West Coast Blues

West Coast Blues is the smooth, jazz-inflected blues style that developed in California during and after the Second World War, centered in Los Angeles and the Bay Area. Piano-led combos with horns, urbane guitar in the manner of *T-Bone Walker*, and crooning, sophisticated singing distinguish it from the rougher Chicago and Delta schools. Fed by Black migration to wartime shipyards and defense plants, it produced the era's most polished blues: *Charles Brown*'s ballads, *Percy Mayfield*'s songwriting and *Lowell Fulson*'s guitar hits. Its elegance fed directly into rhythm and blues and soul.