For Release: May 9. 2002
"Blind Mississippi" Morris Cummings lost his sight at the age of four, but that didn't stop him from learning the blues. Cummings says he's been playing "ever since I can remember, since I was a little guy."With more than 30 years in the business, plus the help of some strong family genes--Cummings is a cousin of Robert and Mary Diggs, leaders of the legendary Mississippi Sheiks, and of the late blues great Willie Dixon--Morris has become one of the hottest blues acts on Beale Street.
Known as "the real deal from Beale," Morris and his band, The Pocket Rockets, bring their hard-edged, electric delta blues to Jubilee with a performance taped in the summer of 2000 at the W.C. Handy Blues Festival in Henderson, Ky.
During their Jubilee debut, Morris and The Pocket Rockets perform original tracks from You Know I Like That, their debut release, and Bad to Worse, their latest effort. The songs resonate with Morris' raw vocals and slamming harmonica. Blues reviewer Dave "Doc" Plitz lauded Morris' playing as "some of the best blues harp sounds that I have ever heard."
Jubilee is a KET production, produced and directed by H. Russell Farmer. The program is closed-captioned for the deaf and hard-of-hearing. Viewers can find out more about programming on KET by visiting the KET Web site at http://www.ket.org.