BIOGRAPHY
William "Big Bill" Morganfield was born June 19, 1956, in Chicago, Illinois, the son of blues legend McKinley Morganfield — known to the world as Muddy Waters. Big Bill was raised primarily by his grandmother in southern Florida. Bill's earliest musical inspiration came not from his father but from guitarist Lonnie Mack, and he spent years earning a B.A. in English before the blues fully gained his interest. It was his father's death in 1983 that set him on his true path: he spent the next several years teaching himself guitar in earnest, later explaining, "while my daddy was alive, there was no reason for me to play the blues."
In 1996, Morganfield formed the Stone Cold Blues Band and began building a following touring the Atlanta area, a city he still calls home. His 1999 debut album, Rising Son (Blind Pig Records), announced a fully formed artist — powerful original songwriting, a window-rattling baritone voice, and slide guitar work that honored his father's legacy while carving out his own identity. The record hit #1 on the Living Blues charts and earned him the W.C. Handy Award (now the Blues Music Award) for Best New Blues Artist in 2000. He followed with Ramblin' Mind (2001, featuring Taj Mahal), Blues in the Blood (2003), and, after launching his own label, Black Shuck Records, in 2009, Born Lover (2009), Blues With a Mood (2013), and Bloodstains on the Wall (2017) — the latter alongside his longtime collaborator, Muddy Waters Band alumnus Bob Margolin.
Morganfield's contributions to the blues have been widely recognized: a Jus' Blues Award for Best Contemporary Blues Artist and induction into the Blues Hall of Fame in St. Louis as a Master Blues Artist, both in 2013. Over more than two decades he has carried the Muddy Waters legacy to stages worldwide, from the Chicago Blues Festival — where he has headlined Muddy Waters/Willie Dixon centennial tributes and the dedication of Chicago's Muddy Waters mural — to international dates across the UK, Poland, Switzerland, Italy, Hungary, Canada, and Australia. Atlanta's own Blind Willie's has long served as his hometown stage. Most recently, he has been a featured guest across Antone's Nightclub's 50th Anniversary celebrations, performing "Mannish Boy" at the Austin Blues Festival, an ACL Live taping, and Lincoln Center's Summer for the City in New York (2025) (NYS Music), and he is booked to headline the Mississippi Valley Blues Festival's Main Stage in Davenport, Iowa on September 19, 2026, alongside leading a youth blues clinic (Mississippi Valley Blues Society).
In recent years Morganfield has expanded into film and television. He appeared as himself performing original blues music in an episode of FOX's Shots Fired (2017), also contributing original songs "Hold Me Baby" and "Hot Love" to the series. In 2024 he made his feature film debut as "Jesse Moffette" in James Mangold's A Complete Unknown, starring opposite Timothée Chalamet and Edward Norton — an ensemble that earned Morganfield, alongside his castmates, a nomination for Outstanding Performance by a Cast in a Motion Picture at the 31st Screen Actors Guild Awards in 2025 (Screen Actors Guild Awards; IMDb). He is an active SAG-AFTRA member continuing to pursue film and television opportunities alongside his music career.
As CEO of Morganfield Enterprises and Black Shuck Records, Big Bill Morganfield continues to serve as both performer and steward of one of the blues' most important lineages — bringing his father's legacy into the present while building a body of work, and a screen career, entirely his own.