How I first heard Blues
My blues roots in the Chicago suburbs in 1971
When I heard Bukka White I was impressed. It was a form of music called “blues.” I had heard a country bluesman. There were many great songs on that record of country blues that I had bought. It was down at the record store. It might have been “Parchman Farm,” or it might have been where the lyric had been “When will I change my clothes,” which was another song about his penitentiary experience, or it may have been “Shake ‘Em On Down,” which is more like, “ go on, kids. Go ahead an’ dance!!!” ~ but I was exposed to the music by one of the late-night “progressive” radio channels I tuned in to. There they played one of those songs of Bukka’s. A few months later I had taken up the guitar. This was done with some intention of playing a style of folk music, more or less in the Bob Dylan vein, but I am sure I was destined to be trying to play country blues. I just had to take up the blues. I wasn’t just listening to rock: that, too, was music I was listening to.
Well, it wasn’t very hard; and pretty soon I was “the” number one white bluesman in the neighborhood. I was a deep enthusiast, a lost case. I am taking this music serious. Blues is spooky; yet I, sought to tame it. Well, I did pretty good at mimicking this blues if i don’t say do myself! I was playing it OK so I went down to the “Checkerboard Lounge” on the South side but I was shy. The men were aggressive about getting up on the stand. I rarely got to play. Who cares? So—? ~ I listened.
I only ever had a few albums. Not that I played on. That I owned. I seem to have picked my blues albums rather carefully. Quite a few of the old boys didn’t get a chance. I can’t say my turntable never got cold, because I had other sorts of music I liked to play as well, and still not all the time. Not all albums did I buy. The blues fills you head and all you needs are a few records. It’s electrifying. A hallmark of the great cultural reflections of the human experience. The music of the South.
Oh, and if you are thinking of the electric style of blues music, I got around to it also. Electric is alternative. There is electric blues and acoustic blues. I had other albums. Those electrified albums seem to be louder, but really even acoustic blues filled my head. It is spooky and deep. And I had to tame it. Is that what I am saying? Did I get it to lay its head down like a little putty cat? I mean I had to get it under my control. I had play it myself. It counts if I can play it myself. It counts when it comes out of my guitar. You have to watch out, because that’s the blues.
And when you sing, that is call a moan.
It is very deep and painful.
Yet, it is like a river. It’s hard to explain . . .
Well, the blues is very deep. Does y’all hear me?
“The blues style represents . . . a saying of things that are very painful, deep and poignant, with a feeling of ease. In the very best blues the pain changes, because of the music, into something light.”www.alanshapiromusic.net/music-education/why-do-the-blues-make-us-feel-so-good
This was a delightful way to start my day. I love your writing!
"A hallmark of the great cultural reflections of the human experience." I saw images of people and places of a not so long ago past, I wished I had been more apart of!!!
I certaintly am feeling the blues.
Thank-You!!!
The first time I recall noticing the blues was as a young college freshman in Columbus, Ohio. I had grown up in the fifties and sixties in a house of pure classical music. I the late sixties, through FM radio, I listened to rock. In the Navy, I was introduced to country. But, when I entered college, I used to listen to FM radio while studying and writing papers. I distinctly remember being electrified with the first piercing blues notes of Roy Buchanan's "Roy's Blues" album, "Going down to the graveyard!" I was hooked! Nowadays, I am pretty much bored with Rock, and my interests are in Jazz and especially the Blues. Jazz is so alive; and the Blues still electrifies me down to my soul!