Michael "Hawkeye" Herman

Michael "Hawkeye" Herman

Everyday Living
Topaz Productions –Topaz CD 0100
1988
(37'12")

Blues Alive !
Topaz Productions –OWR 0110
1997
(55'31")

It's All Blues To Me
Topaz Productions –Topaz CD 0300
2005
(66'22")

Little known in France, except for Eric Doidy who reviewed his last 2 CD's in a recent issue of Soul Bag, Michael "Hawkeye" Herman is some kind of a patriarch on the Blindman's Blues Forum. Not because of his age, the man barely being in his early sixties, but because of his impressive blues culture. A culture that was fed on encounters - he met legends like Son House and Lightnin' Hopkins, and two of them were guests on his first album, Haskell "Cool Popa" Saddler and no less than Charles Brown, mind you – which gained him recognition in the American blues community beyond his own musical skills. Travelling the States from North to South and from West to East to teach the blues with his Blues in the school program, he's also known for his writings in different specialized magazines. He received awards and titles for Keeping the Blues alive in 1998, Ambassador of Iowa Blues, and some of his songs were the soundtrack to different documentaries as well as to the plays El Paso Blue et Handler. He contributed to the book/CD Up The Mississippi/A Journey Of The Blues. One could go on and on, but let's talk about his music instead. Above all, Michael "Hawkeye" Herman is a country blues musician. Though his picture can be seen here and there with a Strat in his hands or with a lap steel on his lap, it's on acoustic guitars he recorded his 3 albums. And though it's a real pleasure to hear Charles Brown and Cool Popa on 2 songs each on his first CD, it would be a big mistake to underestimate the man's own songs. A guitarist with a delicate playing, the different styles he has mastered allow him to play a wide range of sounds. From single note to slide to finger picking, Hawkeye can do it all and his delicate singing happily matches the pure ringing of his acoustic guitar strings. Therefore his live album, on which he's by himself, is just as enjoyable as his studio recordings where he is sometimes accompanied by a second guitar player or bass man, a harmonica, an accordion, a drummer or a washboardist on It's All Blues To Me. It is an ever renewed pleasure for the country blues fan, even a growing one, for Hawkeye Herman's blues is one that grows on you more and more each time you listen to them. It's on the internet you'll be able to find out more about his music and buy some of it, at http://cdbaby.com/cd/hawkeye3 or at his own website, www.hawkeyeherman.com.

René Malines