This video has been posted here before. Let's discuss it. It's a very important moment in the history of the blues. It's a young white harmonica player sitting in the most prestigious harmonica chair in the history of the blues--or of amplified blues at the very least. (Filling in for Sonny Terry in the Brownie McGhee duo might equal it.) And proving that he has the right to occupy it.
What's going on here? I'll start the conversation. I hear Paul doing everything he can for the first three minutes to prove that he's the equal of James Cotton. I hear him essentially replicating the Cotton part on this song--as Cotton told me that Muddy demanded that HE, Cotton, replicate Little Walter's parts until Cotton did this new thing on "Mojo" and Muddy allowed him to be himself rather than replicate Little Walter.
That's what I hear going on for the first three minutes. Oscher has no originality whatever, but that's not the point. The point is that he needed to do exactly the reverse: in the face of pretty much universal inability of white players in the mid-60s to really master the deep blues style of Muddy, he needed to prove that there was one white boy who could, in fact, dish it up. And he does. He swings like a mofo. He's completely grooving with the drummer, with the whole band. That in itself was brilliant--and all he needed to do.
Around 3:09, he gets a chance to blow a second solo, and he tries to up the ante. He does so--slightly. He tries to wail in a way that goes slightly beyond the Cotton stylization.
I'm impressed with Paul's performance here. Very impressed. I don't think there was another living harp player who could have DRIVEN that band with the Cotton-style harp that he throws down. But I'm fascinated at the same time with the pressure that he was under NOT to do anything outside the style. He had to fit in. And if a white boy could do that with a band of black bluesmen of the highest order: mission accomplished.
I'd like to think that the mission in our own time is somewhat different. I'd like to think that the long history, among other things, of strong, original white blues players, including Butterfield, Stevie Ray, Musselwhite, Kim Wilson, Ricci, Tab Benoit, Watermelon Slim, (!), whomever, means that white blues players these days have a wider range of models to choose from--including, of course, a host of African American players in contemporary blues and the jazz and R&B of the past 50 years. In fact, the whole thing is much more of a free-for-all, and that's great.
Of course, many still feel that their job is essentially the same job that Oscher handled so nimbly here: replicate, with passion. And that's too bad. Or so I feel. I want more originality than that. I think originality pushing against stylization and expectation is the way to go. But that's just me, and we've had this particular argument before.
Another thing that's going on in the video is that Muddy is showing the black blues world that he's got a white boy doing his bidding, choosing (and able) to fit in. There would have been a weird kind of prestige in that, back in the late 60s. He was proving that he knew how to evolve what he was doing to remain on the cutting edge. Paul Oscher's presence in this video was a testament to Muddy's continuing dedication to the "modern" in modern blues harmonica. :)
A couple of things. First, he's throwing it down for sure. His tone, style and effort is reflective of Cotton but I don't imagine that he felt as much pressure as we assume. Sure, we all hear that Muddy was insistent on the formula and keeping it the same until proven but in order for Paul to even be there Muddy had to know he was capable. Second, I'm not sure that I hear much more then the standard blues formula so known to Muddy's work. Paul clearly plays much differently in his later work when he stepped outside of the formula. I felt the whole piece was predictable, excellently played of course and every bit ready to be with Muddy but predictable. Third. That he was so ready at the young age speaks volumes of Paul's abilities and that after only meeting Muddy once and then getting hired him after only sitting in two songs says that Muddy had the confidence too. No two ways about it Paul had big shoes to fill. Little Walter, Cotton, Big Walter Horton .... But he was ready. X
That's a very nice video and a handy performance by Paul Oscher.
As far as originality goes, Paul was just playing Muddys' music in Muddys' band. That's exactly what he had to do. He stepped up and laid out a really exciting performance. I wouldn't expect that Muddy would have been disappointed with any of that. As a spectator at that performance I would have said - excellent, got what I came for.
As far as the quest for originality, a different mission, or a modern expansion of the blues is concerned, that's ALL a good thing, but I wouldn't go so far as to say that replicating the traditional styles WITH PASSION is a bad thing. Even for highly accomplished musicians there are very worthy things that can yet be achieved in that endeavor. There is a place for a traditional New Orleans jazz combo that delivers tight replications of really classic stuff, and there is a place for Bharath.
Anyone who otherwise undertakes to push into new territory should be respected and listened to closely, and perhaps admired, but if they think that they have something that allows them to throw everything away and start over again... they better be good. Probably the only absolute, unbreakable rule that stands for any kind of music is that you can't be boring. Other than that, all of the very best music is based on innovation, but of course it's oftentimes the kind of innovation that is inspired or suggested by what the innovator has learned from past musical pioneers.
So.., there's no easy course. If you are new and different it doesn't buy you a pass, you still have to be good, and if you assure yourself in knowing that you still play "The Real Blues" - just be good. It's really just that simple.
I'm still reaching for a lot of what Paul was doing there.
you step into an established band with a strong bandleader and an audience with expectations, you damn well better play the formula or you are out back on the street. i wonder what victor bailey felt like stepping after pastorius left weather report, or sammy hagar taking over for david lee roth? they better be able to do the music as written i suspect, before doing anything on their own.
First, he was playing with Muddy Waters. He was employed by Muddy Waters. He was in the role of a sideman. He played it how Muddy wanted it played.
Second, from things I've read about Muddy and other players of his generation, he was more concerned about his music being represented effectively and less concerned about the race of the player.
Finally, I think Paul Oscher likes playing this style of music. He has been playing it long after this video is shot. He plays some serious low down shit, whether its on guitar or harp. There are people that like to play this style of music. I think Oscher is one of them.
I had a conversation with Skip Simmons a couple of years ago. He was working on one of my amps. He had a restored Masco head that he had sent Paul Oscher. Oscher was looking for old Masco PA heads to capture that old school sound. He loaned that head to me. It was straight out of the 1950's.
That doesn't seem like a guy who was out to set the world on its ear as much as he was a guy wanting to play the music he really dug.
The best way to understand how Oscher felt is to ask him. He is still alive and laying down some old school stuff.
Most of the white guys that had the opportunity to play with the Muddy Waters generation talk about how fortunate they were to play with those guys. They felt they were accepted because of their musical ability. They don't mention the color of their skin.
Either you play or you don't. You love the music or you don't. The older generation gave breaks to people who loved the music and respected their artistry.
If you play long enough, eventually you develop your own voice.
I'm gonna have to disagree with all you and say I've seen this video before and I've never found the harp to be particularly inspiring. I'm not saying the harp playing is bad, but it doesn't grab like this one with Cotton does:
I can't put my finger on exactly why the Oscher version doesn't quite do it for me, but I suspect part of it is just the difference between harmonica mic/amp setups - Cotton gets that really dirty growly sound while Oscher goes with a relatively clean sound. Also it seems to me that the Oscher version sounds like he's trying to hard to sound soulful, while Cotton seems to do it effortlessly (this in particular I notice because I've been guilty of the same offense way too often).
Patrick, the Canadian video that you posted is great, but it's a studio session, the players brought their own gear. The clip Kudzurunner posted is from an overseas tour with pick up gear...not really "like for like". Oscher has a job to do in the first clip & does it admirably with the tools at hand...I too prefer the second clip, but everything is different, even if Oscher had been in the harp chair in Canada it would have sounded different.
I appreciate that none of this is directly relevant to your (or mine, or anyone else's preference), but recordings like Live at Mr Kelly's provide a better comparison between the 2 players in that role.
Oscher gets confused for Cotton quite a lot in blind listenings.
@Joe L: I don't think that you and I disagree on much. I will say that the whole question of what blues players do and don't say (and think) about race, publicly and privately, is slightly more complex than you've represented it. For example, the phrase "blues power," which was used by a range of white and black artists in the late 1960s (Albert King and Eric Clapton), emerged directly on the heels of the phrase "black power." It was a pointed way of asserting a transracialism IN THE BLUES--i.e., in recording studios, on stages, and in audiences--that contradicted the focus on black empowerment and on discerning "real blackness" (as opposed to self-compromising "Negro-ness") that marked hip and highly politicized younger black people at the time.
Blues power vs. black power. Integration vs. separation. Yet the grounds of integration on which the phrase "blues power" took its stand were the blues--in its origins and sounds a quintessentially and indisputably BLACK music, as everybody acknowledged back then, but a music that, in the late 1960s, was in the process of making a huge transition from an almost exclusively black audience (which is what amplified blues had in, say, 1962) to a largely white audience (when Paul Butterfield and Janis Joplin were crowned the King and Queen of the Blues in a big event at Madison Square Garden in 1968 or 1969.)
Muddy's decision to use Oscher in his band took place in that highly charged racial context. Just as Oscher would have known that he needed to fit in, stylistically, and prove that he belonged in that particular harp chair, Muddy would have been keenly aware that HAVING Oscher in that chair would potentially help him develop an audience among the significantly white Blues Power audience, an audience that loved black music but that loved even more the idea that whites and blacks could come together in the blues.
I'm sure Paul, as you say, just loves "playing this style of music." It all starts there. But that fact doesn't mean that there wasn't more going on at the time--in his head and the heads of the band members, in the heads of the audience members, both in Chicago's black community and when the band toured college campuses.
Last Edited by on Jul 19, 2012 5:12 AM
Great info and insight in this thread. Thanks, guys.
The only thing I'd add is that not only is Paul still working, and laying down some ludicrously fat harp sounds, but he also struck me as a very nice and friendly guy. Definitely worth chatting up if you get a chance to see him in a small venue.
Let's not forget Jerry Portnoy who also sat in that chair with Muddy's band. I have always found Jerry's playing to be wonderful in its simplicity and grounding in the classic riffs, but I have often wondered whether he was required to play that way or not. After some thought, there may been some of that going on with Portnoy, but I would probably attribute most of it growing on Maxwell Street in Chicago, where all of the masters played on the street, and becoming fully grounded in that style, rather than anything else. Jerry fit right in with Muddy because that's the way he learned to play IMHO. But you would have him to ask to get the answer.
i was going to avoid commenting on this thread its forty years old its still sounds good to me i'll just play it a few times and enjoy it then i noticed at about 2.59 into it he appears to step on the mike cord or he drops the harp right in the middle of the solo heck i've been there!
@kudzurunner - I totally understand where you're coming from.
There is a lot of stuff that is written about that time period in interviews, but people, especially Black people from the South, were acutely aware of what to say and more importantly, what not to say.
Muddy isn't alive so we can't ask his criteria when selecting a harp player. I think the only guy that is still alive from that band (in the video) would be Oscher. I guess someone could ask him.
Muddy and his band members could have been thinking about the social impact of selecting a harp player based on race. They could just as easily been thinking about what they were going to eat after the gig or how they were going to pay their bills.
Considering the socio-economic situation that most of those guys lived in and the waning popularity of Blues music in 1960's Chicago, I suspect they may have been more concerned with the latter, but I could be wrong.
My currently favourite version of mojo working. http://open.spotify.com/track/0A10bGhI6YlyQkRPDKbT4F
It's an old recording by down home blues band with Peps Persson on vocals and harp. The album is "Rotblos" which if you say it in swedish dialect sounds like "rootblues". He's singing in crazy broad southern Swedish dialect that sound really bluesy, IMHO. I couldn't find any YT so here's a spotify link. The album is full of translated harp blues. ---------- Pistolkatt - Pistolkatts youtube
The video brings back memories. Not quite on topic-- but this old man saw Paul at the Retinal Circus on Davie Street in Vancouver in the summer of 1968. He was great.
I was a blues loving harp player, still in university, who thought he'd be a listener all his life, not a performer.
Paul was playing with Muddy Waters, of course. The only other sideman I remember (and what a sideman!) was Otis Spann on piano, and his wife Lucille sharing vocal duties with Muddy and Otis.
I was thrilled to hear live, loud blues harp. I went up to Paul after the gig, as fans will, and said something along the lines of... "I really love your harp playing! I play harp too!"
I remember his response. "Thanks. You got a cigarette?"
