Search - Johnny Bragg :: Johnny Bragg Story: Just Walkin' In the Rain

An amazing and neglected story...

J. Julian | London UK | 08/31/2001

(5 out of 5 stars)

"I first heard of Johnny Bragg while listening to the Bob Harris show on BBC Radio 2 (Saturday nights 22.00-01.00 BST)
The title track of this CD was the huge hit for Johnny Ray in the 1950's and was written by Johnny Bragg.The music on the CD is excellent amd sound quality very good indeed.The interest in the story is explained in full in the first class
sleeve notes that go with the CD.
Johnny Bragg spent much of his life in prison, frequently on false charges.The story revolves around the relationship between Bragg and a reforming Governor of Tenessee Frank Clement.Bragg and his "backing group" The Prisonaires were all long-term inmates who found a route ot of the circumstance they were in through music and the support of Clement.It is a remakable story of two men from the very oposite ends of the social specrum who gained from each other.The story of how Bragg came to write and ecord is all detailed as are the changes to the various backing groups over the years.
Equally amazing is the involvement of a certain Elvis Presley.
Bragg and the Prisonaires became important tools for penal reform and performed on a weekly basis at the Governor's Mansion in front of the likes of Roy Acuff, Roy Rogers, Eddy Arnold and former President Harry Truman.As the sleeve notes comment;
"The Prisonaires too eserve a place in early RandB history...They've been overlooked by most music historians and relegated to novelty staus when history shows they were a pioneering southern RandB group"
The whole story is much more than the very brief summary given above.As time went on Bragg changed both the style of his music and his backing singers, for a variety of reasons.
Sadly Governor Clement was killed in a car rash at the age of 49 and Bragg recorded and wrote no more after his death.
The album is also great music to listen to. As well as all the emotion of this unque story the people involved were obviously very talanted.A must for any serious musice collection great sounds and a great story very well told by Jay Warner in the sleeve notes which are expanded in a book by Jay Warner "Just Walkin'in the Rain published by Renaissance Books (ISBN #58063-140-1)
A very moving story and a very powerful CD. Highly recommended."