About The Film

Bonnie Blue: James Cotton’s Life in the Blues is an emotionally evocative feature documentary that portrays the untold story of James Cotton, a legend whose musical influence shaped the Chicago Blues style having been mentored with the originators of the Delta blues tradition. Cotton’s life tracks a swath of America’s history -- from the post-depression cotton fields of the Mississippi Delta to tough Chicagoland’s era of brilliant artistic reinvention to today’s live music scene in Austin, Texas. In between are tours with Janis Joplin, Paul Butterfield and sessions with the Rolling Stones, Grateful Dead, Led Zeppelin, Santana, Steve Miller, B.B. King and many more. This new film capture’s America’s soul as the blues becomes interpreted in jazz, big band, rock and roll, punk, hip-hop and rap.

In 2013, Grammy award winning producer/musician Tom Hambridge brought Cotton into his studio to begin writing songs for an autobiographical album that would become Cotton’s last recording. Nominated for a Grammy, the lyrics for Bonnie Blue tell of Cotton’s origins that began on a plantation. 

Rarely seen archival footage and stills are woven thoughout the visual landscape of original 4K video in which today’s finest harp and blues musicians lead us on a powerful journey of the heart and soul, bringing a fresh and deep understanding of the harp in the ever expanding blues tradition. With new interviews and original concert recordings, Buddy Guy, Jimmy Vaughan, Steve Miller, Bobby Rush, Billy Branch, Annie Raines, Curtis Salgado, Rick Estrin, Bob Margolin and many others bring Cotton’s story to life and leave us with an understanding of the lasting impact his music has imprinted upon our cultural heritage. Cotton’s unique mixture of high quality musicianship and seemingly boundless energy is an expression of an artist who had become the ultimate showman who made the world pay attention to the ‘harp’ as a complex instrument with its own voice. 

Truly an American treasure, a virtuoso harmonica blues legend who wailed with rock, jazz and blues greats for more than 70 years, Cotton’s career began at age 9 with Sonny Boy Williamson, and continued until his death at age 81 on March 16, 2017 in Austin, Texas. And, even though he lost his signature voice to throat cancer, he persevered, because, as Cotton says in one of the sequences originated specifically for this documentary, “The Blues is all about feeling. If I don’t feel it, I can’t play it.” 

As the harp is an extension of one’s vocal chords, James Montgomery says, “it is the most intimate of all musical instruments.” Cotton’s response was, “The voice is gone, but the wind is still there.”

On stage, Cotton’s signature tunes of Rocket ’88, Got My MoJo Workin’ and The Creeper created an astonishing connection with the audience. Jacklyn Hairston, Cotton’s widow, photographed her husband’s last concert. When Cotton joined her backstage having raised the house with his characteristic dynamic energy, he leaned in and whispered in his scarred raspy voice, “I played the blues, they all stood up!”

Production Team 

Executive Producer: Judy Laster, Executive Producer, is the Co-founder of The Reel Blues Fest, an attorney and also the founder and director of the Woods Hole Film Festival. 

Co-Producer: James Montgomery, Co-founder of The Reel Blues Fest is a blues musician and harmonica player and the leader of the James Montgomery Blues Band, which he formed in Boston in the 1970s.  

Producer-Director: Bestor Cram, founded Northern Light Productions in 1982, a non-fiction motion picture production company creating scores of permanent museum installations, numerous documentaries for television, and multi-screen installations. His work includes award winning feature documentaries: Johnny Cash at Folsom Prison, The Orange Blossom Special, Beyond the Walland recently Birth of a Movement, JFK The Last Speech and The Last American Colony—One Man’s Revolution.