Skip to main content

new book: Searching for the Blues - the whole truth about Robert Johnson and the Crossroads myth

29 October 2023

 

Searching for the Blues

The whole truth about Robert Johnson and the Crossroads myth

Robert Johnson did not sell his soul to the devil. But how did he crack the Blues code...?  → book trailer (Youtube)

Get the book ...  (click on the logos)

Order directly from the publisher (delivered worldwide)

                                                                                     

While modern music historians have now almost completely stripped the Blues of its myths, award-winning Swiss singer-songwriter, slide guitarist and book author Richard Koechli gives him back the soul in a philosophical way. With a mystical story that deeply explores the question of what exactly might be behind the legendary „mojo“ of the great Blues masters.

Koechli embarks on a trip to the temples of the African-American musical soul, gets involved in strange thought adventures, meets all kinds of stars of Blues and Rock history – and in the end is haunted in a dream by the most famous of all Blues figures, by Robert Johnson (1911-1938). Johnson 'tells' him what really happened in Mississippi back then, how he got the Blues secret – and whether the devil really played a role ...

Richard Koechli: «The concept of my book may surprise, the subtitle ("the whole truth about Robert Johnson") even irritate. I didn't want to write a theoretical, bone-dry book about known historical facts of Blues history. My goal is to interpreting the existing facts and soulfully animating them on other levels. In literature, there are various narrative forms for this; meeting Robert Johnson in a dream does not mean to invent imaginary nonsense - it simply means that R.J. is speaking to me in a certain way through the known facts (within my personal dealings with those facts). Those who consider that Blues (as an example of soulful work) can be completely learned by practicing or via the academic/scientific route - will hardly be interested in this book. Blues greats like Robert Johnson proved and still prove that the whole truth is much greater ...»

A stirring story for all Blues lovers; full of light-footed poetry, spiritual depth and music-historical precision. You can feel in every line that Koechli is not a theorist, but a Blues artist down to the core.

Available as hardcover, softcover and e-book (english translation of the German edition):

ISBN Softcover: 978-3-384-04055-8

ISBN Hardcover: 978-3-384-04056-5

ISBN E-Book: 978-3-384-04057-2

The cheapest way to get the book: Pay 7 euros / dollars / pounds to paypal.me/RichardKoechli, and you will receive a PDF e-book directly from the author within one day (don't forget to include your e-mail address!)