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Dirty-South Blues Harp forum: wail on! > keep the blues alive
keep the blues alive
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groyster1
3404 posts
Jul 27, 2019
8:00 AM
I first heard the blues on WLAC Nashville 50000 watts clear channel at night in oak ridge Tennessee over 50 years ago.....where I moved back to...…..the torch has to be passed and the secret is the youth......let them play......its entirely up to them to keep this American music going...……..forever!!!!!!!!!!!!!
jbone
2977 posts
Jul 28, 2019
3:11 PM
I heard blues in the early 60's on a.m. radio across the country. Back in that time there was no f.m. radio. At night- Sunday was the night I remember- I could hear "race radio" shows from Memphis, Chicago, Baltimore, Atlanta, and other places. All the big guys like BB, Jimmy Reed, Muddy, Wolf, were coming into my room via a borrowed a.m. radio. I was much too young to be up that late. My brother took his radio back after the battery ran down. An era ended. But blues had made its mark on me.

I grew up in a place that had no blues bands, clubs, any of that. But the Brit invasion had its effect, and a few friends who had albums by guys like Sonny Terry, Dr. John, Muddy, Wolf, and many others, re-turned me on to blues at a time when I had found a desire to play harmonica.

I promote harp whenever I can to anyone of any age. It IS up to us to pass the torch, however we can.
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groyster1
3405 posts
Jul 28, 2019
4:42 PM
what about WLAC Nashville and john r??????50000 watts clear channel at night......first heard in mid to late 60s......saw muddy waters at local chitlin circuit at paradide inn in oak ridge tn......think it was mojo buford on harp
jbone
2978 posts
Jul 29, 2019
4:04 AM
At age 6 or 7 the names did not stick, just the music.
The first time I saw live music it was a ragtime band in my hometown. My gramps was sitting in on harp. San Francisco Bay Blues I believe. I was 3. Of course I remember my Gramps but the radio was a wonderful sound in a small box.
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agarner
57 posts
Jul 29, 2019
5:53 AM
I first heard the blues at a neighborhood block party when I was 10, I thought it was cool, but not enough to gey absorbed... fast forward twenty five years.

Four years ago my cousin had a blues album on and it caught on for whatever reason. Im now a part of a band and the blues is my sound. Its weird how long it took me to find it.

The blues is alive, but a new generation brinfs their own sound and influences.
jbone
2979 posts
Jul 29, 2019
9:09 AM
Blues has always gone through changes. From rural feed lot acoustic stomp to juke to more citified electric, up to and past digital enhancement. But the core, the feeling that produces the desire to hear and create, I doubt that will ever change. That gut thing is an elemental part of us as a species.
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Rgsccr
508 posts
Jul 29, 2019
12:17 PM
I think I first really became aware of the blues in 1970 or so on Telegraph Ave. in Berkeley. I'd started playing harp a couple of years earlier to try and impress my girlfriend (used Tony Glover's book), but I mainly was trying to play along with Dylan. Then, walking around late at night I would hear buskers playing on Telegraph. To my ears, it usually sounded like really good blues harp, and that got me interested in SBII, George Smith, Sonny Terry. It took me another twenty years or so to really understand much of what I was trying to play, but I sure loved the blues, especially early blues.
Gnarly
2676 posts
Jul 29, 2019
12:17 PM
Is this blues? It does feature the harmonica.

Sounds more like gospel to me--same key, time signature and groove as You've Got to Hide Your Love Away heheh

Last Edited by Gnarly on Jul 29, 2019 12:22 PM
The Iceman
3890 posts
Jul 29, 2019
1:31 PM
"Keeping the Blues alive" is more than a bunch of us old guys sitting around the bar reminiscing about how we first got into it and the good ol' days.

Of course it would be nice if the younger folks coming up kept the flame burning, but, to me, it seems to be flickering and in danger of being snuffed out - where will these "young saviors" play "the blues"? Clubs? Who would patronize "the blues" clubs? Us old guys?

Just like how "pop music" has stagnated since 2000, I don't see much happening for "the blues" once us old guys finally sign up for that last "blues jam in the sky".
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The Iceman
Gnarly
2677 posts
Jul 29, 2019
1:57 PM
The blues is woven into the fabric of American music--but some of the great music of the past which manifested this isn't being forwarded.
Just as swing became popular music, the blues became popularized by the rock music of the 60's. I know because much of my blues references are those threads, not the Walters or the Sonny Boys . . .
I have heard it said that hip hop reflects the blues more than other new popular forms. I don't really know, because I am still studying the music of my time--which was, as we say, last century . . . and that includes some of the blues greats that you guys are all familiar with.
Give you a for instance--I recently starting doing the Cream version of Lawdy Mama, since I have a track for Strange Brew, and that is the version Eric recorded, with a vocal, for Disraeli Gears--until Felix heard it, went home and wrote lyrics (with his lovely wife Gail hehe) and a melody to use instead.
Turns out, that's a Junior Wells song--who knew--everyone but me.
groyster1
3406 posts
Jul 30, 2019
3:30 AM
keeping blues alive is something that will take effort and will not happen on its own.....there are quite a few young people who show great interest and talent playing blues
Spderyak
286 posts
Jul 30, 2019
3:54 AM
I don't see blues disappearing any more than some of the other genre..swing, rock ,country, classical etc.
I suppose blues could be sub divided into boogie or cry in your beer songs..then again so could country swing like "Bubbles in My Beer".

Techno music might be popular now, but blues recordings are around 100 yrs old and many years before recordings..I don't see it fading away. I see it as a continuing for another 100 yrs no problem.
Then again I could be wrong...

.course it might not be harmonica blues...
jbone
2980 posts
Jul 30, 2019
4:33 AM
When Jolene and I get out in public to play, usually we reach at least a few people. Instant converts. Folks respond and don't even know why. We don't do "all blues", we've morphed some to accommodate a wider audience, but being guitar and harp, wit a lot in 2nd and 3rd position, it's pretty blues-y. Roots, Rock, Americana. I love those who mistake us for "bluegrass". They have no clue.

I think this recent surge in harmonica interest will fuel a couple of generations of players at least. An easily portable instrument that needs no charging or apps has an attraction even to this crowd we see coming up now. And we see it most times out, young kids get sort of imprinted by seeing/hearing live performance. Who knows if they will find their way to a harp or guitar later? Some will I believe.


It is admittedly hard to face the fact, most of the guys who fired me up are gone. Even Brit Invasion rockers are getting up there! I have to admit, Van Morrison, Jagger, Daltry, and others did call attention to harp for me.

I'm dedicated to turning people on at the front lines, out live. If I can send them home with a CD or at least a vivid memory, great.
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Raven
161 posts
Jul 31, 2019
8:03 PM
Everything in life seems to go through its ups and downs...including almost every genre of music. And there will always be a certain percentage of music lovers trying desperately to hold on to and promote what they grew up loving or grew to love later in life as the above comments have indicated. What happened to Swing? Big Band? Classical Symphonies? Doo-Wop? Disco? I just looked at a comprehensive list of music genres and there were several hundred listed including every nuance of style, region, ethnicity and so on, each with its own core group of advocates trying to keep the music in perpetuity. When I attend the annual Jazz Festival in Lake George, New York, I hear the same lament as to how to get young people, and young musicians in particular, interested in keeping jazz alive. Every generation has its own particular pop culture for the moment which may live or die or live on for a certain minority. And so it goes with blues. Just do a search on how many different types of "blues" are classified or do the same with pop, punk, rock, or any other genre and you may be surprised how many different categories are listed, and like myself, you may find it difficult to be able to sort out what constitutes each respective division within the super group. Just look back at the discussions on this forum as to just what constitutes "modern blues" and equal discussions on who has the "right" to lay claim to or play such. You don't have to live in Chicago or grow up picking cotton to be a blues lover. You didn't have to be born centuries ago to appreciate Bach, Brahms or Beethoven. You didn't need to have come into this world before 1930 to appreciate Glen Miller, The Dorsey's or Artie Shaw. And so it goes with every form of music you may love and want to keep alive. Obviously some of it will stand the test of time and along will come a generation that discovers what you may have thought died and they may feel they have discovered the most wonderful songs ever created. Or that generation may endeavor to reinvent that music from the past adding their own take on it. Happens all the time. Play what you love, love what you play and share your own personal love with those around you...who knows, they might "discover" the blues someday also.
jbone
2981 posts
Jul 31, 2019
8:13 PM
@Raven, we're on the Champlain Islands this season.
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Music and travel destroy prejudice.

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Raven
162 posts
Aug 01, 2019
5:33 AM
@jbone: What venue will you be playing at and dates? Nate lives in the Capital District about an hour from me...he may want to catch up to you two as well.
jbone
2985 posts
Aug 01, 2019
6:59 PM
This one tomorrow is a burger stand in South Hero VT. The Accidental Farmer. 5 to 8.

the 10th is a morning farmers market gig in South Hero. 10 to noon or so depending on how Jo feels.

the 17th is a place in Burlington, on North Street. Smitty's Pub on Ethan Allen shopping center. 8 to 11.
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Music and travel destroy prejudice.

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