Guitar
I've been working on Blind Lemon Jefferson's "One Dime Blues." It is a solo guitar/vocal performance recorded in Texas in 1927.
For quite a few years I've had a Stefan Grossman transcription book called Texas Blues
, with tunes by Jefferson, Mance Lipscomb, Little Hat Jones and others. I learned out tune out of it when I was a teenager, "Bad Luck Blues" which has become transmogrified over the years.
Lately I've been focusing on Blind Lemon Jefferson's music a bit - he's one of my favorite blues performers. His voice is refined, his lyrics are droll, and his guitar playing is top-notch fingerstyle ragtime blues.
After working on the tune for a while, I took a look at versions on YouTube while my right-hand fingertips recovered. There is this excellent interpretation by "Freddie 12 String":
Damn close to note-for-note on the guitar. The vocal less so, unfortunately. But still nice to listen to and great for cribbing fingerings. Etta Baker's modern version, seemingly as famous as the original on the web, is a lovely gloss on the Blind Lemon arrangement, though it lacks the inventiveness of Lemon's performance - his weird little bass lines under the vocal, the use of an alternating root-seventh during the first solo. These little touches, and the almost orchestral use of a single downmarket acoustic guitar, really make Blind Lemon Jefferson's music worth checking out, in my opinion.
- Rory Gallagher Playing A Harmony Stella 12 String
I found this Photo collage attached to Rory Gallagher's version of Peter Green's Leaving Home Blues. \Great Performance of a very cool BLues tune. ...
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Into the great wide-open, a rebel without a clue... I had an interesting revelation last night: I played better (more dynamically and sensitively) when I had had no idea what was going on than when I did. As regular readers know, I host a...
- Coarse Tuners Part 2
As described in an earlier post, I've tried to make a compact set of coarse tuners to go with the fine tuners on my Schaller 456 fine tuning bridge, so I could reduce the headstock and loose the big and heavy traditional tuners. The earlier attempt...
- Experience Hendrix Tour - Sony Centre, Toronto, Oct. 28, 2010 Part 2
Next out was former teenage blues phenom Jonny Lang, now 27. His was one of only two Teles seen that night - almost all of the guitars played were Strats. No one sported a Flying V, and in fact Gibsons were completely absent from the show; no wonder,...
Guitar
Blind Lemon Jefferson, guitar symphonist
I've been working on Blind Lemon Jefferson's "One Dime Blues." It is a solo guitar/vocal performance recorded in Texas in 1927.
For quite a few years I've had a Stefan Grossman transcription book called Texas Blues
, with tunes by Jefferson, Mance Lipscomb, Little Hat Jones and others. I learned out tune out of it when I was a teenager, "Bad Luck Blues" which has become transmogrified over the years.Lately I've been focusing on Blind Lemon Jefferson's music a bit - he's one of my favorite blues performers. His voice is refined, his lyrics are droll, and his guitar playing is top-notch fingerstyle ragtime blues.
After working on the tune for a while, I took a look at versions on YouTube while my right-hand fingertips recovered. There is this excellent interpretation by "Freddie 12 String":
Damn close to note-for-note on the guitar. The vocal less so, unfortunately. But still nice to listen to and great for cribbing fingerings. Etta Baker's modern version, seemingly as famous as the original on the web, is a lovely gloss on the Blind Lemon arrangement, though it lacks the inventiveness of Lemon's performance - his weird little bass lines under the vocal, the use of an alternating root-seventh during the first solo. These little touches, and the almost orchestral use of a single downmarket acoustic guitar, really make Blind Lemon Jefferson's music worth checking out, in my opinion.
- Rory Gallagher Playing A Harmony Stella 12 String
I found this Photo collage attached to Rory Gallagher's version of Peter Green's Leaving Home Blues. \Great Performance of a very cool BLues tune. ...
- Silvertone Danelectro 1457 Guitar W Amp-in-case In Columbia Mo For $400
The seller had this listed as a Silvertone 1487 but I contacted him and he said it is a 1457 with amp-in-case. That is the better model with the 6VGT amp w Tremolo and the guitar has 2 lipstick pickups - a much better player than the 1448. I'ts...
- Comfortably Numb
Into the great wide-open, a rebel without a clue... I had an interesting revelation last night: I played better (more dynamically and sensitively) when I had had no idea what was going on than when I did. As regular readers know, I host a...
- Coarse Tuners Part 2
As described in an earlier post, I've tried to make a compact set of coarse tuners to go with the fine tuners on my Schaller 456 fine tuning bridge, so I could reduce the headstock and loose the big and heavy traditional tuners. The earlier attempt...
- Experience Hendrix Tour - Sony Centre, Toronto, Oct. 28, 2010 Part 2
Next out was former teenage blues phenom Jonny Lang, now 27. His was one of only two Teles seen that night - almost all of the guitars played were Strats. No one sported a Flying V, and in fact Gibsons were completely absent from the show; no wonder,...