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Pee Wee Crayton

Pee Wee Crayton was an icon and pioneer of modern blues guitar. With inspiration from jazz legend Charlie Christian and lessons from T-Bone Walker, Crayton helped define the emerging West Coast blues scene and electric blues guitar, and became a patriarch of both. In his heyday (late '40s to early '50s) his popularity was second only to his mentor, T-Bone Walker, and his success preceded that of Lowell Fulson, Gatemouth Brown, and B.B. King. Connie Curtis Pee Wee Crayton was born near Austin, Texas in Rockdale, on December 18, 1914. In 1935 he moved to Los Angeles. By World War II he was in the San Francisco Bay Area, an aspiring musician. There he supplemented the inspiration of jazz guitar trailblazer Charlie Christian with personal tutelage by a man who would be a close friend till his passing thirty years later, the original electric blues guitar master, T-Bone Walker. Crayton told interviewer John Breckow, "We got to be real good friends." According to another Pee Wee interview, T-Bone "showed me how to string up the guitar to get the blues sound out of it. T-Bone was gonna try to help me learn how to play. My timing was real bad. T-Bone helped me with my timing. He would play the piano or the bass and show me how to play in time." The two went on to stage friendly battles, and when T- Bone's health problems interfered with his gigs late in life, Crayton was on call to fill in whenever he was available. Pee Wee added some rawness to Walker's stylish blues approach, and chord knowledge gleaned from guitarist John Collins involving the use of four fingers. Pee Wee proudly stated, "I know how to play them big, pretty chords and where to put 'em at." After some obscure recordings as a leader and sideman (mostly for pianist Ivory Joe Hunter) in the Bay Area, Pee Wee hooked up with L.A.-based Modern Records. In 1948 he broke through with the classic moody instrumental "Blues After Hours" and followed with the equally definitive hits, the swinging "Texas Hop" and vocal ballad "I Love You So." Soon he was tearing up venues around the country with his flashy picking, power chords and grooves suitable for dancing or romance. Though his great Modern sides have been reissued thoughtfully in England and Japan, their unavailability in the U.S. is a major gap in the blues canon.

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Album Review

Pee Wee Crayton: Blues Guitar Magic, The Modern Legacy, Vol. 2

Read "Blues Guitar Magic, The Modern Legacy, Vol. 2" reviewed by Ed Kopp


Some of the most sophisticated blues was recorded during that interval following World War II before rock 'n roll took America by storm. Pee Wee Crayton was one of the leading guitar innovators during that period, and his pioneering style is well represented on this disk. The Modern Legacy, Volume 2, Blues Guitar Magic is not quite as strong as its precursor Volume 1 (1996), but it comes close. This one is dominated by slow, enticing numbers and ...

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