Anyone hear like blues?

Leroy Carr and Scrapper Blackwell, from around 1928. Along with Brownie and Sonny, arguably the best blues duo ever.

Here's another:

speaking of bo diddley, one of his sidemen, the jester who threw in the one liners, has one of the great dozens lines, "if brains was dynamite, you wouldn't have enough to blow your nose" (might have been on "Say, Man").

Taj Mahal, one of the urban kids who looked back to the blues in the 60s, honed his chops at that noted hotbed of authentic blues UMass, during the week, playing in Cambridge on the weekends. Ry Cooder on lead slide, I think.

Great tune, Jack, and nice commentary to go along with it.

thanks, L.

Talkin bout Ry Cooder, here's one of his classic slide compositions:

A classic blues tune, covered by many artists in a variety of styles. But the best style is always blues:

Champion Jack Dupree was a Nawlins boy, born in 1908, who grew up in an orphanage for colored boys there. He taught himself to play piano, and later learned how to play a respectable guitar from Scrapper Blackwell, in Indianapolis.

Encouraged by Joe Louis in Detroit, he became a boxer, and fought over 100 matches, winning the golden glove award and other championships. Hence the "champion" nickname.

He served in WWII and was a Japanese POW for two years. Prior to the war, he recorded a number of classic blues tunes, such as "Junker's Blues," in 1940. Fats Domino reworked this tune into a huge hit of his own, in 1949, calling it "the Fat Man."

Dupree was an early rocker. Jerry Lee Lewis took inspiration from this tune of his from 1952, as well as Big Maybelle, of course, in his "whole lotta shakin."

Chuck Berry, the proto rock and roller, doin a straight blues tune like ones he had been doing for years with Johnnie Johnson at the Cosmo Club in East Saint Louis (Illinois), before he headed to chess records in Chicago.

Chuck covering the classic Big Maceo and Tampa Red composition from the '40s, "Worried Wife Blues."

The Stones stealing a Buster Brown riff for one of their early blues compositions, from 1965:

The fat boy, with his long-time homey, Dave Bartholomew, on horns.

I aint got no clue why they call that "blues." It aint nuthin but jazz, eh?

Now, here's some blues, with Sonny Terry playin a "Mississippi saxophone:"

"Blues" is a big buffet table of different styles and flavors. While the back country delta style is the wellspring, instrumental performances can be blues, just like amplified blues played by white guys can be. The shared musical structure and the harmonic progressions are there for all to see. Sometimes after our band has been playing a lot of jazz standards and bebop tunes someone will call a blues and you can see the audience reaction — they know it's blues.

Straight-up blues from the Stones, recorded almost 30 years ago:

When a woman....gets dissatisfied
She hang her head, and cry.
When a man gets dissatisfied
He flag a train, and ride

I gots me seven hundred dollars...
now don't you mess with me....



The great McKinley Morganfield, eh?