It's the holy grail, isn't it? I had an email inquiry from somebody asking if such video existed. I told him that I didn't know of any, but that I would ask.
Amazing how his style was already there, the use of the upper octave, the flirting with non blues scale notes, even the cap. He didn't have that bandolero belt back then though.
@kudzu, I don't know if the guy who asked you was looking for such videos for personnal interest or for professional purpose, but if it's professional, I know there's such footage in the french TV archives (in particular of SB playing in Paris metro). If he needs that for a documentary, he must be prepared for a hefty price of use. Maybe not as expensive as a footage of Jimi (the Hendrix trust is greedy to the point of being plain silly), but still, he will need a big wallet.
I am fairly sure you were there at Manny's Adam-Sugar would jump up on the bar,play all the way down the bar to the front door-then exit out onto 3rd Avenue and play on the street. That was my first time seeing Sugar-I got the chance to talk to him after-great player and a great human being.
Last Edited by on Mar 12, 2010 6:13 AM
The oft repeated observation that SB plays a lot of non blues scale tones completely misses the point.
So many posts around here obsess about how to play the blues scale for this chord or that chord. SB is musically so much more sophisticated than that. He's more often creating lines and runs built around the extension tones of those chords, which is a point that so many of his critics fail to grasp. That's what makes his note selection so masterfully musical, whether or not most harp players actually understand what he's doing. However, it's somewhat easier to recognize his virtuoso technical mastery of the instrument.
Sure, maybe his playing can sometimes be a little excessive, and he might be better off if he worked with a producer occasionally instead of producing his own recordings all the time. But make no mistake about it: This is a modern day master in our midst.
Classic Sugar Blue from the early 80's. I used to see him all the time in Chicago. I saw him do some amazing stuff. He used to host the Monday night jam at the Kingston Mines. Guitarist Melvin Taylor used to come down and the two of them would do some amazing jazz-influenced stuff. I also saw some cool mini-harp battles between him and Billy Branch, who is also rather adept at high register playing, too.
The guy who shot those videos has some killer videos with some great harp players on his youtube channel. Everyone has seen his footage of Big Walter, but he has some nice footage of Carey Bell, Billy Branch, Little Mac Simmons and some lesser known players such as: Scott Bradbury, the late Dimestore Fred and Steve Kaufmann. All of them could play their asses off.
In that second video, he was playing with guitarist, Lee Jackson. He was a seriously bad ass player that was all over Chicago. He toured with Willie Dixon and the All Stars before he was tragically killed.
A man wearing an earring has nothing to do with homosexuality. However, a man wearing an earring only on his right ear is universally accepted as a symbol of homosexuality. Take a look at pictures of men with pierced ears, you'll notice it's always on the left(unless they are gay - Elton John for example).
To Todd L. Greene - congratulations on outing yourself as a homophobe. You disgust me. I asked a serious question in a serious tone and to imply that I'm a troll(someone who purposefully posts inflammatory comments for a reaction) implies that you think homosexuality is synonymous with an insult. The fact that you posted this under your full name is even funnier -how dare you. Get out of here, this isn't a place for intolerance.
Sandy: Not to pick a bone with you, or pop your balloon, but when I googled "earring homosexuality" I came up with a website that had a long essay on the general topic of earrings and several paragraphs on the topic. This guy disputes your claim. Here's what he says:
"Most males [men] don’t know it, but earring wearing by males was homosexual symbolism. As the left side of the body is feminine and the right side, masculine, homosexual males pierced that side of the ear denoting their role in a same sex affair or relationship. If a male homosexual had his left ear pierced, he was stating that he was “passive” in the sex act. If he had the right ear pierced, he was stating that he was “active” in the sex act. And if he had both ears pierced, look out, it was “party time” as he went both ways – receiving it and giving it, whether it was anal sex or head (fellatio)."
So there's nothing intrinsically homosexual-signaling about piercing the right ear. Or at least that's what this commentator says. I wouldn't know.
Last Edited by on Mar 12, 2010 3:48 PM
Unless the earring in the right ear acts as some sort of counterweight to allow him to move up the high register more quickly, i don't understand the purpose for the extended discussion about all this earring stuff.
Whether the earring wearer is gay, straight or bi, black, white or mixed, male, female or transgender--who cares and why bother talking about it? The relevant inquiry is whether the musician can play. Whether or in what ear the musician may or may not be wearing earrings or why has nothing to do with playing skill, playing style or originality of artistic expression.
There's so much really interesting stuff to consider about SB's playing that I'm positively astounded so many have so much to say about the significance of his taste in jewelery and so little to say about his music. Go figure....
Last Edited by on Mar 12, 2010 5:00 PM
Trolls want to hijack and disrupt discussion. Sandy88 has a history of doing just that. For the sake of not feeding this troll any more this is my last comment in this thread about Sandy88.
Adam- On the wikipedia entry for "earring" it states:
In various Western cultures, piercing the left vs. the right ear alone has sometimes been popularly perceived to be associated with a particular sexual orientation. In the late 60's it was said that "right is 'right' and left is 'wrong'"; the left ear being safe for piercing by straight men and a pierced right ear meaning one was gay.
Todd Green- Its laughable to think that you're maligning me for speaking out against hate. I asked a simple question relating to Sugar Blue, you responded with a homophobic remark and got the thread off topic and then tried to turn it around on me, good job.
BACK TO SUGAR BLUE THOUGH- his speed is impressive, as well as his note selection, but ultimately if there is such a thing as modern blues harmonica (a term that I think suggests something that is an impossibility, I don't think it is found in acrobatics and superlative technique
Sandy: I'm curious to know what you think about Charlie Parker. Do you like his playing? Do you consider him an important voice in the history of sax playing? Or do his acrobatics and superlative techniqe--which left so many self-styled jazz critics in his own day spluttering about how he was ruining jazz, committing the "heresy of bebop"--strike you as stylistic elements that place him outside the main tradition of his instrument?
I consider Sugar Blue the equivalent of Charlie Parker, relative to the harmonica playing of our time. I'm speaking now about Sugar Blue as he existed, fully formed, by the mid 1990s. He's essentially doing the same thing now that he did then, except he's mellowed slightly and his songwriting is even better.
But the Sugar Blue of the 1980 album CROSSROADS, with his versions of "Pontiac Blues" and "Another Man Done Gone," and the Sugar Blue of BLUES IS TRUTH with Brownie McGhee and Louisiana Red, and the Sugar Blue I saw in the NYC clubs between 1988 and 1995--that Sugar Blue was Charlie Parker next to every other harp player out there, with the exception perhaps of Paul Delay. He was that far beyond what everybody else was doing at that point that he might as well have been playing another instrument. He could also play completely old school, non-amped, on-the-vocal-mic stuff with all the finesse, intensity, and tone of Big Walter. I was in the room when he did that.
I used to grumble to myself that he didn't swing. But he had incredibly good funk bands behind him, and I've come to understand, more than a decade after the fact, that he'd already figured out that "swing," as we understand it, is no longer modern, as it once was. I love swinging sax players; I was listening to Houston Person once again this evening and loving every minute of what he does. Sugar doesn't do that. But that's because he's ahead of us.
Again, I come back to my point about Charlie Parker. The jazz critics of his time downrated and dismissed him precisely as you're downrating and dismissing Sugar Blue. I think you'll agree with me that they--those jazz critics of the early 1940s--were wrong. And?
I love plaquet shirts, too, baby. And fins on cars. They were modern in their time. Now they're retro.
But there are other kinds of modern that are more.....hell, I don't know. Year-appropriate. I consider Sugar Blue that kind of modern. A better kind of modern for this particular website.
Don't worry, I'm not prejudiced against trolls. Every good website needs a resident troll, lurking under the bridge.
Last Edited by on Mar 12, 2010 8:26 PM
Amazingly, I managed to find the CROSSROADS album as a digital download. This one's a keeper. If you haven't heard what SB does on a big Sonny Boy harp on "Another Man Done Gone," do yourself a favor. Get that tune and "Pontiac Blues" for 19 cents each! This is the deal of the week, right here. And the previews are almost a minute long:
http://www.tunespro.com/album/48079/sugar-blue/crossroads
Last Edited by on Mar 12, 2010 8:35 PM
Amazon also has a MP3 compilation of BOTH Crossroads AND From Chicago to Paris (Sugar Blue's first 2 albums released in France). This is his seminal stuff--much better than the Alligator CDs. This MP3 compilation is itself called Another Man Done Gone and is available as a download of both albums or one can download tracks separately.
I can't seem to insert a link that works, but you can go to Amazon and search music for "Another Man Done Gone Sugar Blue." It's there. Great stuff.
Last Edited by on Mar 12, 2010 9:04 PM
I've been a fan of Sugar Blue's since I first saw him around 1983. His music contains a lot of what I like about Blues. It's based in the traditional music. He brings new stuff to the table. His music is fresh, exciting and "in your face". He writes some cool songs. They are not always pretty, but it's music about the world as he sees it.
His music is different than everyone else. He's a unique artist. He can take a 60 year old song that would sound dated and out of touch in the hands of most artists. He's the kind of guy that will make it sound fresh and relevant. He's a unique stylist and interpreter. It's my opinion that he has been an influence on quite a few players, but few admit it.
I've seen some amazing harmonica players in my life. Blue is one of them. I think he has amazing tone and mastery of the instrument. More importantly, he knows how to take a tune, interpret it and play it right.
Another thing I like about Sugar Blue is that he's his own man. His personality sort of reminds me of Howlin' Wolf. He does what he does. He doesn't seen to care what people think. People either like his music or they don't. He doesn't bend to critical pressures. He just makes his music. Sugar Blue is a true blues man.
Those are qualities that I respect.
Last Edited by on Mar 13, 2010 11:38 AM
I recently met a drummer from Chicago here in the uk called Chicagomike who is a personal friend of sugar blue, and spent time with him in the Swiss Alps when he was trying to kick crystal meth.
The point I would like to make is that how the heck do these great players play sooo well when they are completely off their faces on whatever?
I have heard that sonny boy liked whiskey a lot too.
A man wearing an earring has nothing to do with homosexuality. However, a man wearing an earring only on his right ear is universally accepted as a symbol of homosexuality. Take a look at pictures of men with pierced ears, you'll notice it's always on the left(unless they are gay - Elton John for example).
Sandy the paragraph Above holds some truth.way back in the 50's 60's 70's 80's, in my region ya just didn't pierce ya right ear unless you wanted to be beat up real bad, it still holds some stigma today,
In Newcastle Australia and it's outer suburbs to advertise that you where Homosexual, it was common to wear Bright Luminus Green socks those heal hugger shortys,
well Bro you could imagin the shock my Father got when he thought geez those socks look cool,im gunna get some to wear to the next Bee Bop Dance,
Ok Guys Downunder we ain't got that much exposure to todays Blues Players,you say Adam Gusso,Adam Who?,or Jason Ricci,Jason Who?
ok i didn't know Jay was Gay it does not bother me, what bothers me now is that i found out is,
i have to go searching the Archives to remove a stupid ass comment i left on his Post Jason Ricci is a girl thread.
Last Edited by on Mar 14, 2010 1:58 AM
I think Sugar Blue is about the best I have ever heard. Fast, accurate, totally unique, and puts a signature on every note while playing fast, using the whole harp. Huge fan. I believe he is appearing in person near me - Allentown I think, in May - and I am taking my whole family. I am not one for traveling to in person performances - went to see Satan and Adam in Philly and that was fantastic. I am glad I will have a chance to see Sugar.
Sandy88 - rather than try to impress upon you that one's sexual preference has little bearing on their skill in a profession, I will just suggest that when someone such as yourself makes a moronic statement, do you really think anyone takes it seriously or gives it credibility? The better among us may try to reason with you. I just dismiss you as a cretan. Not as in one from Crete. Have a nice day.
"I notice that he has his right ear pierced. Does Sugar Blue predate Jason Ricci as the first well known homosexual harmonica player?"
implies I think that sexual orientation has anything to do with one's quality as a player? This is a thread about sugar blue and I asked a serious question about the man. In fact I even praised parts of his playing, and stated that he and Jason are both well known(again implying that they have mastered the instrument).
By the way, the definition of Cretan is "one who is from Crete." You were looking for Cretin, chief. You should probably just delete your post- you've failed on all counts.
The comparison beetween Charlie Parker and Sugar Blue suits me perfectly. But the next question is : where is the Sugar Blue school ?
We all known now that Charlie Parker was a radical genious, but he also left an imprint, not only by creating be-bop and inspiring other be-bop musicians, but also on the way jazz is played even today. few musicians are that big (Coltrane is an other exemple).
Back to Sugar Blue : what is is imprint on harp playing and on blues ? I can think of nobody following his steps. Maybe he is too good, too much ahead, maybe the blues creed is too conservative... I have no clue.
On his last CD, Sugar sings "I am a lonely man". And I guess that he is.
Part of the reason SB is not as influential as he might otherwise have been is the distraction some of his non musical obsessions created, causing his career to drift for a number of years.
Also, his approach is more musically sophisticated than most harp players can grasp and his playing technique is challenging to emulate. But it's all there for the taking if any of us want to learn from it.
Personally, i don't understand why 4 of the 5 harp players it takes to change a light bulb stand around talking about how Little Walter must have done it instead of how Sugar Blue or Paul Butterfeld would be doing it.
There seems to be a a prejudice against innovation among harp players in general. For example, read the Joe Filisko interview posted by Elwood. There seems to be this widely held belief that if you are not playing just like they did 50 years ago there's something wrong with your playing. IMHO, this is nothing more than a rationalization for lack of imagination and inability to be musically creative. SB's approach is not inhibited by such anachronistic folklore. He is a much better musician than that with a truly original artistic vision.
Btw, although Jason Ricci disclaims any Sugar Blue influence, i hear a lot of SB ideas in his playing. SB also appears to have been an influence on John Popper, which Popper used to acknowledge. Some of Billy Branch's high register work reflects some SB influence, too.
In general, though, I think SB's work is more musically sophisticated and technically accomplished than most harp players can comprehend, so instead of appreciating it, they criticize what they don't have the ability to understand--which, after all, is easier to do than admitting ignorance. And attempting to copy his musical ideas is much harder to do than regurgitating SOS blues licks which seems to be the standard by which so many harp players judge one another (like, for example, the guys in the Mark Hummel harmonica blow off vids who, IMHO, have about as much creativity as the average Elvis impersonator).
Anyway, SB has been a big influence on my playing. I'm not saying that i imitate him, or that I play like him. But it took a lot of time and effort to figure out what he is doing and incorporate some of those ideas into my own playing--I've become a better harp player AND, more importantly, a much better MUSICIAN because of it. Thanks, Blue.
Last Edited by on Mar 14, 2010 9:44 AM
Hey hvyj. As I find time to read some of these posts I'm appreciating your grounded wisdom plus I have a history with some of your references, growing up listening to SB on the streets and clubs and fests of NYC, communicating with him here and again now (He'll be at Terra Blues next month), etc. It's led me to wonder about your playing: do you have a website you can link? (personally I love it when posters on forums link their music). Thanks. With respect. d
@bigd Well, I'm flattered to learn that my posts actually make sense to someone besides me. It's especially nice to hear this from a player of your caliber--I've listened to the material you've posted and i enjoy and respect your playing a great deal. You and i have actually corresponded before on Harp-l.
Anyway, I don't have a music website or a Facebook page or anything like that. I play out 2-3 nights most weeks. I have some regular gigs with a couple of bands, and a whole lot of standing invitations to sit in with other bands, so i am able to pretty much play as much as i want to when i have the time. The band leader for my own band, the Postmodern Blues Band, has a website with music samples from his jazz band, but none for the Postmodern Blues band yet, but that may change soon. I'll keep you guys posted.
As a philosophical matter, I've never played the harmonica like it was a harmonica and never wanted to. I mean, i can and do play harmonica specific licks when the music requires it, but more often i get my musical ideas and approach from listening to other instruments--typically sax and keyboards, but sometimes guitars and other horns. I don't play any other instrument, though.
The harmonica players who have been the biggest influences on my playing are Paul Butterfield and Sugar Blue. Of the older traditional players, i like James Cotton and Howlin' Wolf the best. But i don't really copy any other player. I think the most important thing for any player is to play what he or she feels. Of course, one has to develop a certain level of technique and music theory knowledge to be able to express oneself effectively on the instrument, but, within that context, IMHO, it's never too early to start finding one's own voice.
Btw, I always go to see SB if he appears anywhere within driving distance. Always a high energy show and well worth the trip. I'm curious about what SB's playing was like on the street???
Last Edited by on Mar 14, 2010 10:34 AM
SB (James Whiting)'s playing on the street was often in Washington Square park and predated his "found playing in a train station in Paris-picked up by the Rolling Stones- Miss you" day's. I doubt you could ever get a harmonica out of the guys mouth back in those day (as Adam will know). On a 1-10 verve scale I would say he was a 10 on the street. And he made money with that verve wowing the audiences that crowded him.... I understand using your harp as a musical extension of yourself and not necessarily as a "harp". In my own modest way I try to model singers. The voice inside my head is simultaneously a vocalist and a harp player. My best. d ---------- Myspace: dennis moriarty
In Washington Square, did SB play w/ an amp or was he purely acoustic??
And, I absolutely agree that the most important sound to try to recreate when performing is the sound you hear in your head--not something copied from a recording.
Last Edited by on Mar 14, 2010 10:52 AM
Amped with accompaniment. This was when it was not against the law to play amped in W.Sq.. I believe he played on a "dwarf" amp at the time as opposed to the more ubiquitous mouse and maxi-mouse. d ---------- Myspace: dennis moriarty
when sugar blue played on the street he used a pignose amp (small one) that he slung over his shoulder with a guitar strap. he had a french girlfriend that accompanied him on the bass ( this was after he went to paris)
@hvyj: Thanks for your great posts. It's good to see SB getting some respect here.
For obvious reasons, Sandy failed to address the specifics of my Charlie Parker / Sugar Blue analogy. It's easy enough now, with 60 years' distance, to say that Charlie Parker was a genius. But that is NOT what the jazz critics were saying in 1945. The so-called moldy figs who endorsed trad jazz of the Preservation Hall variety complained that he was ruining jazz. And they faulted him in almost exactly the same terms that Sandy88 is faulting SB: they claimed that he was merely technical; that he lacked feeling, tone, all the crucial attributes of "real jazz." Sandy can't address that point, so he doesn't.
As for why Sugar Blue hasn't had the same effect on musicians who play other instruments: a good question, but not really relevant to the question at hand. Still, I'll venture an answer, and it goes to the heart of this website's mission.
Sugar Blue hasn't had the same effect on other instrumentalists as Charlie Parker because he hasn't had the same effect on other harmonica players that Charlie Parker has had on other sax players. Bird was part of a movement: bebop. People who wanted to play bebop on other instruments quite naturally went to the source. Sugar Blue, by contrast, is a one-man operation. He has indeed modernized the language of the harmonica as Bird modernized the language of the saxophone, but the general mass of professional harmonica players--the white guys of his generation who played amplified harp, for the most part--simply weren't interested in modernizing. Billy Branch was, to some extent, and Johnny Mars. And a few of us white boys got it. But most were more interested in mastering, mining, and recapitulating the tradition rather than modernizing it.
I'm happy to say that Sugar Blue profoundly affected my approach. Hearing "Pontiac Blues" and comparing it with Sonny Boy's version taught me what the modernizing process is all about. I was already interested in the high notes, but Sugar Blue convinced me to work them really hard. I would certainly say that he is one of my top 5 harmonica influences, along with Butterfield (for long triplet lines), James Cotton (for tone and intensity of attack), Nat Riddles (for vibrato and swing), Big Walter (for basic tongue blocking riffs and blue third), and Sonny Terry (for all around speed and fluency).
So you may certainly put me in the Sugar Blue camp. He invented harp-bop. But a critical mass of players never joined his movement. Maybe it's not too late for that.
Last Edited by on Mar 14, 2010 12:32 PM
You know, I consider it unfortunate that no one else has anything to say about analyzing SB's playing. Very disappointing. I guess that may be part of why SB is not more influential. It seems that harp players in general only want to analyze old stuff that's been played over and over again ad nauseam--probably because that SOS is easier to play and easier to understand.
To play the harmonica as a musical instrument one must at least have some interest in musical ideas that don't involve simply regurgitating old blues licks.
I have just begun to listen to some Sugar Blue. I just bought one of his older and one of his newer cd's. The older stuff is more traditional (while still exploring the boundaries), I find that his newer material really pushes the envelope. There are so many great players old and new I think that some get overlooked at times. This forum has given me a whole new insight to players that I would have never heard.
Paul ---------- Music is your own experience, your own thoughts, your wisdom. If you don't live it, it won't come out of your horn. They teach you there's a boundary line to music. But, man, there's no boundary line to art. - Charlie Parker
Paul ---------- Music is your own experience, your own thoughts, your wisdom. If you don't live it, it won't come out of your horn. They teach you there's a boundary line to music. But, man, there's no boundary line to art. - Charlie Parker
