Clifton Chenier


Clifton Chenier was an American musician known as a pioneer of zydeco, a style of music that arose from Creole music, with R&B, blues, and Cajun influences. He sang and played the accordion. Chenier won a Grammy Award in 1983.
Chenier was known as the King of Zydeco, and also billed as the King of the South.

Biography

Chenier was a native of Leonville, Louisiana, near Opelousas. He spoke Louisiana French as a first language.
Chenier was exposed to music growing up, as he accompanied his father, Joseph Chenier, a farmer and player of the single-row diatonic accordion, to dances. His uncle, Morris Chenier, played fiddle. Musical influences that he cited from radio were Muddy Waters, Peetie Wheatstraw, and Lightning Hopkins, while local influences included Creole musicians Claude Faulk, Jesse and ZoZo Reynolds, and Sidney Babineaux. Clifton began playing accordion around 1947, and by 1950 was playing in a club in Basile with his brother Cleveland Chenier on rubboard. Before launching a professional music career, Chenier worked in fields and at a Gulf Oil refinery in Port Arthur, Texas, outside of whose gates he also played music with Cleveland.
Chenier began his recording career in 1954, when he signed with Elko Records and released Cliston Blues, a regional success. Imperial Records picked up and reissued the single and Chenier cut four more sides for their "Post" subsidiary. These early sides were credited to Cliston Chanier. In 1955, he signed with Specialty Records and garnered his first national hit with his label debut "Eh, 'tite Fille". The release's national success led to numerous tours with popular rhythm and blues performers such as Ray Charles, Etta James, Chuck Berry, Little Richard, T-Bone Walker, and Lowell Fulson. He also toured in the early days with Clarence Garlow, billed as the Two Crazy Frenchmen. Chenier was signed with Chess Records in Chicago, followed by the Arhoolie label in the early 1960s. Arhoolie gave Chenier exposure to new audiences of blues and rock listeners across the US.
In April 1966, Chenier appeared at the Berkeley Blues Festival on the University of California campus and was subsequently described by Ralph J. Gleason, jazz critic of the San Francisco Chronicle, as "one of the most surprising musicians I have heard in some time, with a marvelously moving style of playing the accordion... blues accordion, that's right, blues accordion." Over time, the band expanded to include saxophone and organ, and electric effects pedals, with all melody instruments taking turns at solos.
Chenier was the first act to play at Antone's, a blues club on Sixth Street in Austin, Texas. In 1976, he reached a national audience by appearing on the first season of the PBS music program Austin City Limits. In 1979 he returned to the show with his Red Hot Louisiana Band.
Chenier's popularity peaked in the 1980s, and he was recognized with a Grammy Award in 1983 for his album I'm Here! It was the first Grammy for his new label Alligator Records. Chenier followed Queen Ida as the second Louisiana Creole to win a Grammy.
Chenier is credited with redesigning the wood and crimped tin washboard into the vest frottoir, an instrument that easily hung from the shoulders. He sketched his idea for a metalworker in Port Arthur named Willie Landry, who made the first frottoir. Cleveland Chenier, Clifton's older brother, also played in the Red Hot Louisiana Band. He found popularity for his ability to manipulate the distinctive sound of the frottoir by rubbing several bottle openers along its ridges. During their prime, Chenier and his band traveled throughout the world.
Chenier suffered from diabetes, which eventually forced him to have a foot amputated and required dialysis because of associated kidney problems. He died of diabetes-related kidney disease in December 1987 in Lafayette, Louisiana. A lifelong Catholic, Chenier was funeralized in Opelousas, where two bishops and several priests presided at his funeral. He is buried in All Souls Cemetery in Loreauville.

Legacy and tributes

Since 1987, his son C. J. Chenier has carried on the zydeco tradition by touring with Chenier's band and recording albums. Clifton Chenier's bandmate and protégé Buckwheat Zydeco achieved national success playing the piano accordion.
Paul Simon mentioned Chenier in his song "That Was Your Mother" on his 1986 album Graceland, calling him the "King of the Bayou." Rory Gallagher wrote a song in tribute to Chenier, "The King of Zydeco" on his last studio album Fresh Evidence. Sonny Landreth recalls growing up on the rhythm of Clifton and Cleveland and the Red Hot Louisiana Band in South of I-10, song title and name of the album released in 1995. John Mellencamp refers to "Clifton" in his song "Lafayette", about the Louisiana city where Chenier often performed, on Mellencamp's 2003 album Trouble No More. Zachary Richard mentions Chenier in his song "Clif's Zydeco". The Squeezebox Stompers' "Zydeco Train" says, "Clifton Chenier, he's the engineer."
The jam band Phish often covers Chenier's song "My Soul" in live performances. Chenier is the subject of Les Blank's 1973 documentary film Hot Pepper.
In 2025, to honor Chenier on what would have been his 100th birthday, Valcour Records issued A Tribute to the King of Zydeco, a recording with 12 newly-recorded tracks by artists such as the Rolling Stones, Steve Earle, Taj Mahal, Lucinda Williams, David Hidalgo and Molly Tuttle. The album was nominated for a 2025 Grammy Award in the Best Regional Roots Music Album category.

Awards and honors

Chenier received a 1984 National Heritage Fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts, the U.S. government's highest honor in folk and traditional arts. He was inducted posthumously into the Blues Hall of Fame in 1989, and the Louisiana Music Hall of Fame in 2011. In 2014, he received a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award.
In 2016, the Library of Congress deemed Chenier's album Bogalusa Boogie to be "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant" and selected it for preservation in the National Recording Registry.

Discography

Early singles

  • Louisiana Stomp / Cliston Blues
  • Louisiana Stomp / Cliston Blues reissue
  • Rockin' The Bop / Country Bred
  • Rockin' Hop / Tell Me
  • Ay-Tete Fee / Boppin' The Rock
  • The Things I Did For You / Think It Over
  • Squeeze Box Boogie / The Cat's Dreamin'
  • Where Can My Baby Be / The Big Wheel
  • Standing On The Corner / The Big Wheel there are two issues of Argo 5262, one with "Standing On The Corner" as the A-side, the other showing "Where Can My Baby Be" as the A-side; they are the same song under two different titles.
  • Sloppy / My Soul
  • It Happened So Fast / Goodbye Baby
  • Worried Life Blues / Hey Ma Ma
  • Night & Day, My Love / Rockin' Accordion
  • Bajou Drive / My Soul reissue
  • Ay Ai Ai / Why Did You Go Last Night
  • Hot Rod / Louisiana Blues
  • Zydeco Et Pas Sale / I Can Look Down At Your Woman
  • Keep On Scratching / It's Hard

Albums

Louisiana Blues and Zydeco Bon Ton Roulet! Bayou Soul compilation of Huey P. Meaux produced materialBlack Snake Blues Clifton Chenier's Very Best compilation of Arhoolie material from first 3 albums: 1024/1031/1038King of the Bayous Bayou Blues compilation of Specialty materialLive Out West Bogalusa Boogie Frenchin' the Boogie Boogie in Black & White with Rod Bernard Boogie 'N' Zydeco recorded 11/19/75Clifton Chenier and His Red Hot Louisiana Band Cajun Swamp Music Live 2-LPIn New Orleans Classic Clifton compilation of Arhoolie material from all 8 albumsThe King of Zydeco recorded 7/12/75I'm Here! Country Boy Now Grammy Award Winner 1984! Live at the San Francisco Blues Festival recorded 9/12/82Black Snake Blues Sings the Blues recorded 4/01/69Clifton Chenier – 60 Minutes With the King of Zydeco reissue of Arhoolie 1082, plus 3 bonus tracksLive! At the Long Beach and San Francisco Blues Festivals includes an entire previously unreleased performance at the 1983 Long Beach Blues Festival, plus the reissue of Arhoolie 1093Zydeco Dynamite: The Clifton Chenier Anthology 2-CDSqueezebox Boogie Live! At Grant Street recorded 4/28/81Clifton Chenier's Rockin' Accordion: A Selection of His Earliest Recordings 1954–1960
  • ''Clifton Chenier And His Red Hot Louisiana Band Live At Tipitina's / June 7, 1980''