the crossroads spirit - the big black man

this is pretty cool, the crossroads "ritual":

"If you want to learn how to make songs yourself, you take your guitar and you go to where the road crosses that way, where a crossroads is. Get there, be sure to get there just a little 'fore 12 that night so you know you'll be there. You have your guitar and be playing a piece there by yourself...A big black man will walk up there and take your guitar and he'll tune it. And then he'll play a piece and hand it back to you. That's the way I learned to play anything I want." from "Tommy Johnson" by David Evans (London: Studio Vista, 1971). [Thanks to Debbie Sexton (Ginger5904@aol.com) for sourcing this material.]