The great Leroy Carr, for example, hailed from Indianapolis. .
The "elevation" of the blues by its integration into ragtime -- led by W.C. Handy ("Memphis Blues," "St. Louis Blues") beginning in 1912 -- played a major hand in the birthing of jazz; the freedom of improvised vocal and instrumental call-and-answer was probably an attraction for ragtime musicians. For another decade, the blues itself was still mostly played live for phonograph-less rural audiences, yet eventually the jazz connection did pay off. Performed as somewhat urbanized blues with large jazz-musician ensembles, Mamie Smith's 1920 breakout hit "Crazy Blues" and the ensuing (1923-on) recordings of Ma Rainey and Bessie Smith first exposed the blues to a mass audience (this was despite the blues having been considered as primarily a man's medium!). The earliest men's blues recordings, even including those of pre-blues-music artists like the Mississippi Sheiks, did not begin until 1924, and the floodgates only really opened in 1927. The Delta's Charley Patton, one of the most popular bluesmen of the era and one of the most influential of all time, did not record until 1929. .
Patton's influence might have extended further had he lived past 1934. As it was, he touched fellow musicians including the already-powerful Son House, and possibly the single greatest bluesman of all, Robert Johnson. Like all the greats of any genre and era, Johnson was a superb synthesis of styles, taking everything he borrowed--even the integration of the pietistic of Leroy Carr--a step further. Other Mississippian bluesmen such as Skip James, Mississippi John Hurt and Tommy Johnson also developed their own gripping, individual styles. If anything can be said to be characteristic of Mississippi blues besides its vocal intensity and rhythmic drive (often accented by the use of a slide or bottleneck on the guitar), it is its exciting diversity. .
A particular strain of the blues -- Georgia/Carolinas blues -- was gradually extending influence north through Virginia, and eventually came to be known as "Piedmont".
