Drink Small was born on January 28,1933 and is an American soul blues and electric blues guitarist, pianist, singer, and songwriter.
22 Facts About Drink Small
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Drink Small is known as The Blues Doctor and has been influenced by a variety of musical styles including gospel and country music.
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Drink Small was born in Bishopville, South Carolina into a family of singers and musicians, who were sharecroppers working in cotton fields.
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Drink Small's mother was Alice "Missie" Small and his father was Arthur Jackson; they never married.
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Drink Small taught himself to play the guitar around the age of six or seven, originally learning on his uncle's one-string guitar.
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Drink Small made a guitar as a child, cutting up an old inner tube for strings.
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Drink Small wore a makeshift body cast for weeks, which ended his days picking cotton and helped turn him towards his musical path by listening to the radio and learning to play the songs on the guitar.
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Drink Small found playing music at night and cutting hair all day to be difficult, so he quit barbering and began to play music full time.
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Sister Rosetta Tharpe once invited Small to be her permanent guitar player.
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Drink Small's first recording was a single with The Spiritualaires in 1956, on Vee-Jay Records.
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Drink Small had eclectic musical influences, including Tennessee Ernie Ford, Merle Travis, John Lee Hooker, Fats Domino and the blues guitarist and singer Blind Boy Fuller.
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Drink Small watched diverse musical shows on television, including Soul Train and The Lawrence Welk Show from which he drew musical inspiration.
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Drink Small was considered one of the best guitarists in gospel music in the 1950s, before he turned his attention to secular music later in that decade.
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Drink Small performed his blues at almost every institution of higher learning in South Carolina, along with frequent appearances at nightclubs, roadhouses, and blues clubs throughout the state.
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Drink Small started his own record label, Bishopville Records, in the 1970s.
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Drink Small has toured nationally and internationally, including performances at well-known festivals such as the Chicago Blues Festival and the King Biscuit Blues Festival, as well as at three international World's fairs.
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Drink Small was the opening act for Little Milton, Bobby "Blue" Bland, and Koko Taylor, and was once on the same bill as Furry Lewis and Johnny Shines.
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In 2009, Drink Small was the closing act of the first Pee Dee Blues Bash, held in Florence, South Carolina.
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In February 2010, Drink Small was one of several South Carolina musicians featured in the episode "Juke Joints and Honky Tonks" of the television documentary series Carolina Stories.
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Drink Small moved to Columbia, South Carolina in 1955, bringing his mother with him.
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Drink Small never made enough money solely from his music career, so he required outside income.
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Drink Small sometimes sold fishing worms out of his backyard between musical gigs.