Mississippi Matilda Revisited

I'd like to begin with saying that this post contains my original research and, albeit it's rather short, I'm quite proud :-) I was recently listening to a great blues compilation by Saga Jazz Records called "Plantation Blues: Cotton Patch & Tobacco Belt Blues" and found there a track by mysterious Mississippi Matilda. None of my books mentioned her and I couldn't find anything on the net. Her sole song I got was "Hard Working Woman" (it's even on YouTube with only 56 views!). I listened to it about a billion times in a row and even then couldn't figure out all the lyrics ;-) Anyway, it was a love at first sight.

If there's one thing I'm good at, it's searching and digging for information. They say: if it doesn't exist on the internet, it doesn't exist. And slowly I started gathering information about Mississippi Matilda...

"Hard Working Woman" with 3 other songs was recorded on October 15, 1936. In St. Charles hotel in New Orleans :) That was cool enough for me, but Wirz.de was even more informative: artist's real name was Matilda Powell, she was the wife of Eugene Powell who recorded those songs with her (and probably Willie Harris, Jr.). I started looking for 3 more songs and found two of them in another source: "A&V Blues" and "Happy Home Blues" were on albums by Sonny Boy Nelson as bonus tracks. "Peel Banana Blues" (that song title is still on my mind) remains unreleased by Bluebird Records. I couldn't find any contact and the label seems dead.

Google Books is a great research tool I've never used before. I've searched for Mississippi Matilda and found two interesting results in two books: "Africa and the Blues" and "The tribe of black Ulysses". And voila! ;) I've got even photo of miss Powell from 1972 (by Steve LaVere).


I've even found lyrics for her best known song, "Hard Working Woman":

I'm a hard working woman, and I work hard all the time
But if you hear my baby, he just isn't satisfied

I have to go to my work baby, between the night and day
I didn't think my baby would treat me this way

I'm a hard working woman, but I'm becoming a rolling stone
And the way my baby treats me, Lord I ain't gonna be here long

I've uploaded Matilda's complete works on here, it's about 13MB.