Huddie William Ledbetter,  was an American folk and blues musician. Noted for his clear and forceful singing, his virtuosity on the twelve string guitar, and the rich songbook of folk standards he left behind.  He is best known as Leadbelly or Lead Belly. 

Huddie William Ledbetter was born on January 29, 1885 on the Jeter Plantation near Mooringsport, Louisiana. He was the only child of his parents Wesley and Sally. Huddie and his parents moved to Leigh, Texas when he was five and it was there that he became interested in music, encouraged by his uncle Terrell who bought Huddie his first musical instrument, an accordion. 

It was some years later when Huddie picked up the guitar but by the age of 21 he had left home to wander around Texas and Louisiana trying to make his living as a musician. Over the next ten years Huddie wandered throughout the southwest eking out an existence by playing guitar when he could and working as a laborer when he had to. 

Leadbelly's volatile nature often led him into trouble with the law.  In 1915 (or 1916) he was sentenced to do time on a chain gang from which he miraculously escaped. He spent the next two years under the alias of Walter Boyd. In 1918 he was back in prison for the second time. This time he killed a man in a fight over a woman and received a seven to 35 year sentence in Sugar Land Texas.  After seven years he gained his release after begging pardon from Governor Pat Morris Neff with a song: 

Please, Governor Neff, Be good 'n' kind
Have mercy on my great long time...
I don't see to save my soul
If I don't get a pardon, try me on a parole...
If I had you, Governor Neff, like you got me
I'd wake up in the mornin' and I'd set you free

Governor Neff was convinced by the song and by Huddie's assurances that he'd seen the error of his ways. Huddie left Texas a free man. But in 1930 he was arrested, tried, and convicted of attempted homicide in Louisiana.

 It was in the Louisiana State Penitentiary in July 1933 that Huddie met folklorist John Lomax and his son Alan who were touring the south for the Library of Congress collecting unwritten ballads and folk songs using newly available recording technology. The Lomaxes had discovered that Southern prisons were among the best places to collect work songs, ballads, and spirituals but Leadbelly, as he now called himself, was a particular find. 

Over the next few days the Lomaxes recorded hundreds of songs. When they returned in the summer of 1934 for more recordings Leadbelly told them of his pardon in Texas. As Allen Lomax tells it, "We agreed to make a record of his petition on the other side of one of his favorite ballads, 'Goodnight Irene'. I took the record to Governor Allen on July 1. On August 1 Leadbelly got his pardon. On September 1 I was sitting in a hotel in Texas when I felt a tap on my shoulder. I looked up and there was Leadbelly with his guitar, his knife, and a sugar bag packed with all his earthly belongings. He said, "Boss, you got me out of jail and now I've come to be your man".

In 1935 Lomax took Leadbelly North where he became a sensation. Leadbelly remained Leadbelly. After hearing Cab Calloway sing in Harlem he announced that he could "beat that man singin' every time". His inclination toward violent resolution of conflicts, though mellowed, lead to threatening Lomax with a knife which effectively ended their friendship. Nevertheless by 1940 Leadbelly had become well known in the recording industry. Over the next 9 years Leadbelly's fame and success continued to increase until he fell ill while on a European Tour. Tests revealed that he suffered from lateral sclerosis and he died on December 6, 1949. 

For more information on Leadbelly, go to wikipedia.

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