Harding "Hop" Wilson (April 27, 1921* – August 27, 1975) was an American Texas blues steel guitar player.
He was Harding Wilson was born on a farm in Houston County between Grapeland and Crockett and was named after the President of the United States. His nickname was derived from his ability to play the harmonica, or "harp," which he pronounced "hop." Acquiring his first steel guitar sometime between the age of 12 and 18, Wilson performed at various Houston clubs. Though he also played fine down-home blues on conventional electric guitar and was a powerful singer as well.
He played in local venues around Crockett when he was a teenager and worked at other odd jobs throughout the 1930s and early 1940s. He was drafted in 1942 and served with the United States Army and became a private first class. When he was discharged in 1946 he decided to pursue a serious career as a blues musician. After returning to Crockett, he played local gigs while working in non-music-related jobs until the early 1950s. In the mid-1950s he joined drummer "King" Ivory Lee Semien, and for the next several years they worked clubs in East Texas and Louisiana.
Wilson and Semien recorded a number of sides for Goldband Records in Lake Charles, Louisiana during 1957. Their wild, rough-edged style on ‘Chicken Stuff’ and ‘Rockin’ in the Coconut Top’ got them a few regional hits in the late 50s, but they never troubled the national charts. His low sounding playing gave several of his tracks, even "Merry Christmas Darling", a morose, disillusioned feel. Strictly a local phenomenon, Wilson recorded fitfully and hated touring.
He was described as having "absorbed not only the black Texas blues as sung and played by the likes of Blind Lemon Jefferson but also the heavily amplified, often wildly distorted, steel guitar sounds of the region's white Western Swing bands." Hop Wilson didn't lead his own sessions until 1960, when he signed with the Ivory record label. Wilson only recorded for the label for two years -- his final sessions were in 1961. After 1961, Wilson concentrated on playing local Houston clubs and bars.
Although he was virtually unknown outside of Houston, he was a local sensation who influenced numerous modern guitarists. Wilson is best known for his work on the eight-string Hawaiian steel guitar, which he helped popularize throughout the South during the 1940s and 1950s. He played the instrument in the country-and-western style on a stand or in his lap. His unique slide stylings had a significant influence on a variety of guitar players, including L. C. "Good Rockin" Robinson, Sonny Rhodes, Jimmie Vaughan, and Johnny Winter.
He continued to perform in Houston until August 12, 1975 when he was admitted to the V.A. hospital in a confused state and was diagnosed with brain damage due to lack of oxygen- often indicative of a stroke. He died 15 days later from respiratory arrest on August 27, 1975.
The maestro of tender fury is buried at Mount Zion Cemetery in Grapeland, less than two miles from where he was born. His instrument may have been a novelty, but It didn’t matter what he played. It’s how he played it. No one can deny that Hop Wilson was a true original! While Wilson's recording career has been characterized as "slight", he did have an influence on a variety of musicians, including Ron Wood of The Rolling Stones, who stated in 1994 "There's another guitar player called Hop Wilson. I got songs that I wrote like 'Black Limousine' from him, those kinds of licks".
Peter Green, founder of Fleetwood Mac, interviewed in 2007 discussing his favourite blues artists, stated "then there's Hop Wilson, a slide guitar player from Houston who used a twin-neck lap steel. He recorded a couple of singles calling himself Pap Hop, and wrote the song Black Cat Bone. I love his album Texas Steel Guitar Flash."
