“Archive museum” paper – 280g / m2 – 11.5 milPrice : from 250 euros to 350 euros.
© LE COMPTOIR GÉNÉRAL — 201480, QUAI DE JEMMAPES - 75010 PARIS +33 1 44 88 24 48 www.LECOMPTOIRGENERAL.COM
The BookVoices of the Mississippi Blues is a book-record consisting of 336 illustrated pages, a 22 track CD and a DVD of Ferris’ 6 documentaries, gathers the interviews, music and pictures collected by William Ferris’ through his encounters.
The French edition was given the 2014 award by the Charles Cros Academy in the World Music category.
BOOK + CD + DVDWILLIAM FERRIS© PAPA GuéDé, 2013
Original Edition : Give my Poor Heart Ease, Voice of the Mississippi Blues, Universityof North Carolina Press 2009.Translation from American English : Cyrielle AyakatsikasFormat : 20.5 x 24 cmPagination : 336 pagesClothbound edition + 1 CD + 1 DVDRelease Date : November 29 2013Sales price : 38 euros
Papa Guédé EditionsVaudou spirit Papa Guédé is considered by many to be the incarnation of Baron Samedi’s benevolent figure. Today it is the name of a publishing house, specialised in multi support books, that started off with the publication of “Les Voix du Mississippi”.Papa Guédé Publishing wish to develop a
catalog directed toward exploration that could facilitate the interaction between sound, image and text and put the book-record at the core of its editorial projects. Benjamin Daussy, founder on Papa Guédé Publishing and blues aficionado, has spent many years in Mississippi, where he recorded Jimmy Anderson’s album King of the Swamp Blues (2007) as well as the album Winnsboro’s Sacred Songs and Gospel for Olga Records.
© LE COMPTOIR GÉNÉRAL — 201480, QUAI DE JEMMAPES - 75010 PARIS +33 1 44 88 24 48 www.LECOMPTOIRGENERAL.COM
Le Comptoir GénéralLe Comptoir Général is a museum dedicated to Ghetto Culture. That’s how it was chosen to designate marginalised exotic and underpriviledged cultures that bloom all over the world. Its mission is to protect, support and represent them through its Parisian cultural center as well as through social
business incubation in partnership with local stakeholders. Le Comptoir Général dedicates all of its profit to funding these adventures.
CONTACT80, quai de Jemmapes — 75010 PARIS Paris 10e
Metro : République or GoncourtEvery day from 11am to 2am, with exceptions.
Sara [email protected]
tel: +33 1 44 88 24 48
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