A Tombstone for Texas

Alger 'Texas' Alexander was one of the original blues stars of the 1920s. As an original honker and shouter, he was a major influence on many blues stars to follow: Lightning Hopkins, Lowell Fulsom and Frankie Lee Sims. He worked with legends Eddie Lang, Lonnie Johnson, King Oliver and The Mississippi Sheiks. For many years Alexander has been a ghost whose past was shrouded in mystery. He took only one photograph in his lifetime. Texas music historian Coy Prather spent 4 years researching Alexander's past. Reading through census pages and searching courthouses and even the Texas Prison system for records. He discovered the oft repeated story of Alexander's imprisonment for murder was a myth. Prather worked to uncover the lost years and found Alexander's life was far more tragic than previously thought. It is story of man who scaled the heights of success in the music business and fell back to the Texas earth where he came from. An exciting story of a man who influenced the entire blues music industry and who wrote some of the greatest blues songs of all time.