slaphappy
53 posts
Dec 15, 2014
4:15 PM
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are there a lot of guys out there who are really good at both styles?
Other than Joe Filisko and maybe Lee Sankey I'm not aware of that many players who play both pre-war and post-war styles really well although I'm probably just unaware. (?)
Is it just that there aren't that many really good or well known country blues players, or it's just hard to really master more than one style? Or maybe country blues is just not as popular so you don't see that many players doing it?
curious what MBH'ers think about this.
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4' 4+ 3' 2~~~
-Mike Ziemba
Harmonica is Life!
Last Edited by slaphappy on Dec 15, 2014 8:28 PM
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jbone
1833 posts
Dec 15, 2014
8:04 PM
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I strive for a wide spectrum. It's open to interpretation how well I do but My partner and I and most who hear us like what comes out the amps. Or out the harp on a street corner.
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http://www.reverbnation.com/jawboneandjolene
https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100000386839482
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qbTwvU-EN1Q
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KingoBad
1576 posts
Dec 15, 2014
8:36 PM
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I think your catagories need a bit of refining. You are presupposing a great deal...
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Danny
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slaphappy
54 posts
Dec 15, 2014
9:08 PM
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fair enough
I suppose it's kinda like trying to be a great jazz, rock, blues, country, and classical guitar player. Not easy to do.
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4' 4+ 3' 2~~~
-Mike Ziemba
Harmonica is Life!
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KingoBad
1578 posts
Dec 16, 2014
4:43 AM
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I mean the logic you choose to make these distinctions is sloppy.
Pre-war and post war, Chicago and country - are not the same thing.
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Danny
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cliffy
124 posts
Dec 16, 2014
7:24 AM
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Hi Mike, I think some of the other posters are breaking your balls of it. I know what you meant by your question... By country blues, I got the idea you were referring to Sonny Terry's style.
One guy you should definitely check out is Paul Lamb. He's a professional player from the UK. He plays both amplified postwar style blues and acoustic Sonny Terry-style. I've never heard him play any of the real prewar type of songs that you would hear from Kyle Wooten, DeFord Bailey, or Palmer McAbee. He has a lot of YouTube videos in which he plays acoustic harp. I think he knew Sonny Terry and spent a good amount of time with him, because he really has the style nailed down well. I enjoy his YouTube videos because it is a chance to hear that style of playing with good modern sound quality.
For the prewar acoustic harmonica songs, there are not a lot of guys who have YouTube videos. The one you definitely see the most of, is Joe Filisko, with whom you are already familiar and who must be their premier harmonica player working with that style of playing. His set on the "history of the blues harmonica" concert is really amazing. He plays a bunch of medleys of tunes by prewar artists and does a nice intro for each one explaining about the particular style he's demonstrating.
Also, Gary "Sonny Jr." Onofrio is a fantastic player in the Sonny Terry style. I've only heard him play amplified while demonstrating his amps -- he is the creator of the Sonny Jr. boutique harp amplifiers. But he can definitely do both amplified and acoustic harmonica really well.
One other guy who can do pretty much everything there is to do on the harmonica is Peter "Madcat" Ruth. He is truly an astonishing player, and I would say that his style is more holistic/integrated and less separated than most other harmonica players. His amplified work has a lot of prewar type chugging and rhythmic stuff incorporated into it. Most of the players play the amplified stuff kind of by itself and then play the country/prewar stuff also purely by itself, but Madcat's style is a real melting pot.
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Milsson
180 posts
Dec 16, 2014
9:49 AM
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Being good att pre war train stuff does not have to exclude being good at modern stuff. I belive that learning train rythms is essential to learn how to breath thru your instrument propperly. Some will argue against this but that is my strong belife.
I'm pretty shure that IF you do train songs at a home party you will get a lot more applause then doing some blazing fast singel note overblowe funkjazz blues stuff.
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barbequebob
2791 posts
Dec 16, 2014
10:04 AM
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Being versatile in different style types as well as genres does take some woodshedding and remembering that one size does NOT fit all. You do have to take the time to study the various styles and avoid making the mistake of one generic way of doing things and it does take work.
A big part of those pre-war harp styles that is necessary to understand is often times the playing is going to be decidedly more rhythmic than heavily melodic, even tho there are plenty of good melodic ideas happening and someone who likes to be ultra modern who has a tendency to be ultra melodic playing as many notes as possible will often have trouble with a more rhythmic approach and knowing how to make space useful in their playing.
The key is to do TONS of hard care listening in great detail and NEVER assume that if you know one particular player's style, you know it all because that kind of thinking is totally BS.
Even the Chicago players like Big Walter Horton and SBWII owe a huge debt to the sounds of country blues and Big Walter's teacher was Will Shade, who played harp in the Memphis Jug Band, and that's also a very important country/prewar harp style to learn.
A lot of modern players today too often think of acoustic harp as just harp with the mic and harp tight cupped played on a rig that's totally clean, but that's NOT really acoustic harp at all because like country blues style harmonica, the way you use your hands to SHAPE the sound along with proper breath control is VITALLY important and the guys that think that just playing with the mic in their hands tight cupped but with a totally clean sound rarely use their hands for anything other than holding the harp, which is basically nothing but amplified harp without the dirt in the sound.
Damn, I can still see in my mind's eye the time I saw Sonny Terry making great use of his hands to make the harmonica talk and say, "I want my mama." You ain't gonna see anyone doing that with amplified harp too easily.
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Sincerely,
Barbeque Bob Maglinte
Boston, MA
http://www.barbequebob.com
CD available at http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/bbmaglinte
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Diggsblues
1612 posts
Dec 16, 2014
10:25 AM
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This is Chicago Modern Butterfield style.
This is my studio country style
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KingoBad
1579 posts
Dec 16, 2014
12:09 PM
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Cliffy, I'm not busting balls... Your singular reference to Sonny Terry's style is equally as narrow.
Sonny Terry's style is only a fraction of what I would call "country style" harmonica. Don't make me break out the Venn diagrams...
There are plenty of pros out there who can pull off a bullet, and play well over a vocal mike acoustically - and do it well.
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Danny
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cliffy
125 posts
Dec 16, 2014
1:17 PM
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@KingoBad: point well taken. When you say "There are plenty of pros out there who can pull off a bullet, and play well over a vocal mike acoustically - and do it well," obviously that's true. Kim Wilson and Rick Estrin would be two of my absolute favorites that do this really well, especially doing the SBW1/SBW2 thing. Certainly lots of amateurs can do it as well, myself (and I'm certain many, many others on this list) included.
I referred to Sonny Terry's style on its own because he is really the only guy that performed this type of playing through the 60's 70's and 80's. But you are definitely right in that I ignored all of the other types of acoustic playing that could be classified as "country blues".
But for the most part, the prewar stuff and Sonny Terry's stuff is significantly different from the vast majority of acoustic harmonica playing done by most touring pros.
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ted burke
27 posts
Dec 16, 2014
2:57 PM
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There are many harmonica players around who are , in my view, equally strong and distinct as both blues and country players. The late Norton Buffalo was praised by guitarist Mike Bloomfield for being able to play stand-up shuffles that would make Butterfield envious and for being able to play country style , blue grass and fiddle tunes with equal ease and finesse. We can also mention Micky Raphael in Willie Nelson's band , who has style that is a unique synthesis of blues bends and vibrato and buoyant country architecture. The point of being a harmonica player , I think, is to play what you feel like playing, to play the music you think is expressive and emotionally resonant , and not worry about credibility in any one style. Any style I think can expand on what I already know on the harmonica and which serves the requisite need of turning honest feeling into music is a legitimate quest. It's about the music, not the labels.
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Ted Burke
__________________
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tburke4@san.rr.com
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Joe_L
2553 posts
Dec 16, 2014
3:31 PM
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Chicago Blues and Country Blues are the same thing. Listen to the guys who came from the country and migrated north. You can hear the progression in terms of style. The big difference is learning to work with a microphone and an amplifier.
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kudzurunner
5187 posts
Dec 16, 2014
6:34 PM
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I know what Joe L. means by Chicago and country blues being the same thing. If you leave Sonny Terry and Deford Bailey and Rev. Dan Smith and Peg Leg Sam and Phil Wiggins and Billy Bizor out of the equation--none of them plays anything that could remotely be called Chicago blues, with or without amp--then his claim makes a lot of sense.
The connection between a West Tennessee-born player like John Lee Williamson and a Chicago-pedigreed player like Junior Wells is audible and clear. Those two guys cover the country/city spectrum. They came from the country and made their big names in the city.
I think facility with the amp and mic are a big deal--bigger, perhaps, than Joe suggests. Little Walter is probably exhibit A. In "The Stuff You Gotta Watch," an early tune, he's playing acoustic and sounding like John Lee. In "Juke" he's doing something very different--creating Chicago blues harmonica style, you might say, given what's happened since, although John Lee's was arguably THE Chicago style before that.
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mastercaster
104 posts
Dec 17, 2014
3:53 AM
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Had to have a listen .. so sharing it up ..
Last Edited by mastercaster on Dec 17, 2014 3:56 AM
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kudzurunner
5188 posts
Dec 17, 2014
4:49 AM
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Actually, my teacher Nat Riddles excelled at both styles. His album with Larry Johnson makes clear that he's got all the country chops.
He can play amplfied chromatic:
Here he's playing John Lee style with a jump ensemble:
I think I'm going to put another of his cuts--a heavily amplfied one--out on YT. It will show that he was explosively powerful when amped up.
Point is, he's a good answer to the OP.
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barbequebob
2792 posts
Dec 17, 2014
10:15 AM
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One thing not mentioned here with country blues is that often times besides playing more rhythmic (which doesn't necessarily mean just chording), but many of the tunes will often have very irregular progressions as well as time signatures and if you'e used to Chicago or any sort of band blues with chord progression and time signatures that are very regularized, that will often be like severe culture shock if you're not prepared for it and in a band situation, the closest to that was doing a gig with someone like a John Lee Hooker or a Lightnin' Hopkins, and the best single advice about playing in that style was given by Muddy Waters many years ago in an interview where he said, "if he don't change, I don't change."
What Sonny Terry is more representative of (and a more modern day proponent of that style being Phil Wiggins) is the Piedmont style, which is so different than hearing let's say very early Rhythm Willie backing Peetie Wheatstraw or the kinds of things played in a jug band style like Will Shade or other prewar players like Jaybird Coleman.
The early LW stuff unamplified is essentially the influence of SBWI with bits of SBWII and Big Walter, but more heavily souped up and the very beginnings of the influences of jump/swing horn players in the mix. Muddy's cover of Stuff You Gotta Watch is a more down home version of the jump blues classic originally done by the Buddy Johnson Orchestra featuring Ella Johnson on vocals.
Even the stuff Jazz Guillum did in the 40's is directly tied to the old country blues as well.
@ted burke -- what your post is about is country music, but unfortunately NOT country blues, which is quite the bit different here.
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Sincerely,
Barbeque Bob Maglinte
Boston, MA
http://www.barbequebob.com
CD available at http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/bbmaglinte
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ted burke
31 posts
Dec 17, 2014
11:02 AM
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Thanks, Bob. I realized that so I decided just sit back and enjoy the informative conversation and the posted videos. I do believe, of course, that one can excel at both chicago and country blues styles. In fact, I think it's required for any player truly in love with the blues. Knowing both styles can't help but you a stronger, more exciting musician to listen to.
Anyway, it's time for me to make my attention span longer when reading topic posts.
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Ted Burke
__________________
ted-burke.com
tburke4@san.rr.com
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