Billy Branch has spent half a century playing the blues, but also protecting it, carrying it, teaching it, and keeping its Chicago flame burning through generations. Now, with The Blues Is My Biography, the harmonica master steps forward with his most personal album yet, one that distills 50 years of sweat-soaked clubs, historic mentors, and a career that reads like a blues encyclopedia into one powerful musical autobiography. What makes this album remarkable isn’t just the virtuosity, though Branch still blows with a fire most players half his age can’t touch. It’s the clarity of purpose. This is the blues as lineage, blues as lifeline, blues as lived history.

Branch’s résumé is unmatched. Discovered in college by the “father of modern Chicago Blues” Willie Dixon, he was urged to finish school but destined for the road. Instead of heading to law school with his political science degree, Branch joined Dixon’s Chicago All-Stars, understudying harmonica great Carey Bell before stepping into his role full-time. Six years of world touring later, Branch had become a force in his own right.

And that was just the beginning. Branch has now played on more than 300 recordings, released 15 albums with his revered Sons of Blues, earned three Grammy nominations, won an Emmy, served on the Grammy Board of Governors, and been officially proclaimed Chicago’s Blues Ambassador by not one but two mayors. His harmonica has backed everyone from Koko Taylor and Taj Mahal to Keb’ Mo’, Lurrie Bell, and Big Head Todd. He’s taught world leaders, narrated film and radio dramas, and even jammed alongside rock royalty in Jim Irsay’s all-star band.

But The Blues Is My Biography is something different, a summation, a celebration, and a reckoning with a life lived inside the music. Produced by Larry D. Batiste and filled with heavyweight guests including Bobby Rush, Shemekia Copeland, Ronnie Baker Brooks, and, of course, the Sons of Blues, the album feels like Branch opening a long-kept journal. “Every song on this album has special meaning to me,” he says. “This is the most important work I’ve ever done, and the best work I’ve ever done.” You can hear why. The record moves with the depth of a man who learned directly from giants like James Cotton, Junior Wells, Willie Dixon, Big Walter Horton then spent decades forging his own voice between their echoes. Branch’s harmonica isn’t just an instrument here; it’s a narrator, bending and wailing through five decades of triumph, heartbreak, and joy.