This is reference a clip of Kudzurunner demonstrating an amp. Its the one where towards the end some guy walks into the room carrying a stand.
I came to this forum for no other reason than I was searching on the net for amps.
Now I knew nothing about Kudzurunner at all and yet this person in this clip does enough to convince me that everything is been executed brilliantly.
Without knowing anything about this blues man at all the clip told me that this guy had worked the streets as a player at some time. I immediately recognised the horn and major groove influence from let's say Ray Charles and may be even Marvin Gaye.Things perhaps not traditionally associated with Blues harp.
Strange I hear you all say.
If members fancy having a go at picking out positive things to support this in the clip, then after I'll put kind of why I came to this. This post is an appreciation of a true blues Artist.
Interesting I hear you say ( including Kudzurunner)
Last Edited by on May 18, 2009 4:03 AM
There's another clip taken several years earlier where I'm playing "Thunky Fing" on a HarpGear 1.
I assume that everybody here knows that "kudzurunner" is Adam Gussow's handle--I'm a Mississippi-based distance runner--but I'll put that in just in case. Thanks, Sopwith.
When I try to sum up my personal philosophy of blues harmonica, I always end up coming back to three things:
These three things can't be notated, but they're the core elements of what I do.
The fourth element is one I always leave out, but it's become increasingly apparent to me that it's just as crucial as the other three, and it's something that many players don't stress:
4) playing hard--meaning practicing enough hours that you're able to execute difficult moves with a great deal of intensity.
I know that Chris and Jason see things slightly differently than me on this count. My approach was formed by Nat Riddles, who had incredibly powerful chops. The tone he produced, and the swing, were byproducts of his ability to dig deep into his notes and yet always remain fleetfooted. A fierce attack isn't the same thing as speed; many players who move quickly don't play HARD in the way I'm describing. Watermelon Slim (in the old days in Cambridge), Big Walter Horton, James Cotton, Steve Tracy, all had that. They played very hard. Little Walter did NOT have that. Musselwhite doesn't have it. Kim Wilson digs deep. R.J. Mischo digs deep. James Harman doesn't dig deep. Dennis Gruenling digs very deep, and on the low harps to boot.
Digging deep is a tradeoff; some kinds of playing--and, in general, jazzier playing--tends to require a lighter touch. So I'm aware that I'm sacrificing something through my approach: the sort of overblow stuff that Chris and R.J. Harman are able to do. From my perspective, Jason has managed to combine depth and speed in an optimal way, which is why I love what he's doing. I also love Little Walter's light jazzy touch.
Anyway, those are my thoughts for the day. Many approaches; many good sounds. Anybody who is trying to get my sound should work out on some stiff harps until they feel normal. That builds strong chops.
Last Edited by on May 18, 2009 5:30 AM
That's probably why I don't like Little Walter at all : his playing is too clean for me, always super-controlled, with no fantasy. Boring. I like much more Big Walter and Sonny Boy.
I'll probably never be able to play as fast as Jason, Chris or Howard Levy, but I do my best to play deep and hard.
(By the way, Howard Levy is another one I don't like. What's the point of playing so many notes ? Makes me think of an Yngwie Malmsteen on the harp !).
LW's "Blue Midnight" has some fantasy, doesn't it?
But you're right: Sonny Boy (Rice Miller) had an extremely heavy attack.
Charlie McCoy has an extremely light attack. But Norton Buffalo has a heavy attack, at least on his blues album (songs like "Tore Down"). It's possible to have a heavy attack and a thin tone, if you're playing high harps.
Billy Branch has a heavy attack--listen to what he does on a G harp on "Broken and Hungry" off the HARP ATTACK album--but he's also very fast.
Sugar Blue has found a nice balance. He's extremely fast, but on songs like "Another Man Done Gone" off the CROSS ROADS album, he plays a big low harp fast with quite a heavy attack. His singing style is part of this: he's got a very strong high tenor and he hits it hard; I think that finds its way into his harp playing. Still, he tends to use an overdriven sound that facilitates his high-note playing by giving him a lot of sustain, and when you do that, you can ease up on the attack and still sound pretty good.
Last Edited by on May 18, 2009 6:08 AM
I think digging deep is one of the secrets to blues playing and it's one of the biggest reason I readily tell people I'm not a blues guy. My blues tone just isn't there. I can fake it but I would never claim to be blues guy and I would shudder if forced to stand toe to toe with a player like Adam.
I also agree with Adam that Jason has managed to combine the depth with speed. To me Jason is the ultimate modern blues style player. He has it all.
I don't consider my playing to be fast. To compare me and Jason, Jason is fast and I am quick.
Really interesting comments on playing deep and hard Adam, it's one of the reasons I am a huge fan of your playing.
Over the years I've been playing, a heavy attack seems to have found its way into my style, almost without being consciously cultivated. I guess the stuff you absorb the most eventually finds its way out.
Much as I love that jazzier feel also, it just doesn't come out of me that way!
What about Mitch Kashmar's attack? as an example, the track Nickels and Dimes, particularly the first solo - beautifully nuanced, but man does he dig in and pull that stuff outta there.. gets me every time.
Last Edited by on May 18, 2009 9:50 AM
Kudzurunner: This clip is another example for sure but the one I meant to talk about had a guy walk through the room holding a stand towards the end of your playing. You are I believe playing in 3rd position.
I won't make my view yet till some more posts but a very interesting point from Budda regarding playing blues.
A true Artists recognises who they are and exactly how to express themselves.
Now as say a session player Budda points out he could do Blues in his words "fake"it I prefer "impression" of it. I'm sure if he chose to he could do an excellent job.
That in my view however is a top pros answer. Budda understands himself totally. ( That kind of sounds odd, ha but I hope everyone knows what I mean)
In the jazz sax world I come from you come across lots of fantastic players but can't play blues blues. The thing is they think they can.Because they do jazz they believe the transition is elementary.
Last Edited by on May 18, 2009 8:56 AM
Here's the clip. I'm playing my own composition, "Thunky Fing." Third position on a D harp, with overblows. It's my signature piece and I've milked it tirelessly; it's really time for me to come up with something new. But for now it's my one original contribution to the (blues) harmonica canon:
I always used to wonder what jazz guys meant when they'd say, "Blues is the root of jazz" and "You have to be able to play blues if you want to play jazz."
Then I had an insight one day, listening to Coltrane. I realized that it was about VOCALIZATION. Blues uses microtones in a way that puts an edge on notes, makes them sound like a cry, like somebody saying something. THAT element of jazz--when a hornplayer goes "waaaaaugh!" or "baugh!"--is the blues element. It comes from nowhere else. It's certainly a part of the whole Dixieland idiom. Tailgate trombone, toilet-plunger mutes, etc. Bird certainly had it, because he started off with the blues. Trane had it. Louis had it. It's less obvious in piano players, but they find ways of approximating the blues vocalization/microtone vocabulary by hitting major & minor third at the same time (Monk), or running a fingertip ..............> straight up the keyboard to glissando into a note.
Miles and Wynton have their own versions of this blues-vocalization. James Carter has it big time.
Keith Jarrett and the ECM crowd radically tone down the blues element. The hard bop guys radically upped it. And the free jazz guys, like Pharoah (sp??) Sanders, had huge elements of the blues cry in what they did. Eric Dolphy.
Cut and paste this URL for a vid/audio of Sanders doing "Gotta Have Freedom." THAT is the blues cry. I sat in the first row at the Village Gate one night and let him blast me out of my chair.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3eeBaIUrdec
Last Edited by on May 18, 2009 9:55 AM
This is exactly what I was talking about in the thread about comb materials. The TONE (fat sound) that I can get on one of my custom Marine Bands is impossible for anyone to get on any other harp I have heard. That goes for any one, any harp! I'm not just tooting my own horn(pun intended). That is why people like Adam and others use this Harp. You have to have big strong lungs to do this and it only comes from playing a lot!! Adam I have a question for you if you don't mind? I have been wondering about this for awhile. I use to tell people I play power harp when someone asked what kind of music it was that I played. And here you talk about playing that way! Do you or did you find it difficult to gap your harps to play powerful and be able to do overblows. To me it seems like a harp can be set up to do one or the other well, but not both! When I first heard you playing Paul Butterfield type licks on the bottom end and overblows in the middle. I thought OK I'm wrong about that. That day I started playing overblows and overdraws. But still the lighter a person plays the easier it is to set up a harp for overblows. Correct? I don't play that way so I don't know. Is this something you battle with or did at one time? This is the type of stuff I wish we could talk about. I know a lot of harp players aren't all that comfortable getting this deep into their own playing, but I would really like to hear what you have to say about the balance between power harp and overblow harp.
Last Edited by on May 18, 2009 11:06 AM
I've always thought that blues is such a vocal-based music, and therefore all the instrumentation mimics the subtleties of the human voice. One of the best pieces of advice I got from a great NZ harp player, Terry Casey, was to make every solo like a vocal line, to give it dynamics and let it breathe.
And Elwood - yep, that's one of my favourite videos - absolutely stunning playing, so many ideas in less than 5 minutes - and I can't believe how hard Adam is on himself here. I'm actually not a great fan of fast playing (or maybe just fast playing all the time), but when it's this *musical*, it's killer
Kudzurunner: Thanks Adam thats what I wanted this was the clip you in 3rd. Sorry I'm still steam powered in modern technology.
Your probably fed up with this clip however I draw reference to it simply because thats where I discovered your playing.
Heres what captured my attention.
1. A riff that is repetitive and is delivered with utter confidence and dare I say contempt.By 0.26 you have left me in little doubt (If you like it you like it if you don't take off)To me thats typical terrific street art. 2.Confidence of attack to attract, now heres the thing. Coltraine has a cry similar cry with Booker Ervin. Coltraine uses cycles and sub harmony to replace dynamics so you get the feeling of dynamics when he's actually on one dynamic (full on sheet of sound.) Adams playing hit me like a freight train.Dynamics you say where? Like Coltraine but in this unwittingly or naturally I think 0.33 on the chord or tounge block 0.37 starting to dig and 0.42 aline at 0.55 gives felling of dynamic to about 1.24 that shift at 1.26 is significant to 1.41
That chordal movement, that shift is sublime to me drag and hook the listner and command attention without ramming it. (Climb inside yourself ) What it says to me is here is a bolt from the blue take it or leave it, but thats where it's at for me.
Now that is modern blues harp in motion brilliant.
Last Edited by on May 18, 2009 12:07 PM
Something keeps popping up in mind that kudzurunner said in a previous video, the difference between playing "nasty" and playing "sweet". Does that have any relation to playing hard vs light? Rice Miller strikes me as nasty, Little Walter as sweet...
Good post Sopwithcamels Thunky Thing is the tune that sucked me into the Satan and Adam vortex.In 20yrs of listening to the blues harp I was knocked on my ass with Adams attack, groove sense and riff move-ability. I never like copying any song,simply for pure spirit of improvisation,untill I hear this song. Then Big Daddy Gussow starts transmitting free lessons...................what!!!!!,this cant be true. Then he does Thunky Thing...................what!!!! Shit,I got to over blow???? So I mission down and spend months working on overblows,just to get the Thunky Thing down. Adam there's so much milk in dat tune you could wipe out all dairy farmers. A good example of the throat coughs Adam was talking about in his latest videos is heard on this video. I love how tongue blocked octaves gives this shimmering oscollation.kinda makes your head warble. And for the record,no plastic comp could ever make Thunky Thing swing.............Respect Adam,all the way.
I only know of three of Adam's "extras":- 96, 100 and this one, 128, which was new to me too (and I only just discovered 96, in fact). On YouTube I can only find the standard videos normally. How the hell do you find the extras? I'm asking here so as not to bother Adam.
I'm not sure you're right about plastic combs and Thunky Fing. I'm OK with plastic combs for high note playing. I had a Hohner Big River harp in D-flat for a while; in fact, I had two or three. They had a bright clear sound that I liked. I think that might work on TF.
"Mother Mojo" and "Unlucky in Love," on the other hand, which rely on a crunchy 2 draw bend, are where I love to work the wood. So to speak.
I feel a bit vindicated about my current choice of Big River harps. They've been a little tough to learn all the bends, etc. on, but I think they have helped develop my chops too.
I'd also like to say thanks to all who've contributed to this thread (excluding myself). One of the most in-depth and interesting to date. This is what makes this forum great.
I love my Sp20's and GM but about 2 months ago I resumed my MB purchasing again(as a result of whats been going on here,good thing) and reveiwed some of your old tubes.And KABANG I nearly slapped my self,for all the time I've been studying you(Adam) I could'nt get that fat clunky kachuncka sound you make,even with all the magical micro tricks youve shared.until I started play MB's again. Now I'm reworking (slightly) my technquie to fit with my newly loved MB. Adam out of all your recordings did you ever use plastic?
Well Adam if you never come up with anything else to beat thunky fing I would not feel to bad; its a dang good groove. It gets stuck in my head abotu every other day
"It gets stuck in my head about every other day." - Same here: In fact, I hear it right now: Da dam dap, da di da dam daa, Da dim dap da di da di da dip du,...
Ah, I forgot you all knew how crappy my scatting attempts are. ;) ---------- germanharpist, harpfriends on Youtube
Last Edited by on May 20, 2009 1:56 AM
