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Article: Donegan, Lonnie
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- Contemporary Musicians
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CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2003 Gale, a part of Cengage Learning. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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Lonnie Donegan
Singer, guitarist
Initial Exposure to American Folk and Blues
“
Rock Island line
”
a Breakthrough Hit
Illness Curtailed Career
Selected discography
Sources
Lonnie Donegan was the undisputed king of skiffle
—
a jazz-tinged hybrid of American folk and blues. Performed with acoustic guitars, banjos, a tea chest or washtub bass, and a washboard for scrubbing out the backbeat, skiffle was crude, spirited music that began at American rent parties and in English workingmen
’
s pubs. Like rockabilly music, its commercial life was relatively short, but the form and Donegan
’
s recordings in particular, set the stage for the British rock
‘
n
...