Organizers with the Sunflower River Blues and Gospel Festival recognized two of Clarksdale’s famed musicians Saturday night for their assistance and roles in promoting the festival, which was celebrating its 31st year.
Josh “Razorblade” Stewart and C.V. Veal were each recognized as special musicians who made significant contributions for many years to the festival. Stewart died April 21 at the age of 72, while Veal died May 8. He was 91 years old.
Family members of both musicians were on hand Saturday night at the festival’s main stage located next to the Delta Blues Museum to receive the awards.
Stewart’s son, Clarksdale resident Jermaine Hanfor, said Saturday’s ceremony meant a lot to the family, especially their appreciation for all the hours and work he performed for the Sunflower festival committee.
Stewart was one of the first artists to take part in the blues and gospel festival, helped to get it off the ground and running, and remained a supporter throughout his remaining years.
“You could pick any particular year, but he was going to be here,” Hanfor said. “He loved it. He loved to perform for the people because music was his life.”
Both Hanfor and his sister, Latrena Haynes, of Clarksdale, were quick to point out that even while Stewart lay in a Memphis hospital in April, it was still his desire to get up and get out in time for the upcoming Juke Joint Festival.
“He told them to let him out, and he’d come back the next day,” Haynes said.
They both remembered childhoods spent around music and their father seemingly always on the road performing.
“He’s always been a performer,” Hanfor said, but added that it wasn’t until they read a three-page article describing Stewart as a “certified Delta legend” that his children fully began to grasp the enormity of their father’s popularity.
“That’s when we kind of realized he’s a big deal. Before that, and even after that, he’s always been Dad to us. He’s always going to be Dad to us,” Hanfor said.
The two said their father always had a special relationship with children, whether it was with his own grandchildren or all the children he taught in the music program at the Delta Blues Museum.
“He loved children. He worked with children. No pay, no nothing. That was his life. He wanted kids to love music and hoped they loved it and got as much out of it as he did,” Hanfor said.
And that’s just who their father was, Hanfor said.
“He had the biggest heart and the biggest smile. He would be your best friend if you allowed him to.”
Pepper Von expressed similar sentiments about his father, C.V. Veal.
Von said the thing he takes with him are those conversations he has with those who had any interaction with his father. They talk not only of his Veal’s accomplishments as a musician, but also talk of “his journey as a human being.”
And that journey, Von said, included his father’s “spirit, his loving energy, compassion, love, humor. Everything that made him what he was.”
“I see him as having left the world a better place than it was when he got here,” Von said. “And it’s a privilege for me to take that baton that he passed and run fast with it and keep it moving.”
Von is a dance and fitness educator in California, as well as a motivational speaker and author.
He said the one thing his father said that has stuck with him over the years was, “Son, your blessings look good on you.”
Pepper said he first thought the saying was a lesson in gratitude, but it was actually a lesson in compassion and service to others. Because as soon as he said, “Son, your blessings look good on you”, his father turned around and said, “But they look better on others.”
“That’s the type of man my father was,” Von said. “I always learned from him to leave a place better than it was before you got there.”
Von said he and his sister and other family members were appreciative of Saturday’s honor.
“I know that this world is full of great people. This world is full of ordinary people who have done great things. No one has to acknowledge you. So when they do, that is a gift,” Von said.
“So, I don’t take it for granted that someone feels that my father was special enough in his contribution in blues and gospel, and just as a human being to this community, to recognize and acknowledge him and honor him for everything he left as a legacy.”
