by Dr. Barry Lee Pearson
Cora Fluker grew up on a cotton plantation near Livingston, Alabama. From an early age she sang in the cotton fields leading a family work gang. A deeply traditional artist with a large repertoire of work songs, spirituals, blues and ballads, she is the niece of Rich Amerson and Vera Hall, who recorded extensively for the Lomaxes. She made a one-string guitar as a youngster and credits her Uncle Amerson as inspiration and mentor. Moving to Marion, Mississippi, she built up a church congregation. Her years as a missionary and church leader make her as confidant a stage personality equally adept at sacred and secular material. She performed at the Chicago Blues Festival in 1992 and the Sunflower Blues Festival in Mississippi in 1993, where this interview was conducted.
Cora Fluker, Clarksdale, Mississippi, August 7, 1993.
“When I was a little girl, my daddy had us out on a plantation. So well I always wanted to play I had an uncle, he died. He was a guitar player. He was the man who wrote “John Henry” – you remember “John Henry”? He wrote that song. And I used to follow him up and watch him play the guitar and hear him sing. So well when we used to go to the cotton fields I would lead the field. The boss in the field, Mr. Poole, always put me there for me to lead the field. So I’d get to hoeing and get in the front of them. Oh, I was a little girl about 12 years old. I started at 12 singing, you know, all them songs like “Bring ‘em down Lord.”
And they would be chopping behind me “Swing Low, Sweet Chariot” and all that. And so I got interested in it. So I got me some screw wire, got me a piece of plank and I made me a guitar. So I quit for a while playing my guitar, saying I was saved. So after I got up and got grown, got married, I’d be up near a church. Then I went to singing. Now I sing. But I got lots of records that I made but I never got nothing out of them. It’s a man come from Jackson, I was singing so some people advertised me he was looking for some talent. So when he come, I had about 50 songs and I give them to him. Somehow or another they go around. Then he sold me out. But I never got nothing out of it. I just was doing it just to be doing something. So this lady come and told me the song I sung about “The Long White Train,” said he was gonna put that in a movie. And she told me another song, she told me she was gonna put. And I told her, “Yes, ma’am.”
Well, you know, I can’t read and write or I don’t understand nothing. I just like to sing and play music, you know, my talent I got. So that’s how I got hooked up there. But I got a church. I sing. But I first started to singing blues. I still sing about them: “Baby Please Don’t Go.” I got to singing them, you know, and then I’d change it into a church song. Then I started, I’d get somebody when I hear them reading the Bible you know, I started putting them words together and singing them too, you know. So I just stand out there, you know, and hear songs or just make it up.
Well, you know, when I built that church, they call me a missionary. Oh I was singing blues too. But what I think about it, if God forgives you for telling a lie, he’ll forgive you for singing a song. Because a song is a song only you’re carrying a blues different than you carry a church song. So I sing them both. So I got it in my head now. So, well, if they ask me to start singing, I’m gonna just go to singing, playing the guitar and singing the same songs until I die.
Now I go to the old people’s home that are older than I am and play the guitar. You ought to see them shoutin’ and going on. They call me their star. And, honey, you ought to hear them when I did it. I have to go and I go up there and sing for them, play the guitar. And I got to singing when I got there. I get happy and I just go to make up one. And I would sing a song to them about it. “He let you rise this morning,” so many over there didn’t get up. Why don’t you thank him, you know. And everybody got in there. I said, “Oh, oh, oh, I thank that man.”
They got to shouting. I had all of them all up in their chairs. I had them just shouting, you ought to have been there. So the lady, the boss lady there, so just come over to the house say: “Cora, come on over and sing for me. Come over and sing.” I’d go over and sing for them. And they just squeal when I come through the door and I just love that.
My mama’s dead, you know. My mama she was a Christian. She prayed. But my uncle was a blues singer. So you know I would cling now to him. But I can sing that song what he sung. He’s dead.
John Henry had a little woman
The dress she wore was red.
And she come screaming and hollering that day
The people asked her “What’s the matter?”
Said I’m going where my man fell dead
Great God, Going where my man fell dead.
Say she picked up a 10-pound hammer
And she hung it on the left of her arm
And she picked up a 5-pound hammer
that she hung it on the right of her arm.
She said, Before I stand and see my man go down
She say I brought these hammers on down, great God.
And see I done loved that song. Yes, sir, there’s a heap of verses to that song:
John Henry had a little baby boy. He was laying in the cradle screaming and hollering.
And the people asked her what’s the matter that day.
He say, I’m gonna die like my daddy died, Good god, I’m gonna be a steel driving man.
John Henry’s daughter was screaming and hollering that day.
She say, “Who gonna glove my little loving hands? Who gonna shoe my little feet?”
Her daddy say, “I can shoe your little loving feet. And I can glove your little hand. But I can’t be your loving man good God.” . . .
I just got it all. Yeah I sing all of it. I sing ‘em all when I get ready to sing. I sing religious songs and I sing blues too. I get ready to sing. I just sing them all. They had me singing church songs and blues too. When I go to church I just take the church over. They can play, I go home and I jam all around the children, and I get me some drums, some cans. And I’d get my old guitar, and I’d get near my daddy’s — you know and some white people come from somewhere and heard me up on the hill, and he come there and try to get my mama to give me to them. My mama wouldn’t. I was singing then.
Got me way down here
Got me way down here
By the rolling forks
And treat me like a dog
I was singing: “Baby please don’t go.” I was singing that then. And the white lady come on the hill and told me, “you know anything else you can sing?” I said I sang a song about roaming this highway. Honey . . .
When the moon peep over the mountain.
Honey I’ll be on my way.
I’m gonna roam this highway, until the break of day.
And I would hit my guitar, hit my drums down and I was singing that song. I just kind of done like my uncle. He sung a song. You all might heard Richard Amenson, he sung: “Run here black mama whoo. Sit on black daddy’s knee.” That’s my aunt. He’s dead. That’s my Uncle Richard Amerson. Vera Hall, that’s my aunt. That’s the one about John Henry. People make it hard on you but they didn’t do nothing to me. Oh you know, of course, I’ve got a church and all that you know. But if I want to sing a blues I’ll sing them — because if the good Lord will forgive you for getting out there and lying, he’ll sure forgive you for singing a song. A song ain’t nothing.
Others, I don’t pay them no mind. You brush them off. Because they ain’t taking care of you. You taking care of yourself. And they do what they want to do and I do what I want. And as you sweep around your own door, you ain’t got time to sweep around mine. It’s a person made a song about “sweep around your own door.” That’s the best song that’s ever been made in this world.
Nobody tried to tell me to stop playing music. They don’t tell me what to do. If I want to play music, I’ll play the music. I used to be the best dancer. The music, I used to be the best dancer. Well I just had a talent on it. So I got a church. Yeah I got a church but it’s a lots of liars in them churches. See, they do their dirt in the dark. What I do, I do it out because you can’t hide from God. If I’m gonna do anything, I’ll do it out here. I don’t care what they say because they ain’t Jesus. Jesus Christ is a forgiving God, man don’t forgive you. He say I forgive you for everything but killing yourself, and sinning against the Holy Ghost. That means if you don’t never say “Lord Have Mercy,” you done sinned against the Holy Ghost. Well now he gonna forgive you for anything. He’s a forgiving God. He know we were gonna do these things when he made us. But I know he don’t say that if I get up there and sing a blues song, I can turn that song into a church song. See, I can turn that song into a church song.
I don’t preach but I got a daughter that preaches. I don’t preach but I sing. I get up there and make them songs and sing them. I made up all them songs back there, “Long White Train.” “I get tired of this world.” I make a change. “Do the Shotgun Boogie” – I made that song. “Hey, John, What you gonna do about this Doggone Dog.” I made that song. I made all that. I been all over. I give a lawyer over there about 15 songs and he made like he was going to help. And I went over there and he said I’m going to see about them. And, dog, if I didn’t hear one of my songs but somebody else was singing it. So I make up all my songs. And then I got back to the time I was a little girl and I sing about what all happened. And then I was beaten one time and I told all of that and I got that. I done made a song about it. Then I made a song about how I come to religion and all of that. I made a song about everything. That’s the way I do.”
_____________
Dr. Barry Lee Pearson, Professor in the English Department at the University of Maryland stands as the most steadfast supporter of the local acoustic blues scene in the greater Washington, D.C., area and beyond. As a musician, author, college lecturer, folklorist, and personal friend to the musicians, he has been the voice of this regional blues scene.