Long before rappers started spitting crude rhymes about their sexual prowess, a group of female blues singers in the ‘20s and ‘30s were known for their provocative lyrics. Vocalists including Bessie Smith and Victoria Spivey sang clever songs loaded with suggestive double entendres on classics like “One Hour Mama” and “Empty Bed Blues.” These numbers are being revisited by Grammy nominated Americana singer Maria Muldaur on her latest CD Naughty, Bawdy & Blue.

On Smith’s “Empty Bed Blues,” Muldaur wraps her smokey vocals around lines like:  “He’s a deep sea diver/With a stroke that don’t go wrong,” over a piano and sultry horns. Her take on Spivey’s “One Hour Mama” is even hotter, as Muldaur seductively delivers humorous and slyly sexual pleas telling a lover he better know how to use his artillery before he makes love to her.

Maria Muldaur plays Blues in the Park on Sunday, July 29, from 1pm to 4:30pm at Laguna Grande Park, across from City Hall on Canyon Del Rey Boulevard, Seaside. Free. 899-6270.