Matt ‘Guitar’ Murphy

I’m still learning man. But there ain’t nothing you can do when you’re dead, you know? All that means is – you keep living and you’re gonna get older, and one day you’re gonna be old. So, hang on and you will learn …
Matt ‘Guitar’ Murphy


There’s something about Matt ‘Guitar’ Murphy; something beyond his spectacular guitar playing. Catch him on stage and you’re going to see a blues player who is having as much fun as his audience. He proffers a wide smile and you can’t help but notice the glint of pure joy in his eyes peering out from underneath his baseball cap. Despite the fact that he’s built like a bull, there’s a distinctive soft touch when needed on his fretwork.
Not sure who Matt ‘Guitar’ Murphy is? Well, if you’ve seen the Blues Brothers movies, you’ve seen and heard him. If you’ve listened to Muddy Waters and Bobby ‘Blues’ Bland’s Chess recordings, you’ve heard him. Perhaps maybe you’ve caught some of his guitar work on the recordings of Memphis Slim, James Cotton and Chuck Berry. And then, of course, there’s his solo work.
Matt ‘Guitar’ Murphy has had a long career as an incredible blues guitarist and may very well be one of the best players of the genre you may not recognize immediately.

Murphy was born on December 27, 1929 in Sunflower, Mississippi where he lived until the age of three. His parents relocated with Murphy and his brother Floyd to Memphis where their father had taken a job at the Peabody Hotel. In an interview with Tom Guerra, Murphy said that his first foray into music was through the record collection of an Aunt he had. “My Aunt had an old corrugated crate filled with records, and I’d listen to then all the time growing up. Guys like Petey Wheatstraw, who called himself ‘the devils son-in-law’, Blind Boy Fuller, and Josh White …these are the guys I was listening to for the open string playing.” T-Bone Walker was also a major influence. “He had a certain way he’d play, by using the 9th and 13th chords, and then he’d add on to them’.

But it wasn’t just blues. He had a love for jazz, country and even classical music. As a child, he actually wanted a clarinet and would go down to the local pawnshop and stare at the horns through the window. “ …A lot of my phrasing comes from the horn players that I love, including Stan Getz, Coltrane, a whole bunch of them …”

Matt and his brother Floyd, also a well-respected blues guitarist, worked their way into the Memphis blues scene in the early 50’s. Matt hooked up with Howlin’ Wolf’s band for a brief time and eventually formed The Blue Flames with Junior Parker. (On a side note, Matts’ brother Floyd played guitar on Junior Parkers famous track, Mystery Train). “I know that I was instrumental in teaching Howlin’ Wolf his time, because he’d always run over the right number of bars, you know? I was aware of counting the correct number of bars, usually 12, and whenever he would overrun, I would just cut through and get him back on time, and that really helped him. I probably played with Howlin’ Wolf for a year, then Wolf hired Little Junior Parker, who would play when Wolf took a rest. From there, Little Junior and I got a band started and I named it The Blue Flames. It was Little Junior, L.C. Drane, Ike Turner, and me from The Blue Flames,”

By the late 50’s, Matt had relocated to Chicago where he continued on and built upon his reputation as one of the most respected bluesmen on the circuit recording with some of the most powerful blues bands of the period. “I guess I was one of the staff guitar players down there at Chess. I was on an album by Chuck Berry, and I also played on Muddy Waters’ things, I played on some of Sonny Boy Williamson’s records like "You Gotta Help
Me"…(laughs)! I’ll never forget, one time I was playing in Atlanta, Georgia, and this lady was trying to tell me how "You Gotta Help Me" went, so I just stopped the band, and I said "Look lady, I’m on the record, I KNOW HOW IT GOES! HA HA HA!!"

He eventually decided to join up with Memphis Slim’s House Rockers (where he stayed a member of the band steadily for twenty years) who recorded a number of tracks for Vee-Jay and United Artists labels.

Through the 60’s and 70’s, Murphy continued on with session and sideman work along with steady employment with both Memphis Slim and James Cotton, he was content to stand on the side of the bandstand. Although his appearance at the 1963 American Folk and Blues Festival was notable for his flashy picking performance of Matt’s Guitar Boogie.

But his appearance in the Blues Brothers movie in 1980 brought him in the spotlight. His work on the subsequent disc for the Blues Brothers, Briefcase Full Of Blues finally cemented his status as a premiere blues guitarist. How did he come to meet up with the Blues Brothers? Murphy explained in his interview with Guerra. “I was playing one night at McHale’s, in New York City, and what happened was it seemed like everybody was there that night…Sha Na Na was there, then Johnny Winter came through the door, and people were like (in a hushed voice) "Ohhh, here comes Johnny Winter!" Oh well, we had become friends before that because he invited us to go on the road together with him… So, what happened, was…since I always carried two guitars with me, I gave him one, and we were on the bandstand jammin’ when John (Belushi) and Dan (Aykroyd) came in. Oh yeah, we got through jammin’ and the people understood what was happening! So, when I came off the stand, they introduced themselves to me, and they said that they’d like to make an album with me, and asked if I’d be interested. I said "Yeah, I’d be glad to do it."

In 1985, Murphy hooked up again with Memphis Slim for the live disc, Together Again One More Time which was recorded at Antoines, the famed Austin, Texas blues club (Antoine’s was the home to The Fabulous Thunderbirds and the launch pad for blues legend, Stevie Ray Vaughn). He returned to Antoines again in 1987 to record the live James Cotton Live At Antoines.
In 1990, with the help of his brother Floyd, Murphy recorded his first solo disc Way Down South for Antoines record label. In 1996, Murphy recorded his second solo effort, Blues Don’t Bother Me followed by 2000’s Lucky Charm. (He also appears in The Blues Brothers 2000 film and soundtrack). In 2003 while performing in Nashville, Murphy suffered a stroke on stage. After a time off to recover, Matt ‘Guitar’ Murphy is back on the road again. In November of 2011, Murphy married his long time girlfriend Kathy Hemrick in Florida. Just to prove his staying power, Murphy has just released his latest disc Last Call At The 40 Watts Club.
Not familiar with Matt ‘Guitar’ Murphy? Now might be the time.

While most people only know him as Aretha Franklin's henpecked husband in "The Blues Brothers" (she starts singing "Think" to him in the diner when he starts entertaining notions of joining the band back out on the road), if you like laid-back, old-school, foot-tapping blues, you'll like Matt Murphy. "Way Down South" is one of my most-played blues CDs in my collection.