Phil Wiggins, blues harmonica virtuoso, is dead at 69

Phil Wiggins, a harmonica player with such range that he could make his instrument sound like a clarinet one minute, an accordion the next, and then an entire percussion section – all in service of the style’s complex melodies and steady rhythms , who is known as Piedmont Blues – died May 7 at his home in Takoma Park, Maryland. He was 69 years old.

His daughter Martha Wiggins said the cause was cancer.

For much of his career, Mr. Wiggins was best known as part of the duo Cephas and Wiggins, in which he performed and recorded with guitarist and singer John Cephas. The two were considered one of the best Piedmont blues acts in the country and toured regularly at home and abroad for over 30 years until Mr. Cephas died in 2009.

Piedmont blues is distinguished from its Delta and Chicago cousins ​​by its relaxed but intricate melodies and haunting rhythms. His influences include gospel, Appalachian folk and early country music.

Mr. Cephas played his instrument with the sophisticated fingerpicking typical of Piedmont blues. Mr. Wiggins packed all sorts of counterpoint around it and then broke out into a solo that could be aggressive or reserved, firm or relaxed.

“The harmonica works just like your voice,” he told Blues Blast magazine in 2021. “You have an idea in your head that you want to express and it just comes out, just like speaking happens.” In many ways it still feels as intuitive to me, except for me the harmonica works better than mine Agree!”

Phillip Theodore Wiggins was born in Washington on May 8, 1954, the son of George Wiggins, a cartographer with the Department of the Interior, and Vicci (Carter) Wiggins, who managed the home. His father died when Phil was seven, and his mother later married Elliott Johnson, an army officer.

Phil’s family had a well-stocked record collection at home, which enabled the first steps in his musical education. He had to buy his own instruments, he later said, and with a small income from a newspaper tour he could only afford a plastic harmonica.

While in high school, he began hanging out with black musicians in Washington, many of whom were new to the city from the South. They met on weekends in homes and barbershops and played a range of music that reflected the diverse origins of migration.

He became particularly close to a partially blind street singer named Flora Molton, and through her he met the who’s who of accomplished East Coast blues musicians. While still in school, he accompanied them on stage at the Smithsonian Folklife Festival and later joined a band led by another respected blues artist, pianist and singer Big Chief Ellis.

Mr. Cephas, 24 years Mr. Wiggins’ senior, joined Mr. Ellis’ band in 1975, and two years later he and Mr. Wiggins struck out as Cephas and Wiggins.

Within a few years they caught the attention of L+R, a German record label that specialized in jazz and blues. The label released their first two albums and, more importantly, took them to Europe to tour blues festivals.

The duo later traveled the world on behalf of the State Department and the Kennedy Center; In 1988, before the fall of the Soviet Union, they performed once at a folk festival in Moscow. They recorded 12 albums and won 11 WC Handy Awards, considered the blues equivalent of the Grammy.

Mr. Wiggins’ marriage to Wendy Chick ended in divorce. Along with his daughter Martha, he is survived by his partner, Judy LaPrade; another daughter, Eliza Wiggins; four brothers, Skip, Charles, William and Elliott; a sister, Rabiyah Khaliq; and two grandchildren.

Despite his reputation as a fierce virtuoso, Mr. Wiggins was humble offstage and eager to share his craft with others. He led blues workshops across the country and helped establish the blues program at the Augusta Heritage Center in Elkins, West Virginia, an organization that promotes traditional arts and crafts. He was a regular lecturer at the summer workshops.

“Phil was a deep and thoughtful musician,” Emily Miller, the center’s artistic director, wrote on Facebook. “He wrote bold, essential songs and performed them alongside traditional gems that he refined to just the right dark perfection.”

After Mr. Cephas’ death, Mr. Wiggins played with a number of other guitarists as well as with his own string band, the Chesapeake Sheiks. In 2017, he received a National Heritage Fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts.

He continued to play the harmonica but also sang, something he rarely did when working with Mr. Cephas.

“The most important thing in singing is to tell a story,” he told Country Blues magazine in 2014. “If I do that, it will work out for me.”