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Post by Michael Messer on Feb 20, 2024 15:20:00 GMT
Roy Buchanan was a very deep and soulful musician, and while there are moments of abstract wildness in his playing (you could say the same of Miles Davis and John Coltrane), he was a master and certainly left his mark on many great guitarists, especially Jeff Beck, who was also a great master. His band are really not there to shine, they are there just to create a carpet for Roy to sit on, or maybe jump about on! I hear the band's approach and attitude very much like the Jimi Hendrix Experience, Rory Gallagher's Taste, and maybe even Miles Davis' band on Bitches Brew, of which I am sure Roy was a fan.
I believe that a musician of Buchanan's stature that was in session bands at Chess Studios in the 50s and played with the musicians that eventually became 'The Band' knew exactly what he was doing, and if he had wanted his band to sound like Elmore James' band, or any other band for that matter, he would have hired the people to make that sound.
While on the subject of Elmore James' band - my friend Louisiana Red's wife, Dora Minter, is from Ghana and Elmore's band is her favourite of all the blues bands because.... she said their music made her shake her body like West African bands do!
Now what are you playing on your reso?
Shine On Michael
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Post by bonzo on Feb 20, 2024 15:58:34 GMT
I'm not going on Michael and I agree with you about a band being a carpet and I was also thinking along the lines of Miles and Coltrane et al. I think maybe it's the treatment of this particular song, doesn't sound like there's a lot of emotional engagement going on. Sing a few words and throw in some unrelated guitar pyrotechnics. Nuff sed from me!
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Post by bonzo on Feb 20, 2024 15:59:53 GMT
Ps I am having a bash at can't be satisfied 🙃 🙂🎸
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Post by davetracey on Feb 20, 2024 18:19:00 GMT
I've also been having a go at the Dust My Broom licks over the last day or so. It's one thing playing the riff on the top 4 strings - quite another keeping the rhythm going on the bass string while you do so.
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Post by mrstrellisofnwales on Feb 20, 2024 18:56:21 GMT
I've also been having a go at the Dust My Broom licks over the last day or so. It's one thing playing the riff on the top 4 strings - quite another keeping the rhythm going on the bass string while you do so. Which is what I’ve been trying with the Roy Buchanan piece. I’m not so much listening to it as trying to use it to improve my playing- just as you are I’m guessing. And whether it’s a great track or not is irrelevant to the way I’m using it as a learning vehicle. Even if I could I wouldn’t try to replicate it- just interpret it. Mrs T
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Post by davetracey on Feb 20, 2024 20:08:57 GMT
Mrs T - absolutely!
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Post by snakehips on Feb 20, 2024 21:51:12 GMT
Hi again !
I think the secret to Elmore’s Dust My Broom tupe tunes is getting the shuffle pattern right. He has a cool wee lilt/jump in the beat that I knew I didn’t have right …. Until one day I sussed it out. Also Elmore has this cool thing he does on the chord changes to keep the beat going, while changing chords - which involves the use of letting some D strings ring out (plucked open, rather than fretted), while your fretting hand moves to the next position. It’s actually easier to do than a standard “Status Quo” type shuffle, yet sounds way cooler.
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Post by davetracey on Feb 21, 2024 9:30:18 GMT
snakehips - thanks for the tip. In putting my finger behind the slide to deaden to sound behind the picked notes on the first few strings, my finger covers all the strings - so I am accidentally deadening the two bass strings as well. Not too badly on open D, with the root note being on the 6th sting - but on open G, whenever I l play the 5th G string in counterpoint to the notes I am playing on the 12th fret on the top two, I notice Iv'e inadvertently deadened it.
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Post by Michael Messer on Feb 21, 2024 9:59:00 GMT
What Snakehips says about playing that shuffle is absolutely correct and is something I have done for as long as I can remember, long before I was aware that other players did that. Or maybe I absorbed it without realising I had. In open tunings it makes total sense to hit the root on the changes and it sounds great. Also, a blues shuffle has hardly any connection to what Snakehips is calling a Status Quo shuffle. They are totally different with the accent on the other beat.
If you are playing it as a solo piece you need to build up to actually playing the whole part at the 12th fret. Try playing the shuffle with no chord changes and counting with your playing (and 1 and 2 and 3 and 4...) and going to the 12th on the "one and two and...." back to the shuffle...."3 and 4 and....back to the 12th....etc.
Walk before to run. Just at a steady pace and don't try to be Elmore James until you can co-ordinate playing a one chord shuffle with a lick at the 12th..... When that becomes natural, then try to develop it further.
Just listen to Robert Johnson playing Rambling On My Mind (not the outtake, the proper take, take 1. I've put the track in here) and concentrate on how the guitar part is mathematically divided up between the shuffle and the slide part, and he is occasionally dropping the root into his chord changes too. This is a masterpiece....the tempo, the rhythm, phrasing, pitching....everything is under control.
Shine On Michael
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Post by mrstrellisofnwales on Feb 21, 2024 10:00:23 GMT
Been listening to this for ages and can’t believe I’veonly just thought to give it a go. Gone to Open C and trying to give it a call and respond treatment between the Bass line and the Accordion played high up the neck with the slide. A slide version of the guitar solo needs to go in there when I get the basic song sorted. Mrs T
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Post by bonzo on Feb 21, 2024 10:33:25 GMT
Thanks for posting Mrs T I enjoyed that! 🙂🎸👍👏
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Post by slide496 on Mar 3, 2024 9:35:25 GMT
Added Fred McDowell's Highway 61 based on the Lomax first recording. The vocal separators I use identified the pitch as D# minor so am attempting half step down with F# tuned to F. There may be others where he didn't play that 3rd string that have been misidentified as D major that I might try to find
Also in G Walking Blues and Come on in My Kitchen.
H
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Post by Michael Messer on Mar 3, 2024 10:40:05 GMT
Added Fred McDowell's Highway 61 based on the Lomax first recording. The vocal separators I use identified the pitch as D# minor so am attempting half step down with F# tuned to F. There may be others where he didn't play that 3rd string that have been misidentified as D major that I might try to find Also in G Walking Blues and Come on in My Kitchen. H Hi Harriet, The AI is detecting it as a minor piece of music because there are no major notes being played. It is being played in a five note blues scales, or pentatonic minor in straight Vestapol open D# tuning. In vestapol tuning those notes on the top D or D# string are frets 0 3 5 7 10 12 - same as all other McDowell pieces. It does sound very minor, so the AI is correct, but whoever programmed the AI didn't take open tunings and primitive folk music into consideration. Minor tuning, unless approached like Bukka White did, won't work. I hope that helps. Shine On Michael
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Post by blueshome1 on Mar 3, 2024 10:47:33 GMT
Sounds like Vasterpol at Eb to me. None of the other songs from this session hint at a minor tuning. Doesn't mean your device was wrong or he wasn't tuned that way but seems unlikely. As you say he doesn't consciously play the 3rd string.
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Post by gordon on Mar 3, 2024 11:24:11 GMT
That Fred McDowell first Lomax recordings Highway 61 is a great one, hadn't listened to that in a while. Thanks ! I was playing this Henry Thomas by way of Steve James number this morning.
Maybe a bit too laid-back a rendition, but it is Sunday ... Nice guitar that Tom G sold to me a couple of months ago.
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