Taj Mahal (born Henry Saint Clair Fredericks) became interested in the roots of black American and Caribbean music while studying animal husbandry at the University of Massachusetts in the early sixties. After receiving his B.A., he played blues in Boston folk clubs before moving to California and forming a short-lived blues rock band with Ry Cooder and Ed Cassidy. His moniker, Taj Mahal, came to him in a dream. He appeared mostly solo, wrote musical scores (such as the one for the 1972 film Sounder) and continued to perform and record into the 1990s.
