According to the notes to the box set "the George Mitchell Collection" (Fat Possum Records FP1114-2) Johnny Woods was, "Born in 1917 in Looxahoma, Mississippi, Wood's father made a living trading dogs, horses, and mules when he wasn't working the cotton field. Unable to read or count, Woods made his living in the fields, where he heard the work songs and field hollers that would later inspire his harmonica technique. He was married by aged sixteen, and he and his wife had two children. His playimng went unrecorded until Fred McDowell pulled Woods into the recording session that Mitchell set up in 1967. In the 1980's he toured and recorded with R.L.Burnside and played occasional blues festivals in the vicinity of North Mississippi. Woods passed away on February 1, 1990, in Olive Branch, Mississippi."