SYKES, ROOSEVELT

SYKES, ROOSEVELT. Bluesman (31 January 1906 in Elmar, Arkansas). His family moved to St. Louis, Missouri, when he was a child, but after being left an orphan at the age of seven, he returned to Arkansas. He taught himself to play his grandfather's church organ and later the piano. When he left home at fifteen, he played well enough to perform in local clubs and had been influenced by Jesse Bell and Lee Green , among others. For several years he...