Storyteller Rebecca Jernigan and slide guitarist Wendy Garrison will be telling and playing “Robert Johnson at the Crossroads” for youth and staff at the Barksdale Boys & Girls Club Wednesday, February 22. Their performance is funded by the Mississippi Humanities Council.
In colorful costumes Garrison and Jernigan retell the tale of legendary bluesman Robert Johnson. With music, drama, and sign language, they recount his fateful encounter with the prince of darkness at the crossroads of the Mississippi delta.
Dr. Rebecca Jernigan developed the legend of Robert Johnson from historical sources. Dr. Wendy Garrison’s mournful rendition of blues is representative of music drawn from her first-hand experience. Her mastery of the slide guitar has earned her a slot on the Mississippi Arts Commission Folk Artist Directory http://www.arts.ms.gov/folklife/index.php.
Funded in part by the Mississippi Humanities Council, Rebecca and Wendy have performed together locally in the Oxford public schools for grades 4 through high school; the Oxford Boys and Girls Club; Oxford Double Decker Storyfest; the Yoknapatawpha Summer Writer’s Institute; Theatre Oxford productions; and statewide at the BB King Museum in Indianola; workshops such as “Resources in the Delta” at Delta State University; at the Tupelo Ballet Arts Showcase; and at the Words and Music Community Culture Series in Pass Christian.
