PRISON CELL BLUES by Blind Lemon Jefferson arr. by Steve Mann I’m tired of sleeping in this old Lowdown prison cell Lord, I would not be in this condition If it had not been for Lanelle. I asked the jail keeper, I said, “Governor, Can I please have a few days off of my time?” He said “You lucky long-timer, That they did not give you ninety nine.” I looked into my mirror, all I could see was the Blues staring back at me and out into space; You know that cocaine and reefers, Just won’t reach my case. I asked the jail keeper, I said “Governor, can I Please have a few days off of my time?” He said “You lucky long-timer, That they did not give you lifetime. - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - The verse about looking into a mirror and seeing the blues staring back (Steve’s own addition), and his wonderful guitar arrangement played on a twelve string, are probably the reasons for making this one of Steve Mann’s most requested pieces. The ending line is the correct version of the jail keeper’s sarcastic response: ie, with a sentence of 99 years, you should feel lucky it wasn’t for life. Jefferson was born in Texas around 1897, possibly blind or partially blind from birth. He recorded many songs, with 43 releases on the Paramount label. During his lifetime he met and played with Leadbelly as a duo. Leadbelly was his senior by ten years and an excellent entertainer (who won two pardons from prison from two different Texas governors) but Lemon is more famous for his virtuoso blues guitar work and distinctive high vocals. Leadbelly had to go to prison from 1918 to 1924, and never returned to Texas after he was released, but his close, though possibly brief, contact with Lemon Jefferson could well have spawned the smattering of prison blues that Jefferson wrote. These include "Blind Lemon's Penitentiary Blues" (1928) and "Hangman's Blues" (1928). Jefferson died in 1929, having traveled widely during a musical career that took him through most of the southern United States, His influence among blues musicians today is still very great. Here is an interesting quote from a Blind Lemon Jefferson web site at http://www.glade.net/~blindlemon/photo.htm How did he travel so widely? Presumably by train, riding boxcars or sometimes paying his fare. The stories of Lemon being led around by various blues singers can probably be dismissed as, by other accounts, he had, like Blind Willie McTell in Georgia, an uncanny ability to get around. Both Jefferson and McTell display vivid visual imagery in their lyrics, perhaps stemming from, to borrow a phrase from Stevie Wonder, "inner visions." As an aside, Steve Mann’s nickname, given to him by Dr. John the Night Tripper in Hollywood, was “Lemon.” Today Steve occasionally calls himself Professor Lemons when he doesn’t want his forty-years-later vocals to be compared with his younger voice from the ‘sixties. —JS