LITTLE SAMMY DAVIS

L'octubre de 2008, després de la gravació del seu tercer àlbum, 'Man' Travelin amb Scribner, Davis va patir un vessament cerebral . Es va recuperar i va poder tornar a realitzar la següent primavera. Sammy ja no se li va permetre viatjar , Levon Helm, el batería de THE BAND  amb qui había col.laborat darrerment va  oferir Sammy la obertura tots els dissabtes al "Midnight Ramble" però Sammy va patir un segon atac aquí a un any i des de llavors s'ha deixat parcialment paralitzat i que actualment resideix a Una llar d'avis / unitat de rehabilitació a Middletown, Nova York. 

                        
             

"Little Sammy Davis" is a musical documentary that looks into the life and music of Sammy Davis, a sweet charming 72 year old Mississippi Delta Blues harp player. This film captures a fading culture of "original growth" bluesmen, who are at the core of American music. Sam received his first harmonica from his father and started playing at the age of 8. While growing up, Sam heard the records of Tommy McClennan, Blind Boy Fuller, Peetie Wheatstraw, and one of his favorites, John Lee Williamson.

"Little Sammy Davis" won The Audience Recognition Award at the AFI/SLIVERDOCS Film Festival and was a Jury Selection at the London Film Festival and The Woodstock International Film Festival.

             

                             

Little Sammy Davis (born November 28, 1928) is an American blues musician based in New York's Hudson Valley. Although his musical career began in the 1940s, he was not widely known until the mid-1990s when he began working in radio, singing, playing live on tour, and recording studio albums.

Born in Winona, Mississippi, United States, and raised in a one-room shack, Davis learned to play the harmonica at the age of eight.He eventually left home and settled in Florida, where he continued to play the blues in the Miami area while working in orange groves and saw mills to make ends meet.

Throughout the 1940s and 1950s, Davis traveled with medicine shows and played with blues musicians like Pine Top Perkins, and Ike Turner. He spent a total of nine years on the road with Earl Hooker, including with the short-lived band of Hooker, Ike Turner, Pine Top Perkins and Albert King,ending when the two titans of Blues Guitar came to blows,thus breaking up the band.Sammy and Earl recorded four sides for Rockin' Records in 1952 and 1953 (as Little Sam Davis)

In the late 1950s, Davis lived in Chicago, Illinois, performing with Muddy Waters, Jimmy Reed and occasionally fronting Little Walter's Band, The Aces when Walter did not show. At some point, word had let out that "some guy looks and plays" just like Walter and people THINK he IS Little Walter". One night as Sammy Performed on stage,Sammy spotted a Policeman at the back of the club, accompanied by Hooker. Walter and the officer waited for Sammy to get through with his set and when Sammy got off of the stage, he was arrested on the spot. To quote Sammy:" Walter was a good guy and told me that yes, you do indeed sound just like me but you can't be going around letting people think you ARE me". Sammy was locked up, spent a night in jail before Walter dropped the charges, leaving Davis and Walter friends for the rest of Walter's all too short and tragic life. He later married and settled in Poughkeepsie, New York, during which time he recorded a session for Trix Records that resulted in one "45" single. After the sudden death of his wife in 1970, Davis stopped playing and dropped out of the music scene for the next two decades. No one knew if Sammy was alive or even dead