George Mitchell

Born in Coral Cables, Florida and raised in Atlanta, George Mitchell was among a handful of people (including Dr. David Evans, also featured in this issue and performing in the same show) who ventured into Mississippi, Tennessee, and Georgia to research blues music beginning in the 1960s. Mitchell’s field recordings of Cecil Barfield, R.L. Burnside, Jimmy Lee Williams, and area fife and drum ensembles are standouts among his hundreds of hours of recordings. Mitchell was the only person documenting black female guitar players there at the time, including Precious Bryant, Jessie Mae Hemphill and Rosa Lee Hill. Mitchell turned those experiences into a master’s thesis that would double as his first book, Blow My Blues Away. After a stint as a reporter, Mitchell began overseeing the Georgia Grassroots Music Festival. He then worked for the Columbus Museum, researching a project entitled tional Arts of the Lower Chattahoochee Valley. Before retiring from field recording, Mitchell designed Atlanta’s 1984 National Downhome Blues Festival. The three-day festival was the largest gathering of old-time blues musicians ever assembled, before or since. The packed event yielded a one-hour PBS program and four albums. Mitchell then devoted himself to teaching photography, and has spent the last two decades working with Atlanta high school students while also producing book projects of his own. His photographs can be found in the per manent collections of the Columbus Museum of Art and museums in Sacramento, California and Utrecht, Holland. Now residing in Fort Myers, Mitchell is one of the most experienced professional oil can bassists in the country. More at thecountryblues.com