Greatest person from Mississippi

[jobycom]

Got to cross fields here.

[Fenris]

1. Well, since Senator Lott wasn't on the list...

I went with Muddy.

If Faulkner wins I'll eat my hat. I still cannot stand his writing.

[jobycom]

3. I can't stand Faulkner, either, but his Nobel Prize earned him a spot

[El Supremo]

2. Jefferson Davis.

If you don't agree, go F*** yourself.

[DenverDem]

4. Thanks, Dick.

You fucking fuck.

[IronLionZion]

7. I agree

I like the guy but not some of his political views

[jobycom]

10. Interesting man. Couldn't sing worth a flip

So I left him off.

Besides, he was born in Kentucky. Nice little trivia question, there, since Lincoln was also born in Kentucky.

[Zomby Woof]

5. Chester Arthur Burnett

AKA, the Howlin' Wolf.

[jobycom]

12. Damn! What was I thinkin? I think I'll bump Payton. nt

[dudeness]

6. Mississippi Fats

:)

[merh]

8. Tennessee Williams ...

I do like his writings.

2nd Muddy Waters
3rd BB King

As for Trent - he runs a close 2nd to Haley Barbour in the most disgusting GOP in Mississippi.

[johnnie]

9. Elvis Presley (piano player)????

That's funny. I think he was a little more than that.

[jobycom]

11. Yeah, a tad.

I hear he was a decent cook, too. :-)

[ForrestGump]

21. Though, as an instrumentalist, piano was probably his best

instrument. He played piano on a lot of his gospel songs (and other studio recordings, including some big sellers) as well as on stage on certain songs in the '50s and '70s. I think he was self-taught, somehow, and he played by ear.

[johnnie]

26. The thing I never got was...

It's quite obvious that Elvis had no piano as a child and teen. He actually got pretty good on it in short time. He also was a pretty good guitar player. And the story of him taking the bass from Bill Black while recording "You're so square" because Bill couldn't play it right and Elvis had to do it...is a classic.
It's too bad some people don't realize how much talent this guy had.

[jobycom]

27. He was so good people didn't understand how good he was

We all have this elitist urge to not trust popularity, to believe that when someone becomes a superstar that they are over-rated. The older I get, the more I think Elvis may have been underrated. He was always experimenting with his voice, with his musical skills. He mastered a range of styles most artists would never even attempt, and in many of them, from rock, gospel, country, and ballads, he not only mastered the genre but became one of the strongest influences in it.

[ForrestGump]

37. You speak the truth!

It's long been awfully hip and trendy to dismiss Elvis (I was going to say "people like Elvis," but I can't think of any who even approached his level in terms of not just commercial success but influence and all the rest of it). Stupid, especially when the people involved have no idea of what he actually did, what he recorded, and who he was.

Maybe they know a few songs, but even then they'd be counted among the oblivious because if you listen to just one there's a lot to be found within...maybe not always lyrically, but certainly in terms of what I think happens to be the most important part of any music: the music. "Heartbreak Hotel," for instance, is a song that most of us have probably heard and that perhaps some of us who've listened to it a truckload of times kind of take for granted. But clear your mind and really listen to it and it's a whole different story.

For a start, what the hell is it? Is it blues? Secular gospelizing? Country? Is it -- not that it really existed so formally then -- rock? Pop? It was the first RCA single for the King of Rock 'n' Roll, but is it rock 'n' roll? What is it? Welcome to the world of Elvis, because it's all of those and it was precisely the mixing and matching of those ingredients -- a natural blending of young Elvis' influences and musical heroes -- that started the whole thing for him and for the world and it was the same dynamic blending and failure to segregate genres that was the hallmark of his music right to the end of his life.

Of course, take yourself back to January of 1956 (check the Billboard Hot 100, if you want the full picture) and imagine hearing that abrupt "Well, since my baby left me..." slamming out of the Edsel's radio...that's a whole other dimension, the cultural blandness that Elvis shattered entirely unintentionally, just by being himself. So he was a true revolutionary, albeit as a side effect of his need to be who he was, and hipper-than-thou pundits have never since forgiven him for not being a true, conscious rebel at heart, for not fulfilling the subversive role that they mapped out for him. They hated and hate him, some of them, almost as much as whitebread America hated him back in the '50s.

But let's look at the also-formidably-selling Beatles: John is lionized because of his (often very self-conscious and self-centered, and overtly hypocritical in many ways) championing of progressive causes, and some true oddness along with it, whereas Paul is more often than not dismissed by those same hipsters who'd dismiss Elvis. Never mind that John's motivation in becoming a singer was no more 'noble' than anyone else's, and that Paul was arguably the first to embrace the 'avant garde' stuff that would become associated with John. The Beatles were also hugely successful but they're rarely, collectively, dismissed either musically or culturally. Why? Because they used illegal drugs and wrote some songs and said some stuff that stuck it to The Man? I mean, apart from the incredible music that they gave -- why are they 'okay' despite their success? Stupid, because when it comes down to it Elvis and the Liverpudlians that he influenced (who were, surprisingly, only five or so years younger than their idol) were just doing what they wanted to do. And they were all very, very, very good at it.

[ForrestGump]

36. I always wondered how he learned to play piano...he already knew by

at least 1955. And, yeah, the "Baby, I Don't Care" bass line is a classic. One of the coolest bass moments was when the Beatles visited him in LA in '65 and he asked Paul for help with learning the bass line from "I Feel Fine" -- wouldn't have minded witnessing that, for sure.

He played drums, too -- I'd guess he was decent just because of his innate sense of rhythm -- and seemed able to make at least a serviceable sound come from just about anything he picked up. A lot of people don't realize that the prominent drum-like sound on "All Shook Up" and "Wear My Ring Around Your Neck" (as well as some other songs, including some from the Sun years like his very unique "Blue Moon") was Elvis slapping the back of his guitar.

His 1969-77 live group, mostly gun studio session players, have been quoted as being stunned by his sense of timing and rhythm and his perfect picture of the sound he wanted, and at least one (technically far superior a player than Elvis) has been quoted as not being able to play a piece right until Elvis sat down with him and showed him how. And if the voice counts as a musical instrument, yeah, Elvis was massively underated as a musician.

[TacticalPeek]

13. Easy. Fannie Lou Hamer.

The lady who was "sick and tired of being sick and tired".

My sentiments ex-act-ly.

http://www.ibiblio.org/sncc/hamer.html

[catzies]

30. Thank you for that link. I appreciated learning that much about her.

I'm going to spend more time reading her now.

[TacticalPeek]

32. Glad to be of service.

:)

[salonghorn70]

14. Faulkner

The world is full of sound and fury.....

[Flaxbee]

15. hard to choose, but I had to vote for Henson...

couldn't let the poll go by without at least ONE vote for the man who's brought so much joy to so many children. And I, for one, will always cherish "Mana Ma Na", among many others...

[Bozita]

23. Henson opened the doors of acceptibility for those with different ...

... sizes, colors, and shapes.

And he did it with children.

Henson did Mississippi proud.

Henson did America proud!

[jobycom]

16. Medgar's not gettin enough love here, so I'm adding

a link or two, in case some people think all he ever did was get killed.

http://www.africawithin.com/bios/medgar_evers.htm

http://www.olemiss.edu/depts/english/ms-writers/dir/evers_medgar/

[carpetbagger]

17. Henson.

Thank God those of us Gen X and younger watched his stuff. It's probably one of the only reasons we haven't gone completely off the ultranationalist end.

[elperromagico]

18. Robert Johnson,

King of the Delta Blues.

[amazona]

33. i was thinking the same

Hell, if selling your soul to the devil doesn't give you a few extra points, what does a guy got to do???

[sasquatch]

19. Do you notice that everyone is from Mississippi?

:silly:

[GoddessOfGuinness]

20. Trent Lott

The prototype motherfucker.

[jobycom]

29. Not the best senator nor the best asshole from Mississippi

Trent Lott is a mediocrity.

John Stennis was a great Democratic senator.

[GoddessOfGuinness]

35. Who's the best

asshole? ;)

[Sufi Marmot]

22. Mississippi John Hurt...n/t

[Snoggera]

24. The first educated person from Mississippi

that could actually spell Mississippi.

[WMliberal]

25. willie morris

great writer. North Toward Home is fantastic.

[jobycom]

28. Great writers are a dime a dozen in Mississippi. You have to REALLY

stand out to be listed as a great writer in Mississippi.

[bigwillq]

31. I went with Evers

On the topic "Ghost of Mississippi" was a great movie.

[Nlighten1]

34. I vote for...

Les Dabney