Taj Mahal and The Copper Family

Subject: Taj Mahal and The Copper Family
From: Nick
Date: 01 Mar 08 - 07:08 AM

I'm currently reading Joe Boyd's book "White bicycles - making music in the 1960s" and came across the following anecdote.

Commenting on how people found his (Joe Boyd's) love of traditional music eccentric and that they would greet offerings of CDs of Fairport - Norma Waterson - Richard Thompson with little smiles and nods while getting effusive thanks for Ry Cooder etc ones, he told the story of Tak Mahal coming to Radio 2 Folk on Two award in 2000.

I quote:

"The folk-averse love Taj as a paragon of blues authenticity, but that night he was hitting my arm and making faces of astonished delight as the Copper Family sang their unaccompanied harmonies. Taj recognised soulful music when he heard it. For the grand finale, when the Coppers were joined by the Watersons, John Tams, Eliza Carthy and Kate Rusby and the rest of the English folk establishment, you couldn't keep Taj in his seat. He quickly learned the chorus and his gruff baritone boomed out amid the English voices on 'Thousands Or More'... his grin testified to the pleasure that evening's music gave him. Perhaps it's easier for foreigners"

Subject: RE: Taj Mahal and The Copper Family
From: GUEST,Derek Schofield
Date: 01 Mar 08 - 07:12 AM

and afterwards, I got a photo of Bob Copper and Taj Mahal together!
Derek Schofield

Subject: RE: Taj Mahal and The Copper Family
From: Tweed
Date: 01 Mar 08 - 08:37 AM

Odd that this story laid dormant for seven years.

Thanks for telling it Nick and thanks Derek for popping it up outta the archives as a lot of people must've missed it the first time around. Taj Mahal is probably America's premier blues/all-aroundminstrel/roots musician but gets little to zero radio play over here and not much media recognition of any sort for some weird reason despite legions of underground fans of his music. I will never understand why this is.

Subject: RE: Taj Mahal and The Copper Family
From: BanjoRay
Date: 01 Mar 08 - 08:54 AM

And he's a great banjo player....

Subject: RE: Taj Mahal and The Copper Family
From: Tweed
Date: 01 Mar 08 - 10:17 AM

...and piano player, kalimba player, guitar player, harmonica player, singer, songwriter, story teller extraordinaire...Yaz, Taj is the real thing and the real shit.

Subject: RE: Taj Mahal and The Copper Family
From: Splott Man
Date: 03 Mar 08 - 04:25 AM

Johnnie Walker played Taj Mahal while he was sitting in for Wogan on BBC Radio 2 last week.

Subject: RE: Taj Mahal and The Copper Family
From: PoppaGator
Date: 03 Mar 08 - 05:52 PM

Taj may suffer from being so versatile and difficult to "pigeonhole" in one category or another. Is he folk-blues? Blues-rock? Pop? He may be a little too slick and commercial for folks to consider him in the same light as the nearly-forgotten backwoods blues artists on the Fat Possum label, but on the other hand, he's probably too down-home and funky to be categorized with the really commercial blues-rockers

Also, he's a whole generation younger than the original "old blues guys," but not as young as the bunch of neo-bluesmen that includes Robert Cray, Keb Mo, Chris Thomas King, etc.

Whatever, I've been a big fan since his first LP came out back when I was a college kid, in about 1968 or so, and have had several opportunities to catch his act live here in New Orleans in recent years, at Tip's and also out at the Fair Grounds during Jazzfest. Great player and singer, really great stage presence.

Subject: RE: Taj Mahal and The Copper Family
From: irishenglish
Date: 03 Mar 08 - 06:01 PM

Reminds me of David Lindley's reaction upon hearing Brass Monkey for the first time at, I believe Cambridge Folk Festival. Apparently he said something like, This is going to be a great band, just look at the instrumentation! I'm paraphrasing, but that story was on the notes to the first two BM albums, combined on to one CD some years back.

Subject: RE: Taj Mahal and The Copper Family
From: Nick
Date: 03 Mar 08 - 06:05 PM

I originally heard of him on a CBS sampler album called Rock Machine Turns You On in about 1968 playing Statesboro Blues and subsequently used to play that and Diving Duck Blues in a band I played in in about 1970.

As an aside it's a good sampler and encouraged us to buy five of the full albums afterwards-
1. I'll Be Your Baby Tonight - Dylan, Bob
2. Can't Be So Bad - Moby Grape
3. Fresh Garbage - Spirit (1)
4. I Won't Leave My Wooden Wife For You Sugar - United States Of America
5. Time Of The Season - Zombies
6. Turn On A Friend - Peanut Butter Conspiracy
7. Sisters Of Mercy - Cohen, Leonard
8. My Days Are Numbered - Blood Sweat & Tears
9. Dolphins Smile - Byrds (1)
10. Statesboro Blues - Taj Mahal
11. Killing Floor - Electric Flag
12. Nobody's Got Any Money In The Summer - Harper, Roy
13. Flames - Gantry, Elmer & Velvet Opera
14. Come Away Melinda - Rose, Tim

Subject: RE: Taj Mahal and The Copper Family
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 03 Mar 08 - 07:12 PM

Here he is singing Leadbelly's Bourgeois Blues

Subject: RE: Taj Mahal and The Copper Family
From: GUEST,Ralphie
Date: 04 Mar 08 - 05:21 AM

I was honoured to get the chance to record Taj and Toumani Diabate a few years ago for the Beeb.
Due to problems with flights from Mali, we didn't start until midnight.
But, what joy to hear the fusion of US blues, and it's origins from Africa.
Finished at silly o'clock, with huge grins all round.
Now thats what I call a good day job.
Ralphie

Subject: RE: Taj Mahal and The Copper Family
From: nutty
Date: 04 Mar 08 - 07:40 AM

Bob Copper (that wonderful old man) always stressed his wide musical tastes and (Please correct me if I'm wrong) I seem to remember him saying that he enjoyed playing blues on guitar in his younger days.
Certainly he could never be dragged away if there was a gospel song being sung anywhere near him.

Subject: RE: Taj Mahal and The Copper Family
From: Nick
Date: 04 Mar 08 - 07:47 AM

The part of the quote from the book that I left out was exactly about thier mutual love of blues - Bob Copper and Taj Mahal swapping record collecting anecdotes as BC had sent away for 78s of Sleepy John Estes, Big Bill Broonzy etc

Subject: RE: Taj Mahal and The Copper Family
From: GUEST,DaveH
Date: 04 Mar 08 - 08:06 AM

You can hear the mighty Bob C singing Diving Duck Blues on the re-released version of the Unruly CD by the English Country Blues Band

Subject: RE: Taj Mahal and The Copper Family
From: GUEST,Jonny Sunshine
Date: 04 Mar 08 - 01:01 PM

Damn, when I saw the thread title I thought there was some collaboration on the horizon.. Now that would be worth hearing!

Subject: RE: Taj Mahal and The Copper Family
From: GUEST,Jon Dudley
Date: 04 Mar 08 - 02:05 PM

Bob thoroughly enjoyed an all-too-brief chat with 'Tadge' as he called him at the BBC2 Folk Awards, but long enough to relate his own 'discovery' of American blues in pre-war England. He'd bought a box of second hand 78s in Brighton attracted by the unusual names and titles. Listening to Sleepy John Estes singing Married Woman Blues and Drop down Mama later that day on his wind-up Columbia gramophone influenced his musical interests for the rest of his life and he became a devoted blues fan until the day he died. At his memorial we played Son House's Death Letter not for any morbid reason or clumsy sense of aligning it to the recent event, but simply because it was his favourite blues.