Buddy Moss born 16 January 1914

Moss was one of 12 children born to a sharecropper in Jewel, a town in Warren County, Georgia, midway between Atlanta and Augusta. There is some disagreement about his date of birth, some sources indicating 1906 and many others a more recent vintage, 1914. He began teaching himself the harmonica at a very early age, and he played at local parties around Augusta, where the family moved when he was four and remained for the next ten years. By 1928, he was busking around the streets of Atlanta. 

By the time he arrived in Atlanta, he was good enough to be noticed by Curley Weaver and Robert "Barbecue Bob" Hicks, who began working with the younger Moss. They got him his first recording date at the age of 16, as a member of their group the Georgia Cotton Pickers in December 1930 at the Campbell Hotel in Atlanta. Nothing more was heard from Moss on record until three years later. In January of 1933, however, he made his debut as a recording artist in his own right for the American Record Company in New York, accompanied by Fred McMullen and Curley Weaver,. cutting three songs cut that first day, "Bye Bye Mama,""Daddy Don't Care," and "Red River Blues." 

The January 1933 sessions also featured Moss returning to the mouth harp, as a member of the Georgia Browns -- Moss, Weaver, McMullen, and singer Ruth Willis -- for six songs done at the same sessions. But it was on the guitar that Moss would make his name over the next five years. Moss' records were released simultaneously on various budget labels associated with ARC, and were so successful that in mid-September of 1933, he was back in New York along with Weaver and Blind Willie McTell. 

By August of 1935, Moss saw his per-song fee doubled from $5 to $10 (in a period when many men were surviving on less than that per week), and when he wasn't recording, he was constantly playing around Atlanta alongside McTell and Weaver. That year, Moss went to prison for the murder of his wife in an incident that was never fully recounted or explained (Mitchell has been told that Moss killed his wife by hitting her with a guitar). Moss’ good behavior and the lobbying of two sponsors willing to make sure Moss met the terms of his parole helped him get out of jail in 1941. It was while working at Elon College under the parole agreement that he met a group of blues musicians that included Sonny Terry and Brownie McGhee. 

In October of 1941, Moss, Terry, and McGhee went to New York to cut a group of sides for Okeh/Columbia, including 13 numbers by Moss featuring his two new colleagues. Only three of the songs were ever released. Moss continued performing in the area around Richmond, Virginia and Durham, North Carolina during the mid-'40s, and with Curley Weaver in Atlanta during the early '50s, but music was no longer his profession or his living. He went to work on a tobacco farm, drove trucks, and worked as an elevator operator, among other jobs, over the next 20-odd years. 

Although he still occasionally played in the area around Atlanta, Moss was largely forgotten.  Fate stepped in, in the form of some unexpected coincidences. In 1964, he chanced to hear that his old partner Josh White was giving a concert at Emory University in Atlanta. Moss visited White backstage at the concert, and the white acolytes hanging around established legend White suddenly discovered a blues legend in their midst. He was persuaded to resume performing in a series of concerts before college audiences, most notably under the auspices of the Atlanta Folk Music Society and the Folklore Society of Greater Washington. 

A June 10, 1966 concert in Washington, D.C. was recorded and portions of it were later released on the Biograph label. Moss played the Newport Folk Festival in 1969, and appeared at such unusual venues as New York's Electric Circus during that same year. During the '70s, he played the John Henry Memorial Concert in West Virginia for two consecutive years, and the Atlanta Blues Festival and the Atlanta Grass Roots Music Festival in 1976. 

Buddy Moss died in Atlanta in October of 1984, once again largely forgotten by the public. In the years since, his music was once again being heard courtesy of the Biograph label's reissue of the 1966 performance and the Austrian Document label, which has released virtually every side that he recorded between 1930 and 1941. As a result, his reputation has once again grown, although he is still not nearly as well-known among blues enthusiasts as Blind Willie McTell or Blind Boy Fuller.

(Edited from AllMusic bio by Bruce Elder & Wikipedia)

Here’s a rare and important clip of Buddy Moss playing at the Berea College, Kentucky, on 29^th October 1977. Set list - St. James Infirmary, Chesterfield, A Shanty In Old Shanty Town, Miss Otis Regrets, Love Oh Careless Love, Don't Ever Dog A Woman, Please Send Me Someone To Love, I'll Do Anything For You & Wake Up Old Maid.