Robert Lockwood Junior Dies

Robert Lockwood Junior — a pioneering Mississippi Delta blues guitarist and singer who forged a career in Cleveland — has died. He was 91.

University Hospitals Case Medical Center spokmesman George Stamatis says Lockwood died yesterday afternoon. He had been a patient since suffering a stroke on November third.

Lockwood was born in Turkey Scratch, Arkansas. At 11, he started guitar lessons with legendary bluesman Robert Johnson, who briefly moved in with Lockwood’s mother.

Lockwood worked on street corners and in bars and became a musical mentor to B-B King, who listened to Lockwood in the 1940s on the “King Biscuit Time” radio show.

Lockwood moved to Chicago in the 1950s and was a session player on records by Little Walter, Sunnyland Slim, Roosevelt Sykes and other blues musicians. In 1960, he moved to Cleveland and played in blues clubs for decades.

— Associated Press