Earl Zebedee Hooker (January 15, 1930 – April 21, 1970)[1] was a Chicago blues guitarist known for his slide guitar playing.

An early player of the electric guitar, Hooker was influenced by the modern urban styles of T-Bone Walker and Robert Nighthawk.

The two were frequent street performers, and sometimes, to avoid foul weather (or truancy officers), they played in streetcars, riding from one line to another across Chicago.

This was his introduction to life as an itinerant blues musician (although he had earlier run away from home and spent time in the Mississippi Delta).

This set the pattern that he repeated for most of his life: extensive touring with various musicians interspersed with establishing himself in various cities before returning to the Chicago club scene.

Songs by Hooker and blues and R&B artists, including Johnny O'Neal, Little Sam Davis, Boyd Gilmore, Pinetop Perkins, the Dells, Arbee Stidham, Lorenzo Smith, and Harold Tidwell, were recorded for King, Rockin', Sun, Argo, Vee-Jay, States, United, and C.J.

[11] Despite a major attack of tuberculosis in 1956, which required hospitalization, Hooker returned to performing in Chicago clubs and touring the South.

By late 1959, Junior Wells had brought Hooker to the Chief–Profile–Age group of labels, with which he began one of the most fruitful periods of his recording career.

From 1959 to 1963, he appeared on about forty Chief recordings, including singles for Wells, Lillian Offitt, Magic Sam, A.C. Reed, Ricky Allen, Reggie "Guitar" Boyd, Johnny "Big Moose" Walker, and Jackie Brenston, as well as singles on which Hooker was the featured artist.

During the warm-up preceding a session in May 1961, Hooker and his band played an impromptu slow blues featuring his slide guitar.

[13] Producer Mel London saved the tape and, when looking for material to release the following spring, issued it as "Blue Guitar" (Age 29106).

"Earl's song sold unusually well for an instrumental blues side",[14] and Chicago-area bluesmen included it in their sets.

Sensing greater commercial potential for Hooker's "Blue Guitar", Leonard Chess approached London about using it for the next Muddy Waters record.

[15] The rock band Led Zeppelin later achieved greater success with their adaptations of Hooker's and Waters's "You Shook Me" and "You Need Love".

During his time with Chief, Hooker recorded singles as a sideman for Bobby Saxton and Betty Everett and in his own name for the Bea & Baby, C.J., and Checker labels.

When Hooker was released from the hospital in 1968, he assembled a new band and began performing in Chicago clubs and touring, against his doctor's advice.

[18] Two Bugs and a Roach was "extremely well-received by critics and the public"[2] and "stands today as [part of] Hooker's finest musical legacy.

He again teamed with Junior Wells, performing at higher-paying college dates and concerts, including Chicago's Kinetic Playground.

While in Los Angeles, Hooker visited clubs and sat in with Albert Collins at the Ash Grove several times and jammed with others, including Jimi Hendrix.

[19] Touring with his band in California took Hooker to the San Francisco Bay area in July 1969, where he played club and college dates and rock venues, such as The Matrix and the Fillmore West.

In October 1969, Hooker toured Europe as part of the American Folk Blues Festival, playing twenty concerts in twenty-three days in nine countries.

[26] Unlike his contemporaries Elmore James and Muddy Waters, Hooker used standard tuning on his guitar for slide playing.

"Instead of using full-chord glissando effects, he preferred the more subtle single-note runs inherited from others who played slide in standard tuning, [such as] Tampa Red, Houston Stackhouse, and his mentor Robert Nighthawk.

Depending on his mood and audience reaction, a Hooker performance could include blues, boogie-woogie, R&B, soul, be-bop, pop, and even a country-western favorite.

He experimented with amplification and used echo and tape delay, including "double-tracking his playing during a song, [so] he could pick simultaneously two solos in harmony".

Many consider him among the greatest modern blues guitarists,[20][33] including Wayne Bennett, Bobby "Blue" Bland, Albert Collins, Willie Dixon, Ronnie Earl, Tinsley Ellis, Guitar Shorty, Buddy Guy, John Lee Hooker, Albert King, B.B.