Leo Bud Welch | I Don't Know What You Come To Do

Leo "Bud" Welch | 2013 Otha Turner Family Picnic
© 2013 Steve W. Likens

Otha Turner and his Rising Star Fife and Drum Band performed all over the world. But back home, he was famous for the picnics hosted on his farm in Gravel Springs, Mississippi. Musician friends would drop by for a bar-b-que goat sandwich, and an adult beverage or two, and then stay to play all night long. The Gravel Springs community in Tate County borders on neighboring Panola County. Tate was dry. Panola was wet. The story goes, at least the one told to me, that on the morning of a picnic local politicians would declare Otha's place to be in Panola County for the day. Since his passing in 2003, Otha's granddaughter Sharde Thomas has kept his fife and drum and picnic legacies intact. 

Sharde Thomas and The Rising Star Fife & Drum Band
Photos © 2013 Steve W. Likens 

It was at one such gathering on Otha's old homestead in the summer of 2013 that I met Leo "Bud" Welch. His manager, Vencie (who I did not know at the time), saw the camera hanging on my neck and walked over. "That's Leo Bud Welch," he said, nodding back at the gentleman sitting behind us. "He's 81 years old and plays guitar. Would you take some pictures?" Leo stood up. Vencie introduced us. We chatted a bit. Leo proudly told me he was from Bruce, Mississippi. He also confided that today was not only one of his first public performances outside the church, but one of his first public "blues" performances. I snapped a few shots. Then, it was Leo's and his red guitar's turn to take the stage - a flatbed trailer parked behind Otha's old house. Accompanied by a solitary drummer, Leo played a brand of blues both raw and gritty, yet deeply infused with the gospel music he grew up performing in church. 

The photos from that impromptu shoot would soon help introduce Leo to a world-wide audience. Elmore magazine published the photo at the top of this post, which Leo also used in one of his early videos.

Garden & Gun published the following photo, which also appeared in The StarTribune, The Morton Report, and the fundraising trailer for the full-length documentary, "Late Blossom Blues," by Austrian filmmaker and promoter Wolfgang Almer.

Photo © 2013 Steve W. Likens

              

Over the next four years, I was blessed to spend time with Leo on several more occasions and photograph him again.

Photos above | May 2017 Kimbrough Cotton Patch Blues Festival

Leo and Vencie | 2015 Bentonia Blues Festival
photo © 2015 Steve W. Likens

I took this one at the Foxfire Ranch Blues Barn near Waterford, Mississippi:

Photo © 2014 Steve W. Likens

When Leo passed in December 2017, the family included it as one of three photos etched into his headstone. I am humbled and honored to remain with him in this way.

photo courtesy of Mt. Zion Memorial Fund

Not long after that picnic performance, Leo recorded his first record, "Sabougla Voices." It was released in 2014 on Big Legal Mess Records a division of Fat Possum. In condensed form, the lyrics of the opening track are a fitting conclusion for this post:

I don't know what you come to do.

I come to praise his name.

I don't know what you come to do.

I come to sing my song.

I don't know what you come to do.

I come to kneel in prayer.

You can listen to it on Leo's still-active YouTube channel.

Thanks for stopping by.

- Steve