Linda England

Poverty and limited opportunity is difficult to discuss with children, but stories like this make it a bit easier.

Dexter loves hearing the jazzy groove of Johnny Cotton’s clarinet. This sound lifts him up and inspires him to want to become a musician too. Sadly, Mama tells Dexter that the money must go to the rent instead of musical instruments. Days go by, and Dexter cannot stop dreaming about the smooth, cool feel of a metal instrument in his hands. With Johnny Cotton’s help, one day Dexter may become a musician after all.

In the Old Cotton Blues, Dexter the reader is introduced to Johnny, a boy who loveshis mama, smell of pork chops, and the sound of Johnny Cotton's clarinet. Dexter loves the clarinet and wants more than anything to express all his emotions and dreams through music on the carinet. Once his mom tells him they cannot afford one, Dexter becomes upset until Cotton shows Dexter that he doesn't need a clarinet to play the blues with his heart and soul.

Dexter desperately wants to play a musical instrument. He lives with his mother in a low-income family he wanted an instrument so bad. Then this old muscian Johnny Cotton gives him a harmonica and teaches him how to play the instrument.