The family also owned a Steinway grand piano, and his sisters had lessons in playing, but Shaw's father was against allowing his son to learn the instrument.
[3][4] Although he played in Chicago, Shaw mainly restricted himself to Texas, performing as a soloist in the clubs and roadhouses of Sugarland, Richmond, Kingsville, Houston and Dallas.
[5] The album contained old favourites such as "The Ma Grinder", "The Cows" and "Whores Is Funky", some of them too risque to have been issued previously.
[2] He played with the Preservation Hall Jazz Band at the 1973 Austin Aqua Festival,[2] and continued to perform in the United States and in Europe intermittently in the 1970s, turning up unexpectedly in California in 1981 to help Strachwitz celebrate Arhoolie's 20th anniversary.
[2] The music journalist Bill Dahl described "The Cows", a composition written and recorded by Shaw, as "a piece of incredible complexity that would wilt anything less than a legitimate ivories master.