Most blues origin stories start in a Chicago club or at a Mississippi crossroads. Jimmy Witherspoon first grabbed the public's attention singing in Calcutta, India in the middle of World War II. Born August 8, 1920 in Gurdon, Arkansas to a railroad worker who sang in local choirs and a mother who played piano, Witherspoon joined the Merchant Marines, landed in Calcutta and sang with expatriate jazz pianist Teddy Weatherford's band over the Armed Forces Radio Service, learning to command a massive unseen audience before he ever worked the domestic club circuit.

This episode follows his 1945 recording debut with Jay McShann, the 1949 number one Ain't Nobody's Business that spent 34 weeks on the charts, the Modern Records hits No Rollin' Blues and Big Fine Girl, and stadium-sized Cavalcade of Jazz shows at Wrigley Field in Los Angeles alongsid ...