Elmo Williams was born February 6, 1933, and thanks to a talented and jealous father, Elmo had the best of both worlds for a budding guitarist. Elmo's ear for music came from his father's side. Everybody on that side of the family could do a little something; and, his father, a skilled guitarist with a strong voice, was no exception. An ear for music--and nothing more-- was all Elmo was getting from his father, who made this painfully clear fifty years ago when Elmo asked for a guitar lesson.

"Son," he said. "When I was your age I begged everybody who could play to show me some guitar. Nobody would. Why should I teach you? Ha, I didn't think you had a reason."

Elmo didn't get the lesson he wanted; but he didn't walk away empty-handed either. He'd been exposed-- to an eclipse of the family. This experience gave him the "know-how" he'd need one day as a father. There wasn't a guitar in Adams County-- homemade or store bought, it didn't matter -- that Elmo didn't at least try to borrow. He fretted the neck just like he'd seen his father do. He figured out some basic chords, and invented two new ones before realizing he needed to go back to the beginning and learn to tune.

After a stint in the Army, Elmo returned to Natchez and married. He worked in a bakery, worked on a road crew, drove a truck, and somehow wound up in a sawmill. The situation was simple: if Elmo wasn't playing guitar, it was all clock punching and didn't matter which one. Just because the week was shot by the demands of a wife and babies didn't mean Elmo had to waste his weekend working around the house and in the yard. Hell no. From Friday night to Sunday morning Elmo was across the river at Haney's Big House in Ferriday, Louisiana, then and now the deformed, small, poor, and rural sister city of Natchez.

(Despite it shortcomings, Ferriday has produced its share of freethinkers: Mickey Gilley, Jimmy Swaggart, and Jerry Lee Lewis. Haney had enough smarts to study the locals (who'd been enjoying the advent of the insect screen for almost twenty years), and figure out what they needed from a nightclub. Insect screens weren't the only modern convenience that had made its way to the river town: both drugstores were lined with slot machines. Of all its accomplishments, Big Haney's Fun House will be remembered as the bar that spit up Jerry Lee Lewis.)

At his regular gig at Haney's, Elmo saw major acts and was offered to join by some. He declined all offers -- he had a family to support and only 22 years left to prepare for the Fat Possum project. Fifteen years ago, Elmore Jr., his son, asked senior to show him how to play guitar. Elmo explained the situation to him. "Son," he said. "I was about your age when I asked my father to teach me to play guitar. Do you have any idea what he told me?"

Hezekiah Early, drummer extraoindinaire, was born October 7, 1934, at Anna's Bottom, the rich river bottom just north of Natchez, city limits. His childhood included picnics that relied on music for the entertainment. The field-style drumming, the beats and everything went straight into Hezekiah's head. At the age of 10, possessed with huge visions and an ever-changing set of buckets and pans, Hezekiah was drumming the days and nights down to nothing. He then became interested in the harmonica, which was cheap and easier to carry than drums and mastered it. Hezekiah began spending his Saturdays playing for change in front of the grocery where his father worked.

It was on that sidewalk, where "Papa George," the local harmonica chief, spotted Hezekiah. Papa George knew talent when he saw it and took Hezekiah under his wing. As is too often the case, when Papa George was on the verge of receiving recognition and the producers of the Muhammad Ali film "Freedom Road" wanted him for the sound track, he died. Hezekiah was the only one considered to play Papa George's part.

In 1978, reportedly at the urging of Muhammed Ali (who was in Natchez filming a TV novel), Hezekiah was able to combine his love of the harp with his need for drumming, with the aid of good duct tape. With the harmonica taped to the mic, or held in his mouth, or bolted to the drum kit, Hezekiah's arms are free from distractions. He soon had his own band, Hezekiah and House Rockers, and except for PeeWee Whitaker's trombone, he owned all the instruments they played. Every time an instrument broke or needed parts, Hezekiah had to pay for it. So he had to let the band go in order to prepare for this album, It Takes One to Know One.