The Mississippi Sheiks were a popular and influential American guitar and fiddle group of the 1930s. They were notable mostly for playing country blues, but were adept at many styles of popular music of the time. The Mississippi Sheiks consisted mainly of the Chatmon family, who came from Bolton, Mississippi and were well known throughout the Mississippi Delta. The father of the family had been a "musicianer" (someone with good technical ability on his or her instrument adept at sight-reading written music) during slavery times