oh sheeeit... conjob. your tuggin' on Supermans cape with those responses... some folk here feel pretty strongly about the issue of "free" music. That mightve been a better email than a post... ---------- Kyzer's Travels
well they can tell me what a selfish asshole i am here http://www.modernbluesharmonica.com/board/board_topic/5560960/572787.htm or not download the albums ---------- conjob
thats the thread i was gonna mention. no skin off my head, im as neutral as they come with matters such as this. yep. download em or dont. for me, theres enough on youtube to pacify me as it pertains to his music. ---------- Kyzer's Travels
live at el mocambo is my favorite if your conscience doesn't allow you to use the torrent (a decision which i would have much respect for) ---------- conjob
Last Edited by on Apr 15, 2010 8:31 PM
i don't want this thread to be hijacked, i'll start another one. please direct all discussion that doesnt pertain to which big walter album is the best to the other thread. ---------- conjob
Mike, I'm not sure what's on iTunes. My recommendations would be to buy all the Big Walter albums you can get.
If you only want a few to start with then I'd say get:
Live at the Knickbocker An Offer You Can't Refuse The JOB recordings with Johnny Shines (which has the simply stunning "Evening Sun" on it)
Last Edited by on Apr 15, 2010 10:34 PM
I'll need to see what Itunes offers because most of my BW stuff is on vinyl and there's still stuff that's not on CD or mp3's just yet. ---------- Sincerely, Barbeque Bob Maglinte Boston, MA http://www.barbequebob.com CD available at http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/bbmaglinte
In my opinion Walter is playing softly, with a fairly loose cup on the mic. Then when it comes to the solo he tightens up on the mic to get the mic element to overdrive hard.
I believe many people possibly mistake the tonal variations achieved by good mic technique for "hitting it hard".
When I say hard,I don't mean overly hard. I listened again,and I'm not sure I agree with you yet. I'll have to try it at home. Yes,usually BW plays softly even while playing hard.LOL But that solo's different to me.You can hear him getting rid of air in the solo,he was taxing himself. IMHO
I bought the live one over lunch. He is hard to find on iTunes...there was more on there than I thought...but you have to search under different variations of his name.
Anyways, the first tune blew me away. Great stuff. Will listen as nauseum tonight en route to gig.
I wish I had the chance to play in a more traditionally based Chicago blues band on the side. ----------
On Walking By Myself, he definitely is NOT hitting anything hard at all. To play that solo properly, you definitely need to TB it, especially for the first 4 bars of the solo just to get the accenting right.
He often hit notes very softly and then go back to a more medium breath force, and often times it fools the listener into thinking he's playing really hard, which he seldom ever did.
He often did mess with the way he held the mic, having personally seen him do this tons of times.
What he often does is play so relaxed that the resonating cavity inside of his mouth is incredibly wide open, much like the way an opera singer's throat is and much of this has to do not only with being fully relaxed, but also changing the embouchure and more importantly, the inside shape of the mouth, something the average player NEVER learns how to do.
Mike, not only do you have to look up under different names, but who he was recording with. For me, the mandatory tunes for him are Walking By Myself, Evening Sun by Johnny Shines, his original recording of Easy that was recorded at Sun Studios for the RPM label (and has been reissued on Blues Harmonica Classics by Rhino, his Alligator LP he did just to learn the subtly.
One other thing, all of his diatonics were stock MB's or Old Standby's and they all were tuned to 7LJI so if you are using a harp tuned to ET or comprimise and play the double stops and chordings he uses, it's gonna completely sound different. His use of double stops are a big trademark part of his sound.
Another recording was one that was originally on a Red Lightnin LP, released for a short time on CD, but I believe is out of print now, called An Offer You Can't Refuse, which has him backed only by Robert Nighthawk on guitar, and one of the cuts has him playing acoustic harp and there's some great stuff there, and part of this is pre-Electra records Paul Butterfield with Jerome Arnold and Sam Lay bass and drums (which had been Howlin' Wolf's rhythm section before he snagged them) with Little Smokey Smothers on guitar. If you can find it, get it.
I also have a long out of print LP called King of the Harmonica Players that has some really sweet stuff, including a few totally solo and acoustic and I haven't seen it reissued yet.
There are more places to check out such as Emusic.com or even the new Napster or Rhapsody. I'd also check out CD Universe and Amazon.com as well. If you're looking for his CD's, first place I'd hit is http://www.bluebeatmusic.com. ---------- Sincerely, Barbeque Bob Maglinte Boston, MA http://www.barbequebob.com CD available at http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/bbmaglinte
Last Edited by on Apr 16, 2010 3:12 PM
I believe Joe Filisko put out a complete discography of BW some years back on his custom harp site http://www.customharmonicas.com and his own personal site http://www.joefilisko.com. He's a HUGE Big Walter fan, and when he heard I had some live bootleg cassettes of of BW, he hounded me like hell for them. ---------- Sincerely, Barbeque Bob Maglinte Boston, MA http://www.barbequebob.com CD available at http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/bbmaglinte
