and "Mister Rock and Roll" (1957).” Some blues aficionados contend that Texas blues pioneers can justifiably lay claim to the creation of rock and roll. Thomas Kreason, executive director of the Texas Musicians Museum in Hillsboro, for one, is among those who argue that Wiley studio mate Goree Carter’s seminal “Rock Awhile” was actually the first rock and roll recording. He notes a distinctive guitar rift as the song modulates, a technique later adopted by Chuck Berry and other early rock-and-roll stars, and he reminds that Carter’s 1949 Freedom recording was released a full two years ahead of Brenston’s “Rocket 88.” In fact, southern Black musicians had been playing rock-and-roll-sounding music – albeit under a different moniker – long before either of those recordings. It is doubtful, however, that Ed Wiley, Goree Carter, Jackie Brenston, Ike Turner, Earl Hooker, Harvey Fuqua or any of the 1940s- and 1950s-era architects of rock and roll realized the historic role they would play in the development of that genre or other forms of modern music. After moving from Baltimore to Philadelphia in the early 1950s, Wiley’s bands took on a distinctive new look for the next several years. He would only occasionally revisit the road, joining Big Joe Turner, Al Hibbler and Brook Benton, among others. In 1954, Wiley married singer Maye Robinson, whom he had signed with the band the previous year while touring through Chester, Pa. And, over the next several years, his groups often featured Maye – sometimes leading a Supremes-like trio, called The Inversions. Having worked in Baltimore and New York with organist Fabulous Preston, Wiley discovered that his favorite ensembles were organ trios. He capitalized on the organ craze that had engulfed the City of Brotherly Love during the mid- to late-’50s, and began featuring such organists as Shirley Scott, Bill Hathaway and Bill Miller. “[Scott], was a piano player in Philly, and she had never played Hammond organ before,” Holley quotes Wiley on his liner notes for “In Remembrance,” which features Scott on piano. “I was the first group that she ever played organ with. She’s been a heck of a musician for as long as I’ve ever known her. She’s a heck of an arranger, and she did some of the arrangements on this recording.” Hathaway would appear with Wiley on his 1971 release “Stretchin’ Out,” a funky, driving instrumental with organ, trumpets, bass, drums and