Jimi Hendrix

James Marshall "Jimi" Hendrix (born Johnny Allen Hendrix; November 27, 1942 – September 18, 1970) was an American guitarist, singer, and songwriter. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest and most influential guitarists of all time. Inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1992 as a part of his band, the Jimi Hendrix Experience, the institution describes him as "arguably the greatest instrumentalist in the history of rock music".

Hendrix began playing guitar at age 15. In 1961, he enlisted in the US Army, but was discharged the following year. Soon afterward, he moved to Clarksville, then Nashville, Tennessee, and began playing gigs on the Chitlin' Circuit, earning a place in the Isley Brothers' backing band and later with Little Richard, with whom he continued to work through mid-1965. He then played with Curtis Knight and the Squires.

Hendrix moved to England in late 1966, after bassist Chas Chandler of the Animals became his manager. Within months, he had formed his band, the Jimi Hendrix Experience (with its rhythm section consisting of bassist Noel Redding and drummer Mitch Mitchell), and achieved three UK top ten hits: "Hey Joe", "Purple Haze", and "The Wind Cries Mary". He achieved fame in the US after his performance at the Monterey Pop Festival in 1967. His third and final studio album, Electric Ladyland (1968), became his most commercially successful release and his only number one album on the US Billboard 200 chart. The world's highest-paid rock musician, Hendrix headlined the Woodstock Festival in 1969 and the Isle of Wight Festival in 1970. He died in London from barbiturate-related asphyxia in September 1970, at the age of 27.

Hendrix was inspired by American rock and roll and electric blues. He favored overdriven amplifiers with high volume and gain, and was instrumental in popularizing the previously undesirable sounds caused by guitar amplifier feedback. He was also one of the first guitarists to make extensive use of tone-altering effects units in mainstream rock, such as fuzz distortion, Octavia, wah-wah, and Uni-Vibe. He was the first musician to use stereophonic phasing effects in recordings. Holly George-Warren of Rolling Stone commented: "Hendrix pioneered the use of the instrument as an electronic sound source. Players before him had experimented with feedback and distortion, but Hendrix turned those effects and others into a controlled, fluid vocabulary every bit as personal as the blues with which he began."

Hendrix was of African-American and alleged Cherokee descent. His paternal grandfather, Bertran Philander Ross Hendrix, was born in 1866 from an extramarital affair between a woman named Fanny and a wealthy grain merchant. Hendrix's paternal grandmother, Zenora "Nora" Rose Moore, was a former dancer and vaudeville performer who co-founded Fountain Chapel in Hogan's Alley. Hendrix and Moore relocated to Vancouver, Canada, where they had a son they named James Allen Hendrix on June 10, 1919; the family called him "Al".

In 1941, after moving to Seattle, Washington, Al met Lucille Jeter at a dance; they married on March 31, 1942. Lucille's father (Jimi's maternal grandfather) was Preston Jeter, whose mother was born in similar circumstances as Bertran Hendrix. Lucille's mother, Clarice (née Lawson), had African-American ancestors who had been enslaved people. Al, who had been drafted by the US Army to serve in World War II, left to begin his basic training three days after the wedding. Johnny Allen Hendrix was born on November 27, 1942, in Seattle; he was the first of Lucille's five children. In 1946, Johnny's parents changed his name to James Marshall Hendrix, in honor of Al and his late brother Leon Marshall.

Stationed in Alabama at the time of Hendrix's birth, Al was denied the standard military furlough afforded servicemen for childbirth; his commanding officer placed him in the stockade to prevent him from going AWOL to see his infant son. He spent two months locked up without trial, during which he received a telegram announcing his son's birth. During Al's three-year absence, Lucille struggled to raise their son. Hendrix was mostly cared for by family members and friends, especially Lucille's sister Delores Hall and her friend Dorothy Harding. Al received an honorable discharge from the US Army on September 1, 1945. Two months later, unable to find Lucille, Al went to the Berkeley, California, home of a family friend named Mrs. Champ, who had taken care of and attempted to adopt Hendrix; this is where Al saw his son for the first time.

After returning from service, Al reunited with Lucille, but his inability to find steady work left the family impoverished. They both struggled with alcohol, and often fought when intoxicated. The violence sometimes drove Hendrix to withdraw and hide in a closet in their home. His relationship with his brother Leon (born 1948) was close but precarious; with Leon in and out of foster care, they lived with an almost constant threat of fraternal separation. In addition to Leon, Hendrix had three younger siblings: Joseph, born in 1949, Kathy in 1950, and Pamela in 1951, all of whom Al and Lucille gave up to foster care and adoption. The family frequently moved, staying in cheap hotels and apartments around Seattle. On occasion, family members would take Hendrix to Vancouver to stay at his grandmother's. A shy and sensitive boy, he was deeply affected by his life experiences. In later years, he confided to a girlfriend that he had been the victim of sexual abuse by a man in uniform. On December 17, 1951, when Hendrix was nine years old, his parents divorced; the court granted Al custody of him and Leon.