Praise for Playing for the Man at the Door,
the six-LP Smithsonian Folkways box set
co-produced, written, and annotated
with Jeff Place
"Gripping storytelling and arresting instrumentals from the American South...This lavish, liner-note-heavy set aims to expand our ideas of who these men were, and of the talents they had...You hear real personalities reverberating, not historical records."
--The Guardian
"Revelations abound...critical and monumental."
--Texas Highways
"Free and energetic...the music here kicks and rambles, shudders and shakes--it's the stuff of rural dance halls, raucous bars and impromptu community parties. Whatever more serious trappings we've imbued it with, the pulse of classic blues is its raw vitality."
--Paste
"A fascinating collection...which includes a lavish and informative 128-page book...The set reveals much about what the obsessive self-made folklorist was hunting for, and lets loose hours of exciting, previously unheard music."
--The Wall Street Journal
"This long-awaited set lives up to the anticipation it's created."
--Folk Alley
the six-LP Smithsonian Folkways box set
co-produced, written, and annotated
with Jeff Place
"Gripping storytelling and arresting instrumentals from the American South...This lavish, liner-note-heavy set aims to expand our ideas of who these men were, and of the talents they had...You hear real personalities reverberating, not historical records."
--The Guardian
"Revelations abound...critical and monumental."
--Texas Highways
"Free and energetic...the music here kicks and rambles, shudders and shakes--it's the stuff of rural dance halls, raucous bars and impromptu community parties. Whatever more serious trappings we've imbued it with, the pulse of classic blues is its raw vitality."
--Paste
"A fascinating collection...which includes a lavish and informative 128-page book...The set reveals much about what the obsessive self-made folklorist was hunting for, and lets loose hours of exciting, previously unheard music."
--The Wall Street Journal
"This long-awaited set lives up to the anticipation it's created."
--Folk Alley
Playing for the Man at the Door marks the anticipated first release of music from the archive of reclusive musicologist Mack McCormick, and features 66 never-before-heard performances which span blues, gospels, ragtime, country dirges, and more. With unreleased recordings from icons like Lightnin' Hopkins and Mance Lipscomb, as well as lesser-known heroes like George "Bongo Joe" Coleman, this treasure trove offers insight into these musicians' lives, illuminating their joys and anguish, deep social connections, distinctive voices, and cultural networks.
In the 1950s and '60s, the blues was the dominant form of Black vernacular music throughout Texas and the surrounding areas. Robert “Mack” McCormick, an academically untrained but fanatical devotee of the blues, stepped into this world and became one of its most devout advocates and documentarians. By the time he died in 2015, McCormick had amassed a collection of 590 reels of sound recordings and 165 boxes of manuscripts, original interviews, research notes, and photos. McCormick never published or released most of these materials, and thus his collection became a thing of legend and intense speculation among scholars, blues aficionados, and musicians alike. Now, you can hear it for yourself.
The stunning 3 CD and 6 LP box sets include a 128-page book containing breathtaking photographs by McCormick and his associates, as well as contextual essays by producers Jeff Place and John Troutman on McCormick’s life, and by musicians Mark Puryear and Dom Flemons on some of the marginalized communities throughout “Greater Texas” to which McCormick devoted his life’s work.
