In The Spotlight: Queen Mother Of The [Electric] Guitar

In the previous posts about Female Composers ("Women will be Women: Female Composers", Part I & Part II), it has mentioned that the information about female composers have been vanished from music history, due to societal constructions. To continue the search for female composers in music history, I would like to highlight a few female guitarists, who deserve a spotlight cause of their (re)markably important role. They deserve to be remembered! In this post I would like to introduce you to the Queen Mother of the [Electric] Guitar:    Lady Bo.

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Remember, that in this time of history, female lead guitarists were very rare and not even taken serious as artists. We go back to the timeframe of 1940 - 1990.

Peggy Jones, has been born in 1940 in Harlem, New York City, USA. She grew up in the Sugar Hill section, a cultural and economical place with more opportunities in education, employment, housing and less discrimination for many Afro-American families.

Born to musical parents, she was gifted with a talent for rhythm and music.
Peggy Jones was a young girl back then, who entered the High School of Performing Arts. She could show her talent in ballet, tap and studied opera as well. Her idols were: Ruth Brown, LaVern Baker andSister Rosetta Tharp.

When Peggy Jones was 15 years old, she bought her first guitar. It was a beautiful Subro Guitar. By then, -1955- she joined a local music group who played in the style of doo-wop: A subgenre of rhythm and blues music, originated in African-American communities.The band was called "The Bob Chords" and Peggy Jones became their first female singer.

The band recorded a few songs that became great hits, and they performed on stage as well.
In 1956 the band performed in the Apollo Theater in Harlem, New York. Backstage, Peggy Jones was carrying her guitarcase when she met Bo Diddley*. She caught his attention; He was impressed to see a girl carrying a guitarcase.

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* Ellas Otha Bates was born in Missisippi in 1928 and he was raised in Chicago. His nickname was Bo Diddley. He could play the violin, trombone and sing. Still, he was most impressed by the guitar and the rhythmic sounds from the church, which he implemented in his songs. Bo Diddley got famous on tv as a music artist (performance at the Ed Sullivan Show in 1955; “Bo Diddley Beat”) and got a deal with the record label "Chess". He build a lot of [square] guitars himself for his own shows, including the Electric Cigarette Box Guitars & The Jupiter Thunderbird Guitars. He build his first home recording studio in the basement of his home, where he recorded his own songs and recorded songs from musical groups as well.
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Peggy Jones played a few songs on the guitar and Bo Diddley invited her to join his band as a guitarist and singer. She would replace the previous male guitarist, who had to leave due to military service. And so, Peggy Jones became the first female lead guitarist to be hired by a major act.

In 1957, the band The Bob Chords disbanded. Peggy Jones became part of Bo Diddley's band. She had a talent for rhythm guitar, which lead to Bo Diddley transitioning the Blues into Rock & Roll. Peggy Jones became one of the first female rock guitarists in a highly visable rockband.
They recorded a few singles that became the rise to fame of Bo Diddley. Peggy Jones created backvocals and guitarparts on the songs: "Hey, Bo-Diddley", "Road Runner" and "Gunslinger". One of the most famous songs was "Aztec", where she wrote, arranged and played all the guitarparts.

Besides being in the band, Peggy Jones also kept a seperate career. She begun independently as a songwriter, session musician and bandleader. Peggy Jones strived to be an independent artist. She worked on her own band, called: "The Jewels" (also known as The Family Jewel, Lady Bo & The Family Jewel, The Fabulous Jewels, Little Jewel & The Family Jewel and also Lady Bo & the BC Horns). Being an independent musician, made her be called the Queen Mother of Guitar.
Problems arose in Bob Diddley's band. They were invited to open for the Rolling Stones' tour in Europe, in 1962. Peggy Jones couldn't participate, due to that she wanted to help her ailing mother. The news spread out quickly that Peggy Jones was a "bitchin'" female guitarist, and that she was (too) good.
Bo Diddley hired another woman to stand-in for Peggy Jones. She was called Norma-Jean Wofford. Norma-Jean had been taught the rhythm guitar by Bo Diddley and was known for her skintight stage clothes. Norma-Jean's stagename and nickname became: The Duchess.
Peggy Jones left Bo Diddley's band in the same year.

Meanwhile, Peggy Jones kept on playing locally in New York. She joined many side projects as well. She reappeared and played the guitar part on Les Cooper's hit "Wiggle Wobble" in 1962. Peggy Jones made several recordings with MGM Records, under the name Lady Bo & The Family Jewel. An example is "I'm Forever Blowing Bubbles" and "We Got Togetherness" in 1966. In 1967 she played the percussion on Eric Burdon & The Animals' hit: "San Franciscan Nights".
Norma-Jean (The Duchess) stayed in Bo Diddley's band till 1966. To protect her from the media critics, Bo Diddley told the fans that they were direct family. Later on she harmonized with Gloaria Morgan and Lilly Jamieson as part of the Bo-ettes until 1966.Norma-Jean and Peggy stayed friends till Norma-Jean left the band to raise a family.

Still, both women challenged the status quo of a male-dominated music industry. They played the Rhythm Guitar, which was a masculine instrument/way of playing. This gave the idea that female musicians can play this instrument on a high quality level as well. Also, next to playing the rhythm guitar, they danced and sang - in heels.Peggy Jones performed a lot with her band The Jewels. Also, she was performing with a travelling band called "The King's Paupers",  where she met Wally Malone, the bassplayer of the band. They tried to meet as much as they could; eventually he quit the band and they got married in 1968. Peggy Malone asked Wally to join her band and that's when they started their career together.
In 1969, the label Chess Records sold the label to General Recorded Tape (GRT). A buyout. By that, the sales of the catalog from one company to another made royalty statements hard to track down. Not only for Bo Diddley, were the sales not matching with the recording earnings; Also, Lady Bo's rights and credits were vanished as a female guitarist. In some songs the guitarparts have been removed. A lot of these songs are named as Bo Diddley's songs, but it doesn't state which players are on the same songs. Some of these say "unknown female".
Peggy and Wally Malone were asked to perform together with the band "The Boogie Kings" for a short amount of time. On her own, Peggy Malone fronted the Lady Bo Trio and Lady Bo & the BC Horns. She also performed with Wally as a duo. In the '70s Peggy Jones toured with James Brown as well as Sam&Dave as part of the backing band. She played Gibson guitars and sometimes she played a Roland Guitar Synthesizer.

Peggy Jones reunited with Bo Diddley in the '70s. Her band became his new backing band. They had a few TV appearances. The fans were happy to see them performing together; There she got her stagename and nickname Lady Bo.  She kept her name as Lady Bo, not only as a "label", also as a reminder that she evolved so much from that moment on.

In 1987, Wally and Lady Bo went on a music tour with Bo Diddley and they recorded a documentary. After the tour, Wally decided to get a day job besides being a musician. In this way he could earn a conistant income to help lady Bo's career. (Wally continued to play bass at local gigs as well).

Lady Bo (75) passed away in 2015. She is an inspiring pioneer for future female guitarists.