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| Coney Wilkins, circa 1935 (photographer unknown) |
Coney Frederic Wilkins (February 16, 1911 – circa 1942) was a blues performer, composer and guitarist born in Moorhead, Mississippi. His watershed recordings from (December 3) 1938 for Vocalion Records and the recent discovery of works dating from 1941 have come to be accepted as the "missing link" between American blues music and Rock and Roll.
The mystery surrounding his sudden disappearance in 1942 has led many to believe that Coney Wilkins was murdered. Some evidence points to a shoe store owner from Moorhead, Mississippi who had been allegedly cuckolded by Wilkins; but other evidence suggests that Coney Wilkins had simply moved out of state and changed his name. Another account suggests that he returned to his childhood roots in the Baptist Church, renounced his "evil ways" and ceased performing.
His records, sporadically released by Vocalion before and after his disappearance in late 1942, drew little attention. It was not until a reissue of his music ("The Coney Wilkins Story" - Columbia) in 1961 that the import of his guitar technique and the haunting lyricism of his compositions placed Wilkins among the great innovators and pioneers of what is known today as Rock and Roll. The works that subsequently came to light in 2005, and the controversy that surrounds the unearthing of a long-lost 1941 tape recording of a Coney Wilkins session in Vicksburg, MS (and the alleged plagiarism that made "White Tail Deer" one of the best-selling records of the mid-sixties [see: The Tupelos]) has only enhanced his reputation as one of the outstanding contributors to the canon of Twentieth Century music.
The mystery surrounding his sudden disappearance in 1942 has led many to believe that Coney Wilkins was murdered. Some evidence points to a shoe store owner from Moorhead, Mississippi who had been allegedly cuckolded by Wilkins; but other evidence suggests that Coney Wilkins had simply moved out of state and changed his name. Another account suggests that he returned to his childhood roots in the Baptist Church, renounced his "evil ways" and ceased performing.
His records, sporadically released by Vocalion before and after his disappearance in late 1942, drew little attention. It was not until a reissue of his music ("The Coney Wilkins Story" - Columbia) in 1961 that the import of his guitar technique and the haunting lyricism of his compositions placed Wilkins among the great innovators and pioneers of what is known today as Rock and Roll. The works that subsequently came to light in 2005, and the controversy that surrounds the unearthing of a long-lost 1941 tape recording of a Coney Wilkins session in Vicksburg, MS (and the alleged plagiarism that made "White Tail Deer" one of the best-selling records of the mid-sixties [see: The Tupelos]) has only enhanced his reputation as one of the outstanding contributors to the canon of Twentieth Century music.
The first Coney Wilkins record ever released by Vocalion: "Leland Blues" (from the San Antonio, Texas sessions of 1938)
THE CONEY WILKINS STORY was released in 1961 (Columbia/Heritage). As an easily-available, remastered compendium of the entire Coney Wilkins' catalog, it became one of the "fertilizers" (as one critic called it) of the resurgence of Blues in the mid-to-late Sixties. Its profound influence on blues/rock musicians and composers on both sides of the Atlantic was not matched until the discovery of the so-called "Vicksburg (1941)" sessions in 2005.
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