Invent a new way to play an instrument, mentor future legends, score hits, and die young. Then watch someone else take your stage name, tour the world with it, and become more famous as you than you ever were. That is the documented history of John Lee Curtis Williamson, the original Sonny Boy Williamson, and this episode separates the true innovator from the myth that overwrote him.

We follow his 1914 birth in Madison County, Tennessee, his 1934 move to Chicago during the Great Migration, and the cross-harp technique and hand-cupping that turned the harmonica from a novelty into a lead instrument. We revisit the 1937 Bluebird sessions with Lester Melrose that produced "Good Morning, School Girl," recordings made in the Sky Club atop Aurora's Leland Tower Hotel, his mentorship of Muddy Waters, Little Walter, and Junior Wells, and the June 1 ...