DICK WATERMAN,
1935-2024

Dick Waterman, a promoter and manager of blues musicians who played a key role in the career revivals of Son House, Mississippi John Hurt and Bukka White, died on 1/26. He was 88.

Waterman started promoting blues shows in Boston-area clubs in the early 1960s before creating Avalon Productions, one of the first booking agencies focusing on blues musicians. He helped a young Bonnie Raitt secure her first recording contract, with Warner Bros., booking and managing her for 15 years. Originally a writer, over time he developed a second career as a photographer.

Waterman was part of the Boston folk scene while attending Boston University and writing for Broadside magazine, then starting to book blues artists, working with Mississippi Fred McDowell, Hurt and White.

In 1964 Waterman and others legendarily embarked on a journey to find Son House, who'd made a handful of influential recordings from the 1930s to the early '40s before leaving music. Waterman would become House’s manager, introducing him to folk-revival audiences. House signed with Columbia Records in 1965, releasing a collection of new recordings, Father of the Delta Blues.

This success led to Waterman's booking, among others, Skip James, Junior Wells, Lightnin' Hopkins, Arthur “Big Boy” Crudup, J. B. Hutto, White and Hurt. He also worked with blues musicians’ heirs to help protect estates and oversee legacies. Waterman moved to Oxford, Mississippi, in the 1980s and most recently managed Jimmy “Duck” Holmes.

As a photographer, he shot blues, folk and rock artists, among them Bob Dylan, B.B. King, the Rolling Stones, Janis Joplin and Ray Charles as well the artists he managed.

In 2000 Waterman became one of the first non-performers to be inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame.

I’m deeply sorry to mark the passing of my friend, Dick Waterman, who made such a huge impact on the lives and careers of so many great blues artists, championing them as people as much as their music, booking and managing them with great care, integrity and skill.

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— Bonnie Raitt (@TheBonnieRaitt) January 30, 2024