Huddie Ledbetter, known to the world as Lead Belly, died in 1949, but his influence lives on. His songs have been covered by everyone from the Weavers (Goodnight Irene, 1950) to Led Zeppelin (Gallows Pole, 1970), Mark Lanegan with Kurt Cobain (Where Did You Sleep Last Night, 1989) and Nirvana (Where Did You Sleep Last Night, 1994), and most recently musicians such as Jack White (Goodnight Irene, 2014), Valerie June (Goodnight Irene, 2014), and Smog (In the Pines, 2005).

Smithsonian Folkways producer and archivist Jeff Place takes us through a history of the singer's biggest hits as he discusses the importance of modern incarnations in keeping the Lead Belly legacy alive.

Purchase Lead Belly: The Smithsonian Folkways Collection

Lead Belly: The Smithsonian Folkways Collection, the first career-spanning box set dedicated to the American music icon, features 5 hours of music with 16 unreleased tracks. Lead Belly is “the hard name of a harder man,” said Woody Guthrie of his friend and fellow American music icon who was born Huddie Ledbetter (c. 1888–1949). From the swamplands of Louisiana, the prisons of Texas, and the streets of New York City, Lead Belly and his music became cornerstones of American folk music and touchstones of African American cultural legacy.

With his 12-string Stella guitar, he sang out a cornucopia of songs that included his classics “The Midnight Special,” “Irene,” “The Bourgeois Blues,” and many more, which in turn have been covered by musical notables such as the Beach Boys, Creedence Clearwater Revival, Van Morrison, Nirvana, Odetta, Little Richard, Pete Seeger, Frank Sinatra and Tom Waits. Lead Belly: The Smithsonian Folkways Collection brings us the story of the man as well as the musician.