What is Blues?

Subject: RE: What is Blues?
From: Steve Latimer
Date: 28 Mar 00 - 02:34 PM

Does anyone else feel that there is a very close connection between blues and Bluegrass? I find they often deal with the same subject matter and some songs cross over (Sitting On Top Of The World springs to mind). I love both styles of music.

Subject: RE: What is Blues?
From: Fortunato
Date: 28 Mar 00 - 02:39 PM

whistlestop. You're right. The zen approach is no panacea. In the company of folks who emphasize form I put forward experential learning. I would as willingly emphasize form where needed. How else could we have so much fun talking about it? My true feeling is we must indeed beware of mistaking, as someone quoted John Lennon as saying, the diagram for the chair. Life brings us the emotional content, and the blues brings us the musical framework to express it's experiences in an unparalleled way. I love 'em.

Regards, Fortunato

Subject: RE: What is Blues?
From: Whistle Stop
Date: 28 Mar 00 - 02:49 PM

Well said, Fortunato. I didn't want to neglect the content by focusing on the form; both are essential elements.

Steve, I absolutely agree that bluegrass is closely connected to the blues. People tend to recognize that jazz has blues roots, and that rock'n'roll has blues roots, but I think a lot of folks don't recognize the influence the blues has had on other musics -- including bluegrass, and really on a lot of country music.

One thing that's great about all the cross-pollenation that has gone on between "white" musics and "black" musics over the years is that it has fostered respect and understanding among the people making the music -- who otherwise might not have had a way to relate to one another. And, as the music has been disseminated from musicians to audiences, so has some of the respect and understanding. The process isn't complete, or course, but I think the blending of musical forms has been a tremendous force for social good (on top of the intrinsic value of the music itself, of course).

Subject: RE: What is Blues?
From: Steve Latimer
Date: 28 Mar 00 - 03:05 PM

Whistle Stop, I forgot about the connection. Apparently Hank Williams learned to play from a black street musician, Willie Nelson is heavily influenced by Texas Blues and Old George Jones sure had the blues feel.

Subject: RE: What is Blues?
From: northfolk/al cholger
Date: 28 Mar 00 - 04:51 PM

You've got to suffer, if you want to sing the blues... it could be argued (maybe it already has) that blues is a traditional music that evolved out of a shared experience specific to the Afro-American community... I've heard it said that the blues may not have been born in East St. Louis, Illinois...but that is where her mother got pregnant... tough people, tough places, tough times, a faustian bargain...pretty quick you got some blues.

Subject: RE: What is Blues?
From: GUEST,TTCM
Date: 28 Mar 00 - 05:36 PM

Blues Lesson 404

Most blues begins 'woke up this morning.''

I got a good woman' is a bad way to begin the blues, unless you stick something nasty in the next line: I got a good woman--''with the meanest dog in town''.

Blues are simple. After you have the first line right, repeat it. Then find something that rhymes. Sort of: ''Got a good woman with the meanest dog in town. He got teeth like Margaret Thatcher and he weighs about 500 pounds.''

The blues are not about limitless choice. Blues cars are Chevies and Cadillacs. Other acceptable blues transportation is Greyhound bus or a southbound train.

Walkin' plays a major part in the blues lifestyle. So does fixin' to die.

Teenagers can't sing the blues.

Adults sing the blues.

Blues adulthood means old enough to get the electric chair if you shoot a man in Memphis. You can have the blues in New York City, but not in Brooklyn or Queens. Hard times in Vermont or North Dakota are just a depression. Chicago, St. Louis and Kansas City are still the best places to have the blues.


The following colors do not belong in the blues: violet, beige, and mauve.

You can't have the blues in an office or a shopping mall; the lighting is all wrong.

Good places for the Blues: the highway, the jailhouse, the empty bed.

Bad places: Ashrams Gallery opening weekend in the Hamptons. No one will believe it's the blues if you wear a suit, unless you happen to be an old black man.

Do you have the right to sing the blues?

Yes, if: your first name is a southern state--like Georgia..or..you're blind you shot a man in Memphis....or you can't be satisfied.

No, if: you were once blind but now can see; You're deaf but you have a trust fund.


Neither Julio Iglesias nor Barbra Streisand can sing the blues.

If you ask for water and baby gives you gasoline, it's the blues.

Other blues beverages are: wine, Irish whiskey, muddy water.

Blues beverages are NOT: Any mixed drink and any wine kosher for Passover.

If it occurs in a cheap motel or a shotgun shack, it is a blues death. Stabbed in the back by a jealous lover is a blues way to die. So is the electric chair, substance abuse, or being denied treatment in an emergency room.

It is not a blues death, if you die during a liposuction treatment.

Some Blues names for Women: Sadie, Big Mama, Bessie.

Some Blues Names for Men: Joe, Willie, Little Willie, Lightning.

Persons with names like Sierra or Sequoia will not be permitted to sing the blues no matter how many men they shoot in Memphis.

Other Blues Names: Name of Physical infirmity (Blind, Cripple, Asthmatic); First name (see above) or name of fruit (Lemon, Lime, Kiwi); Last Name of President (Jefferson, Johnson, Fillmore, etc.


...so does that about answer your question, Shambles?






TTCM
--the other clique on Mudcat--

Subject: RE: What is Blues?
From: GUEST,Keb Mo
Date: 28 Mar 00 - 08:51 PM

I, am the Blues.

Subject: RE: What is Blues?
From: Caitrin
Date: 28 Mar 00 - 09:37 PM

*L* TTCM, that's hilarious! (It almost makes me want to change my name to Blind Kiwi Jefferson.)

Subject: RE: What is Blues?
From: Lady McMoo
Date: 29 Mar 00 - 02:36 AM

Excellent TTCM!

mcmoo

Subject: RE: What is Blues?
From: bseed(charleskratz)
Date: 29 Mar 00 - 03:31 AM

TTCM's posting has appeared in the Mudcat at least twice--I believe I was the first to post it, but it wasn't original with me, either. I got it from one of the people I play music with regularly, a couple of years ago. (speaking of TTCM, if he waddles and quacks, he's a duck)

About a year ago I started a thread wondering about the African origins of the blues, specifically about the classic 12 bar structure and the poetic structure, and it seemed to disappear about the time I had my first major hard drive crash and was off line for a while--it never seemed to go in the direction I was hoping: has any African ethnomusicologist found purely African origins for the harmonic and poetic structures we know of as the blues?

Another thing: whistlestop is right regarding the major/minor aspect of blues: while the rhythm instruments are playing major chords and dominant seventh chords, the lead instrument--guitar, voice, harmonica, trumpet, sax, whatever, or right hand over rhythm left hand on the piano--is playing minor runs. The lead figures for blues on guitar are minor: when the rhythm guitarist plays E-A7-E-E7-A7-A7-E-E-B7-A7-E-B7, the lead guitarist is working on runs built on the Eminor scale--or a pentatonic or hexatonic version of it. Of course, the flatted seventh of the IV7 chord (A7 in E) is the flatted third of the key scale, that is, the note that makes a scale minor.

Still one more thing: while blues and bluegrass share a lot, there is one place where they intersect little--bluegrass, like most music based on European traditions, is essentially well-tempered. Bent notes, Scruggs/Keith tuners aside, are not a major part of the bluegrass sound. But blues without choked guitar strings, bent harmonica reeds, voices slurring from one note to another, just ain't the blues.

--seed

Subject: RE: What is Blues?
From: GUEST,Neil Lowe
Date: 29 Mar 00 - 08:11 AM

--seed,

Your post made one of those little "Aha" lights go off in my head.

Your quote "...the flatted seventh of the IV7 chord (A7 in E) is the flatted third of the key scale, that is, the note that makes a scale minor..." provided a somewhat unrelated bridge to something I had puzzled over.

Some months ago I was working out the rhythm parts to a few Robert Cray tunes from "Some Rainy Morning." And I'm noticing more than a smattering of minor chords in his songs. Now I know that minor chords in blues are not unheard of, but it was more of a departure than I'm accustomed to, as I normally work out in that I-IV7-V7 pattern to which you alluded. It sounds like blues to my ear, but with all these minor chords I'm playing I'm thinking, Damn, this ought to sound more like folk. *BG*

Your comments above dovetailed with my random observations to provide me a coherent explanation of why the minor chords fit so well within the blues structure. That was better than finding a few crumpled dollars in my blue jeans survived the laundry. Thank you.

BTW, M.Ted says when I'm playing a pentatonic scale I only think I'm playing a pentatonic scale. I'm afraid to ask. But you, with your vast knowledge(ahem)and(ahem) adept skills at explaining things so that music theory challenged individuals,(cough,cough)such as myself (hint,hint)....

Regards, Neil (who can kiss up with the best of them when it serves his purposes)

Subject: RE: What is Blues?
From: The Shambles
Date: 29 Mar 00 - 01:05 PM

More words of wisdom on the subject can be found here real blues

Subject: RE: What is Blues?
From: Jim Krause
Date: 29 Mar 00 - 01:45 PM

De blooze ain' nothin' but a good man feelin' bad C7, F, F#dim, C, G7

Subject: RE: What is Blues?
From: GUEST,bseed(charleskratz)
Date: 29 Mar 00 - 03:25 PM

a couple of other notes: the IV7 chord is perhaps the most important in changing a folk harmony into a blues harmony (mentioned in my post above as A7 in E). I7 and V7 are also important, but both are freely used in other folk--and pop--forms without providing a bluesy sound.

There are also some classic blues turnarounds, like /I-I7-IV-IVminor/I-V7- - / and /I-IIdim-IIbdim/Idim/I-V7- - /.

-seed

Subject: RE: What is Blues?
From: Larry Boy
Date: 29 Mar 00 - 04:37 PM

I'm new here in the Cafe. So be gentle with me. By way of intro, I'm a harmonica player, primarily Blues and Jazz. I'm also a student of its history, a collector of early, vintage free reed instruments, as well as an educator. (Not that I give lessons on how to play, rather as a speaker/player at children's venues. I'm always trying to stretch the harp into different musical forms, zydeco, classical, etc. This 'What is Blues' thread is a lot to bite off. First I'd share my observations about a few of the earlier posts. I haven't read them all, some of my opinions may be redundant.

I agree that blues as a musical form is easily recognizable. Technically, one can identify the flatted notes in a blues scale and viola, its the blues.

Do disputes and definitions that divide folk music not exist with the blues? Au Contrair (sp?) witness a subscription to Blues-L, a List Service where only blues is discussed ad infinitum, ad nauseum. The hair splitting of what is, or is not blues, is like splitting an atom, and just as explosive. Difficulties arise where "true blues" overlap with other forms such as jazz, country, rock, and pop.

Is Blues Folk music? I think so, certainly in its origin. I think folk music is music of the people, until it becomes music of 'the industry'. To me folk music is when people decide what they want to play or listen to. Folk (and Blues and everything else) loses its vitality when the industry decides what will be played and listened to.

Caitrin............You nailed it. Blues has more to do with the feeling that inspired the music, and the feeling it leaves the listener with than with any specifics.

Who is to say that every "country" song about unrequited love is not blues. It may not meet the technical requiremnets of certain flatted notes, but the feeling is exactly the same.

Many posters, question whether we are talking about the musical form or the emotion involved. I'm not sure you can separate the two. Either one qualifies as blues.

Well that's it for my first official post. (I sent one earlier as a guest)

Subject: RE: What is Blues?
From: M. Ted (inactive)
Date: 31 Mar 00 - 11:13 AM

Neil,

You sure know how to kiss up, and for that, you will get what you wanted!!

First, before I start, I am going to give my example in the Key of C, though it is not the most common Blues key, because it has no sharps or flats, so it is easier to see what is happening--

At first glance, it seems like a no brainer--you are playing a pentatonic scale, because you are jamming away on a scale that includes nothing but C-Eb-F-G-Bb (C)--the only thing is that you are playing this over a C chord, which has an E in it, which makes six notes, not five--and, when you think about it, you occasionally drop the E into the lead--

And, before you decide to just fudge and say you are alternating between two pentatonic scales--remember that you are also playing over an F chord and a G7, which include all the other notes in the diatonic scale, even the B which you thought you had replaced with a Bb--

So, instead of using a five notes, you are using, at minimum, the C diatonic scale, C-D-E-F-G-A-B-C, plus Eb and Bb, giving you a nine note scale!!!!

And there is another note that you could stick in if you want a really hip, Delta sound--the flatted fifth or raised fourth(I have never figured out which one it really is)--

Anyway, this is what makes the blues so cool--you can play what seems to be a very simple part-but the music is polyrhythmic and polyphonic and all these simple piece interweave to make something very intricate--

Subject: RE: What is Blues?
From: GUEST,Neil Lowe
Date: 31 Mar 00 - 11:30 AM

M.Ted...

As usual, you deliver the goods -- in spades. Thanks. Have a bluesy weekend (I mean that in the best possible way)...

Regards, Neil

Subject: RE: What is Blues?
From: M. Ted (inactive)
Date: 31 Mar 00 - 12:26 PM

I am glad that you think so highly of my explanations, such as they are--now you've got me in a "blues frame of mind"--not so good because I a trying to write something Latin concerning Elian Gonzales--though when you think about it, the Blues and salsa can be very close--*if* get the groove!! Maybe I will try writing "coplas"!!

Subject: RE: What is Blues?
From: The Shambles
Date: 31 Mar 00 - 01:32 PM

A very warm welcome to Larry Boy. Look forward to hearing more from you. Thank you for answering the question about disputes and definitions on blues discussion groups.

I don't think that was not the answer I wanted to hear though.

Subject: RE: What is Blues?
From: Steve Latimer
Date: 31 Mar 00 - 02:10 PM

Another welcome to Larry Boy. Looking forward to hearing more from you.

Subject: RE: What is Blues?
From: The Shambles
Date: 31 Mar 00 - 04:25 PM

Larry Boy, I hope you make more sense than my last post, which should have read: "I don't think that was the answer I wanted to hear though".

Subject: RE: What is Blues?
From: Marion
Date: 19 Jan 03 - 01:20 AM

I've been listening recently to Rev. Gary Davis, who I thought was a bluesman, but some of his stuff (Hesitation Blues, Right Now, I Didn't Want to Join the Band) sound more ragtimey/Travis-picky than bluesy to me.

Do you (gentle readers who know the songs I mean and are into blues) consider these to be blues songs? Are ragtime and blues more closely linked than I thought - or did Rev. Davis just happen to go back and forth between them?

Another song I'm wondering about is Merle Travis' "Re-enlistment Blues". I'm not surprised that it sounds Travis-picky, but again it sounds more country than blues to me (although it does have a 12-bar progression, if not other blues conventions). Do you think it's called a blues because of the subject matter rather than the musical elements?

M.Ted posted above:

" The blue note, or notes, (because there are several tasty little intervals that you can bend) open up a different world when you understand the simple tricks that dictate the way they are used--

And of course, the blues bass figures, which seem to have re-defined all of popular music-- "

By "blues bass figures", you mean alternating between a major and sixth chord, or between a major and sixth and seventh chord, right?

And just how simple are these blue note tricks?

Cough cough ahem ahem hint hint,

Marion

Subject: RE: What is Blues?
From: Azizi
Date: 29 Dec 04 - 10:05 PM

Greetings!
I found this fascinating discussion about the blues while wandering through old Mudcat threads.

After reading this thread I am even more convinced that middle schools, high schools, and university educators are missing out on a tremendous learning opportunity if they do not consider Internet posts as literary products and if they do not incorporate into their curriculums course materials on "the art of blogging". It seems to me that posts from Internet discussion forums such as Mudcat should be used as resource material for such classes as English, Music, Sociology, and History and more. In these classes students could be encouraged to consider the insights and information given by various posters, as well as the way the posters write.

Quite a vew of the posts in this thread are proof of the fact that it's not just what you say but the way you say it. For example, on March 29, 2000, northfolk/al cholger wrote:

" I've heard it said that the blues may not have been born in East St. Louis, Illinois...but that is where her mother got pregnant"...

And on that same day we find the wonderfully tongue-in cheek definition of blues that was submitted by TTCM [and previously by another poster?].

Posts like these deserve to be studied. Discussions like these deserve to be discussed.
---

That being said, my purpose for writing here [besides a desire to
re-introduce a thread on the subject of blues] is to respond to bseed's question posed on March 29, 2000:

"...has any African ethnomusicologist found purely African origins for the harmonic and poetic structures we know of as the blues?"

I have just had the pleasure of reading Samuel Charters' book
"The Roots Of The Blues, An African Search" {Boston, Marion Boyars Publishers, 1981}. Charters' book is about his experiences with the jalis {griots} of The Gambia, West Africa. Here is a brief excerpt from the back cover:

"This book details and analyzes the meeting between a Westerner and a thriving culture new to him. It reveals Charters' remarkable analytical talent in discussing African folk music and its relationship with American blues...His extensive quotations of lyrics from songs and wonderful photographs of the musicians make this a unique contibution to our understanding if a culture and its music."

end of quote

There is probably a lot of information on the Internet on this topic, but [in addition to those resources] I highly recommend this book for those who still like to do some things the old fashioned way...

Subject: RE: What is Blues?
From: TinDor
Date: 02 Sep 09 - 11:11 AM

Marion wrote:

"I've been listening recently to Rev. Gary Davis, who I thought was a bluesman, but some of his stuff (Hesitation Blues, Right Now, I Didn't Want to Join the Band) sound more ragtimey/Travis-picky than bluesy to me.

Do you (gentle readers who know the songs I mean and are into blues) consider these to be blues songs? Are ragtime and blues more closely linked than I thought - or did Rev. Davis just happen to go back and forth between them?"




Yeah, it's "East Coast BLues" or "Ragtime Blues". I consider it Blues because that's what it is. Infact, I would group acoustic Blues into 3 types that most are familiar with in this fashion....



Delta = riffs like the type you get in Rock music (Led Zeppelin, Cream, Black Sabbath, Hendrix etc..). "Dark" or "Sad" sounding

Mississippi Hill Country = hypnotic/trance like/chugging

East Coast = fingerpicking with a "happy" sound

.
.
.




Marion write:

"Another song I'm wondering about is Merle Travis' "Re-enlistment Blues". I'm not surprised that it sounds Travis-picky, but again it sounds more country than blues to me (although it does have a 12-bar progression, if not other blues conventions). Do you think it's called a blues because of the subject matter rather than the musical elements?"

That could just me the name of the song more than it relating to any specific genre of music (Blues in this case) although (someone can correct me if Im wrong), the Merle Travis/ModernCountry finger pickers seem to have picked up the fingerpicking styles from Blues players with the "East Coast" sound.

Subject: RE: What is Blues?
From: Richie
Date: 02 Sep 09 - 02:53 PM

Hi,

Blues bass figures usual refer to a boogie pattern: 1 3 5 6 b7

There are also minor patterns. There are literally hundreds of differnt bass patterns.

Blues notes or blue notes refer to the chromatic noted in the scale usually the b3 or b5 but any note that lead to a chord tone can be a blue note.

There are 12 bar, 16 bar and 8 bar patterns and even some irregular patterns. Robert Johnson and many older blues players used irregular measures and patterns.

A "blues" song could be anything really. The white blues from the mountains refers to songs by artists like Dock Boggs and has nothing to do with 12 bar blues.

Richie

Subject: RE: What is Blues?
From: olddude
Date: 02 Sep 09 - 03:59 PM

One of my friends told me once and I thought it was a good one
"The blues is just a good man or woman feeling bad in song"

I liked that actually

Subject: RE: What is Blues?
From: Amos
Date: 02 Sep 09 - 04:45 PM

The blues is JUST like being able to afford a yacht. If you have to ask, you wouldn't understand....


A

Subject: RE: What is Blues?
From: Folknacious
Date: 02 Sep 09 - 04:46 PM

In recent years it has become quite fashionable to refer to musics from other cultures that carry the same feeling/ content/ origins as blues as "the xxxx blues". So what Ali Farke Toure plays is called "desert blues", and rembetika from Greece is called "the Greek blues" and portuguese fado is "Portuguese blues". Is this just journalists etc being lazy, everything getting cuturally American-centric, or does it make real sense?

Subject: RE: What is Blues?
From: GUEST,TJ in San Diego
Date: 02 Sep 09 - 05:22 PM

One old cornet player I met years ago said, "If you have to ask what they are, you likely don't have them." That's good enough for me. I recall another musician who once identified disco music as "rhythm and blues for people who have neither."

Subject: RE: What is Blues?
From: TinDor
Date: 02 Sep 09 - 08:07 PM

Richie wrote:

"A "blues" song could be anything really. The white blues from the mountains refers to songs by artists like Dock Boggs and has nothing to do with 12 bar blues"

What they call "white mountain blues" is/was basically white countryish musicians that were influenced from blues and other black venacular music colorings more than the actual structure "12 bar blues". Frank Hutchison, Doc Boggs,Riley Puckett, Jimmie Rodgers etc..



.
.
.
.
.

Folknacious wrote:

"In recent years it has become quite fashionable to refer to musics from other cultures that carry the same feeling/ content/ origins as blues as "the xxxx blues". So what Ali Farke Toure plays is called "desert blues", and rembetika from Greece is called "the Greek blues" and portuguese fado is "Portuguese blues". Is this just journalists etc being lazy, everything getting cuturally American-centric, or does it make real sense?"


I think there is an obvious link between the music of the Sahel/Griot Africa, which is what is often refered to as "Desert BLues". I remember reading an interview where Ali Fourka Toure said that when he first heard John Lee Hooker, he thought it was music from Mali and wondered where Hooker got this music from.