Ishman Bracey (aka Ishmon Bracey)

January 9, 1901 - February 12, 1970

A Delta blues singer and guitarist, Ishman Bracey often worked with fellow bluesmen Tommy Johnson and Charlie McCoy in the Jackson area. Bracey supposedly served as a guide for Blind Lemon Jefferson whenever the Texas bluesman worked Mississippi. Later, like many other blues musicians of the time, Ishman played socials and picnics as well as on street corners for spare change.

Bracey made his first recordings in Memphis in 1928 for the Victor label. Two years later he traveled to Grafton, Wisconsin, to record for Paramount. He all but abandoned his blues roots when he became an ordained minister sometime in the late 1940s or early 1950s. Bracey continued to play music, but it was mostly religious standards. He died in 1970.