years ago ethnomusicologist allan lomax claimed that whites can't sing blues. i thought this was interesting being that in a film i actually saw him sing some blues his own ofay self. for years living blues magazine featured no white artists. what does this have to do with blues harp? just this. who is your favorite harp player/ singer, white or black or hispanic etc.,and why. by the way, dave chappel believes whites can dance and pasty women are prone to take off their tops as long as there is an electric guitar.
john nemeth is white an he sure as hell can sing the blues. so can charlie mussal white. an many others. ----------
Last Edited by on Mar 13, 2010 10:48 AM
I may be wrong, but I think it is whites that is keeping this genre of music alive. That includes writing and performing. William Clarke would be ONE of my favorites. The reason is obvious.
Ill tell you guys a story ill allways remeber,one time about 20 years ago when i was in the Army and a Black friend i had was specialist Hendrix,We allways used last names its a army thing,but i was getting into Easy E and 2 short,and we were talking music and i said i was starting to get into black music cause i was a metal head back then,And he said something that i will allways remember he said Black music? Music has no color.
Last Edited by on Mar 13, 2010 12:37 PM
Who is my favorite blues harp player? Billy Branch. Why? He's a great player and entertainer. He plays the type of music that I like. His music moves me. He has beautiful tone and technique.
Here's another thing I like about Billy Branch. He has taught thousands of kids the history of the blues and how to play the harp. He's probably taught more people how to play the harp than anyone else. He's helped give some really "hard to reach" kids some direction in life. There are very few people that have made that degree of contribution to the preservation and advancement of the harmonica than anyone. Unfortunately, very few people recognize that contribution. He's proud of that work, but he doesn't brag about it. He just keeps on doing it. He's a humble guy.
I don't care whether a person is white or black. It doesn't matter to me. I don't participate in discussions about whether white performers are legitimate or not.
Music shouldn't have any color. And it doesn't matter to me either if the person is white or black. The music is way bigger than the person. It's all about the music. A performer is here for a short time and hopefully the music will be here forever.
There can be no doubt that the origins of the blues are black, but the question was ,"can whites play the blues"? and the answere to that is undoubtably yes. Being able to perform a type of music has nothing to do with the colour of your skin or your cultural background, it is about the passion you have for the music you are performing, if you have the passion the knowlege and the love for the blues then given the talent you will be able to move people with your performance whatever colour wrapping mother nature gave you
lots of critics and learned types ran with this this color thing during the blues scare of the '60s though i'm pretty sure lomax claim is earlier. i was just curious to see how the so called wisdom of the day has fared. my favorite blues singer/harp players. that's easy. howlin' wolf and sonnyboy(rice miller). also kim wilson. there are just a lot of guys who have weak vocal chops compared to their harp chops or a stylized imitation black growl thing that i find irritating and false.
If you're interested in a really good blues singer that also plays some killer harp and happens to be white, check out Tad Robinson. Black or white, he's just plain good. He's got a fabulous voice and is a rock solid harp player. There are several videos of him on youtube.
William Clarke is okay, but let's be honest, there aren't any white men who can sing as well as the best black singers. I mean come on- Charlie Musselwhite or Butterfield vs. Muddy waters or Junior Wells?
It's got nothing to do with the blues though, or suffering - the difference is probably physical and perhaps a bit cultural as well. You would think there would be at least one example of a comparable white singer, if you have examples post them. The quality of a singer is subjective though, so I'll state the criteria I look for -power and expression
Well colour is really immaterial in music. If however you wanted good examples of blue singers who happen to be caucasian.
Then the people who immediately spring to my mind are James "Icepick" Harman, Tad Robinson, Sugar Ray Norcia, Mitch Kashmar, Kim Wilson, RJ Mischo, Gary Primich, Curtis Salgado and John Nemeth. All of these guys are also killer harp players.
"William Clarke is okay, but let's be honest, there aren't any white men who can sing as well as the best black singers. I mean come on- Charlie Musselwhite or Butterfield vs. Muddy waters or Junior Wells?"
Never heard Tad Robinson or Paul Oscher? You're dead wrong if you think no white person can sound like a great black singer, though I agree with your cherrypicked examples. I don't think Butter or Charlie were or are great singers.
And as for white females, the Australian singer Renee Geyer had good chart success in the US on black radio stations in the 80s UNTIL they started printing her photo on the LPs and people realised she was white. A case of reverse racism.
"And as for white females, the Australian singer Renee Geyer had good chart success in the US on black radio stations in the 80s UNTIL they started printing her photo on the LPs and people realised she was white. A case of reverse racism." I can't agree more, being an Aussie I have liked Renee from the first time I heard her sing, do yourself a favour and get her LP/CD called "Blues Licence" first put out back in the 80's, some really good Aussie blues musicians on this album. I first got it as a cassette, (remember them) I had to keep on making new copies of it because I would wear them out thru playing them so much, regards Neil
If you wanna name check white guys who sound like black guys, then lets have the king of that particular hill ----- RICK ASTLEY!, i almost shit myself when i saw him doing "Never Gonna Give You Up" on Top Of The Pops, te he!
Last Edited by on Mar 14, 2010 4:12 AM
Black white purple pink it doesnt matter blues is a lifestyle,a form a music,and a attitude,for what you love and what you hate,No matter who you are if you want to play the blues play. some love it, some will hate it and the rest dont give a shit,the topics of who owns the blues or what white singer sounds the blackest is stupid in my opion,i dont care what color you are,or what style of music you play,if i feel it in my soul you have done your job ,theres people in china that play great blues,and other places of the world and theres just as important as any one else.Im poor white and love the blues way better than i can play or sing the blues ,but ill still play cause i want to and so should anybody else that wants to blue is the only color in blues,so i guess you better be blue if you gona play blues,
Last Edited by on Mar 14, 2010 4:36 AM
This reminds me of a Chris Farlowe anecdote, he was chatting one day to an African American singer, who said "Hey, I really like a singer called Chris Farlowe", Farlowe replies, "yeah, that's me!"...only to be told, "No, no, the Chris Farlowe I'm talking about is definitely black"!
When Timi Yuro first released records, everyone assumed the singer was black & male...not a 5ft tall white girl. OK so it's not blues (there have always been a proportion of white singers accepted as capable soul singers...especially in the days before video when all people heard was a voice on the radio - and don't even go there if we are talking about musicians), there will always be landmark voices from the guys who originated a musical form (and maybe proportionally more of them)...but singers today, who can do it justice come from varied ethic backgrounds.
Remember that in the past, decisions of who fell into what category were more politically motivated, some markets were simply closed to performers of the wrong colour.
If you can really hear colours, you need to see a neurologist pronto...you'll probably be tasting sounds next! :-)
Last Edited by on Mar 14, 2010 10:14 AM
I had never heard of Timi Yuro.I am 54,but was exposed to a lot of my parents music.She was an Awesome singer.Why was'nt she BIG in Vegas,or run with the rat pack? She certainly seemed she could run with those likes.
I have never seen the original context of Lomax's remark, but if it was as long ago as I suspect, then he had a point not in socioeconomic/ethnic terms, but in a technical musical sense. It is precisely analogous to learning to handle 3D in second position in order to be a convincing blues harmonica player: blues intonation requires training, the blue thirds/fifths/sevenths, the microtones and the conventions of sliding into and around them. That stuff can give a singer with classical Western training hell if they are learning it later in life. That and the rhythmic subtleties that govern groove and phrasing. Grow up listening to & singing along with it, and anybody can do it: Van Morrison is one of my favorite cases in point, you could pick it up in postwar Belfast if that's what your parents put on the gramophone often enough. In 1955 or 1960, so few whites had mastered those singing approaches that Lomax could make a blanket statement like that and it would be hard to produce evidence to challenge him. A fraction of white southerners could do it, enough exposure/practice, but take U.S. whites as a whole, compared to U.S. blacks as a whole . . . in general, back then whites couldn't, for *technical reasons*.
The socioeconomic issues are another matter and one can discuss them no end; I think of what Muddy Waters said about the potential depth of the blues one can sing/play.
The wife of a friend of mine grew up singing in choir, singing pop & country in bands, considered herself a vocalist in the sense of having a pure instrument, and trying to learn the Thunderbirds' first record gave her fits: the intonation, the timing, the phrasing.
I distinctly recall how African American singing made its way into advertising in the 1970s, hearing a studio singer using Aretha Franklin stylings to sing a jingle about Dr. Pepper on a TV commercial. The substance did not fit the style but they did it anyway and retrospectively I realize it was the mainstreaming and commodifying of something hard-won. A debased form of this process can be seen on American Idol, where Mariah Carey-style high runs and melismata are de rigeur for female contestants, who often have considerable technical mastery of them but do not bring much substance to the party. Yeah, life experience matters, ultimately, once the technique is mastered; but life experience is a moot point without the technique and I suspect Lomax meant something more like that.
Give Mark Dufresne some props as another outstanding singer among harp players, Tommy Dardar too.
Some of the guys referenced: Tad, Sugar Ray, Harman (he uses space well too) are pretty soulful guys. Are their white guys that can compare to say: Freddy King? Perhaps not. My favorite singer and musical find of the past 25 years (not a harp player but I actually like to model singers in my playing to the best of my modest abilities) has been Jon Cleary who is a revered Orleans guy that is originally from England. His life seems to be a serial tour with Bonnie Raitt, Taj Mahal. John Scofield, etc. He is used for his hot vocals, piano, and song writing: here is an address to some videos: http://www.joncleary.com/av/index.htm This guy has verve!!. Another really interesting English singer is (talk about gravel) is a guy who often plays with awsome harp blower: Lee Sankey named Ian Siegal: Here is his music page address: http://www.iansiegal.info/pagemanager/templates/music.aspx?articleid=81&zoneid=6. p.s. now if you want to hear the god of nuanced singers look up Andy Bey (non white) ---------- Myspace: dennis moriarty
Ben Henandez plays some harp and is a soulful blues singer. Kim Wilson is good, but sometimes he overdoes the melisma a bit too much to these ears. I like Mischo too - I think he's a fine singer.
Away from harp players, I think the late Sean Costello had it in spades. Ian Siegal has it too - an ability to communicate the lyrics. And in more of a Sam Cooke soul vein, James Hunter is brilliant imho.
Last Edited by on Mar 14, 2010 11:08 AM
It would be hard to say who my favorite living blues singer/harp player is but certainly one of them is Kim Wilson. He's a great blues singer and he's white. But yes, I agree that not many white singers can sing the blues as well as the great black bluesmen and women.
Last Edited by on Mar 14, 2010 11:24 AM
I dig Guy. Tops my list of best live performances and can belt it out (voice and harp). Triggered my wanting to pick up harmonica. Songs with substance. Here is a small sample. To many good ones to choose from on YouTube (check them out).
"If you can really hear colours, you need to see a neurologist pronto...you'll probably be tasting sounds next!" 5F6H
Actually, it's called synesthesia, and some people actually have it. :)
Of course, your point is that being able to sound a certain way has no relationship to the color of your skin. I agree with you, except to the extent that culture influences music.
One thing you need to remember, blues still is originally black music, and black vocalists, just like black musicians playing their instruments, phrase largely off the 2 and the 4, NOT the `1 and the 3, which is fine for rock or latin or other white musics, but for most black music, from blues to soul, R&B, gospel, etc., the vocals are phrased largely off the 2 and the 4, which is where the snare drum hits and that's basically the black music groove in a nutshell, something most white musicians pay VERY LITTLE attention to. ---------- Sincerely, Barbeque Bob Maglinte Boston, MA http://www.barbequebob.com CD available at http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/bbmaglinte
"But yes, I agree that not many white singers can sing the blues as well as the great black bluesmen and women."
And indeed many black people aren't great singers even if they are great instrumentalists or lyricists. Little Walter, Jerry McCain, Albert Collins, Jody Williams, Albert King, Jimmy Rogers and many others were great bluesmen but weak (or weaker) vocalists when contrasted with Freddie King, B.B. King, Muddy waters, Otis Spann and others. In the case of guys like Albert Collins, they developed a vocal style that really worked within their own limitations, but it was his guitar, lyrics and sense of wry humor that made him great - not his pipes.
So basically the whole debate is wrongheaded. Some black people are great singers and some white people are great singers - and many are not, regardless of skin color. I wouldn't necessarily say that people who announce that white people can't sing the blues are racists - just uninformed about the breadth of the blues. They probably have only heard B.B. and Freddie.
Last Edited by on Mar 14, 2010 1:52 PM
I know that there was and are good black instumentalists who were/are poor singers. One example would be Big Walter Horton who was one of the greatest harp players of all time but a poor singer. Another example would be James Cotton who's still a great harp player but his voice is now totally shot. And there are many white blues musicians who are good singers. But I have seen many white blues bands at festivals, clubs, bars, etc. who have a lackluster (white) singer. I didn't mean to imply that white people can't sing the the blues. There are many examples of ones who can: Charlie Musselwhite, Kim Wilson, Mose Allison, Greg Allman, Peter Green, etc. But there are many white blues musicians who need to work on their singing. I like to play blues harp but I know I can't sing so I don't. I have a nephew who is a really good blues guitar player. He and his band have been at the IBC competition at Memphis twice. It's probably his singing that kept him from winning first place. ( I hope he's not reading this but one of these days I need to tell him.)
Last Edited by on Mar 14, 2010 3:15 PM
Following this topic, I did little research on white guys singing the blues, and I found this one I'd like to share : 1. because he CAN sing the blues and 2. because the vid is great. I saw Jeff Healey live some 20 years ago, and this brings back memories of his incredible playing.
Other great white blues singers, I would say Bob Hite, Don Van Vliet, Janis Joplin and Watermelon Slim. But I don't think skin color is relevant, if you can sing, you should be able to sing the blues if you want it.
Last Edited by on Mar 14, 2010 3:24 PM
Greg Allman and Joe Cocker. Also, Willy DeVille, but he is more R&B than blues. But, IMHO, Janis Joplin isn't much of a vocalist, and certainly can't be classified as a great blues singer.
Sorry guys, I checked out all the examples and none of the white guys have it. Pretty much only the bottom of the barrel black singers are comparable to the best white singers (in the blues, and to a lesser degree most musical genres).
For some reason it doesn't seem to particularly matter for women though as many white women have very powerful voices.
Did someone mention Janis Joplin? I can't resist posting this video. If you haven't seen this performance at the Monterey Pop Festival in 1967, you haven't seen Janis at her very best. I get chills every time I see it. She was a great blues singer, I don't care what anyone says.
While pondering this topic, Joseph Campbell came to mind. Specifically, A lecture where he speaks of his first rock concert... I believe this gets to the root of the matter. As for the source of the 'Blues', or whatever it is that is functioning in place of... in Concert with the Audience. At some point in time, common 'White Man' may have lost, at least in part, a connection to the state of Mind/Soul/Source which Joseph Campbell speaks. The issue seems to have corrected itself.
Sorry guys, I checked out all the examples and none of the white guys have it. Pretty much only the bottom of the barrel black singers are comparable to the best white singers (in the blues, and to a lesser degree most musical genres).
EV630: I want to get one of those mic's. I also agree with you.
In my opinion, opinions are:
–noun 1.a belief or judgment that rests on grounds insufficient to produce complete certainty. 2.a personal view, attitude, or appraisal. emphasis on personal.
There are those that sit naked in front of their PC's getting off on stoking the flames so to speak (called Trolls) At the end of the day, at best, if we ignore it, all there is is a greasy spot on a chair.
I know, sick. I also can't sing worth a damn. Must be the Native American/Irish + 1/2 Italian in me.
Need to refill my wine glass and blow some annoying harp. Will regret posting this when the buzz wears off.... Can't wait to meet some of you at the Hill Country Harmonica!
Last Edited by on Mar 13, 2010 10:48 AM