Columbia Artists Management, the organization that's putting on the tour, came up with the name, since we all have roots in the blues. It's a wide-ranging show, so it helps to have a title that shows some kind of focus. I wanted to get out and tour with my daughter, who has a great band, and Vusi Mahlasela, who is a fantastic performer. What was the inspiration for the World Blues tour? I wanted to balance my emotions with something real, and connected with sounds that were meaningful to my heritage.
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Around that time, some family from the Deep South came to New York, so I learned to play the blues from people who knew how to play, not from records. If it hadn't have been for the blues, I don't think I would have been able to work out the emotions his death brought up. When my dad was 39, he died in a tragic accident. There's a lot of joy in most of the tunes that came out of Africa, and a lot of joy in gospel, but the blues have a level of sorrow that set it off from other styles. I wanted to play, and listen to, things that spoke to my background as an African-American. They had friends that spoke every kind of patois, so I got used to speaking in different accents and languages and listening to real music, natural music. They loved all that music, as well as folk from all around the world, I didn't know there were people growing up who didn't get exposed to it.
By the time they got to New York, jazz, big bands and the great singers of the '30s and '40s were popular. Kitts and heard calypso, African and other Caribbean music when he was growing up. My father grew up on the Caribbean island of St. My mother was from South Carolina, where she listened to gospel and church music. Why were you attracted to roots music and blues? Your parents exposed you to music from all over the world. In an exclusive interview with, Mahal discussed how his parents inspired his musical upbringing, how blues served as a refuge following the death of his father, his recent tie to Dave Matthews, and his two career GRAMMY wins, among other topics. On his current World Blues tour, he continues to underline the connections between African-American roots music and traditions from other parts of the world by appearing with Fredericks Brown, a band from New Zealand comprsing his daughter Deva Mahal and South African singer/songwriter and activist Vusi Mahlasela. The two-time GRAMMY winner developed his own inimitable style by incorporating jazz, African music, reggae, soul, Hawaiian rhythms, rock, and R&B elements into his sound. Taj Mahal has been blending world music with blues ever since he started performing more than 50 years ago.
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