Alexis Korner

The Godfather of British Blues

Titles these days are transitory; heroes come and go and stars rise and fall, such is the cut-throat pace of the entertainment and media industry. Over time, Alexis Korner’s celebrity may have slipped into the background, but that’s just the way he would have wanted it. For Alexis, music was everything, he lived and breathed it, and anything that came with it was merely trivial. You may not have heard of him, but in his 40-year career he was directly responsible for kick-starting a whole new musical movement AND the formation of the classic bands it spawned. It’s about time, I’d say, for a re-appraisal of the man quite rightly accorded the lasting honour: “the Godfather of British blues”.