Blues not "difficult"

Hey Chris...sensa humor here...just saw your line that "blues is not the most difficult genre around..." Wow...astonishing indeed. This shows me that you really don't know very much about blues at all....and no problem with that either, but didn't wanna let this slide by...because you might influence others to think the same thing, and that would be wrong. I'm betting, actually, that most folks on the tuning lists have very little, if any, experience with blues, folk, bluegrass, country, western swing, cowboy music, rockabilly, funk, R&B, etc...the more "rootsy" styles of American music...that's the impression I've gotten from being on these lists for the last 15 years or so. None of these styles are "easy," whatever that means; and blues least of all. After 45 years of playing all of these styles, to one degree of proficiency or another, I have a deep love and respect for all of them, and am still learning more about them.

Any style of music has it's own language that must be mastered...and in folk arts, it can be the teensiest of things...and it al starts with the rhythms. When it comes to blues, first...which style are you talking about? Delta? Chicago? West Coast? Texas? Piedmont? Big Band? Bebop? Fingerstyle? Lotsa variety in blues, or any of the above mentioned American styles...and each one has it's own "grease," if you will. But...over the years, I've seen an attitude from folks that don't play or understand blues, that it is easy...perhaps because of the deceptive simplicity of it's structure...a zillion light years from true. Chris...you're a sincere cat, and good musician...but, if we ever get a chance to hang, we can do what the Chicago guys used to do, have a little "head cuttin" session, and see how easy blues is then...hell, we can even do some blues in 19 or 36 if you want..and Catler is doing blues in his 64 tone system, and getting great reviews. Don't know why you think it's easy, cause it's far far from that...best from sunny Denver...Stickman www.microwstick.net

[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

Hi Neil,

What I meant by that comment is that one can write passable blues without a
great deal of difficulty. But to play the blues with the expressiveness of
Buddy Guy - that is hard to do.

You seem to be arguing for the equivalency of all art.
Equivalent as art I can agree - But few blues compositions could be seen as
having the same degree of complexity as say The Rite of Spring.

My take on the blues, and I *have* listened to quite a bit since my wife
loves the blues, is that it isn't what you play its how you play it. Around
last Christmas time I dragged my family to a Taylor guitar clinic and there
was an excellent guitarist (and his daughter singer - song writer and
mandolin player) as the main event - besides the guitars themselves. And he
spent a couple hours playing and explaining what he was playing and he
played lick after lick - this is from Chet Atkins, this is from so and so,
and so on he told us. What his particular signature was playing rapid
harmonic arpeggios anywhere on the fret board with bar chords. Very pretty
sound and difficult technique. Nonetheless it became clear that all of these
famous people he was quoting, and he was an encyclopedia of these riffs,
had developed some piece of the puzzle - "their style" and really great
ones, like Les Paul I imagine, more than one. Its all fine and good but its
not the same thing as what I learned in classical guitar.

Have you noticed just how many Beatles songs use a descending line as the
basis of the composition? Especially later Beatles => Dear Prudence, Cry
Baby Cry, While My Guitar Gently Weeps just off the top of my head from one
album. If you look for them you will find a lot more.

Don't misunderstand me- I really really like the Beatles - but there is a
qualitative difference between them and say "Reflets dans l'eau" by Claude
Debussy - within which I hear lots of premonitions of jazz.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C9wqAzqKYyg
and a better player but noisier video
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LLbpQl1cCl8
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reflets_dans_l%27eau

Bands like Mahavishnu Orchestra - are awesome and can be tremendously
complex http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DQG7XpCiSVA But still don't in my
mind equate to The Rite of Spring or Shostakovich's 14 th symphony.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ffafkWtFUcY

You probably don't know that I taught myself guitar - mostly learned on
Beatles, Zeppelin and Sabbath - and then somehow pulled off being a
classical guitar major at a college level without previous classical lessons
(and only 1 rock guitar lesson). So I stand in both worlds. There is no lack
of respect on my part. However, I see a qualitative difference between the
vast majority of "popular" music and "serious" music. Not even John
McLaughlin can best Andr�s Segovia in my mind. But perhaps I have to declare
my bias on the basis of his recording of Bach's Chaconne in D
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PNXlslzL8EY
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qRhorozjEEg&feature=related

But the thing is - no one needs to have a problem with the division. As my
wife says - sometimes its nice just to have a fun song. And I agree. And in
my house we play music together - folk and pop songs. So a song has just
two chords - so what? If its what you want to do - fantastic. But I'm not
going to call it equivalent to Beethoven.

I hope you don't take offense to this. I think we might have differing
views.

Chris

On Thu, Apr 7, 2011 at 12:58 PM, Neil Haverstick <microstick@msn.com> wrote:

>
>
>
>
> Hey Chris...sensa humor here...just saw your line that "blues is not the
> most difficult genre around..." Wow...astonishing indeed. This shows me that
> you really don't know very much about blues at all....and no problem with
> that either, but didn't wanna let this slide by...because you might
> influence others to think the same thing, and that would be wrong. I'm
> betting, actually, that most folks on the tuning lists have very little, if
> any, experience with blues, folk, bluegrass, country, western swing, cowboy
> music, rockabilly, funk, R&B, etc...the more "rootsy" styles of American
> music...that's the impression I've gotten from being on these lists for the
> last 15 years or so. None of these styles are "easy," whatever that means;
> and blues least of all. After 45 years of playing all of these styles, to
> one degree of proficiency or another, I have a deep love and respect for all
> of them, and am still learning more about them.
>
> Any style of music has it's own language that must be mastered...and in
> folk arts, it can be the teensiest of things...and it al starts with the
> rhythms. When it comes to blues, first...which style are you talking about?
> Delta? Chicago? West Coast? Texas? Piedmont? Big Band? Bebop? Fingerstyle?
> Lotsa variety in blues, or any of the above mentioned American styles...and
> each one has it's own "grease," if you will. But...over the years, I've seen
> an attitude from folks that don't play or understand blues, that it is
> easy...perhaps because of the deceptive simplicity of it's structure...a
> zillion light years from true. Chris...you're a sincere cat, and good
> musician...but, if we ever get a chance to hang, we can do what the Chicago
> guys used to do, have a little "head cuttin" session, and see how easy blues
> is then...hell, we can even do some blues in 19 or 36 if you want..and
> Catler is doing blues in his 64 tone system, and getting great reviews.
> Don't know why you think it's easy, cause it's far far from that...best from
> sunny Denver...Stickman www.microwstick.net
>
>
> [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
>
>
>

[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

>"When it comes to blues, first...which style are you talking about? Delta? Chicago? West Coast? "

   Here's one admitted confusion: when I think blues, I think Delta IE, as I understand it, the original blues: my ear doesn't seem able to distinguish anything else as more than a take-off of Delta (except maybe Big-Band and Zydeco, where the instrumentation is done so differently). BTW, Tower of Power (the band) is awesome...
So what are the difference between the blues sub-genres...and what makes each one difficult to play? The one thing I know...is quarter-tone bends and soaring vocals play a role in a lot of blues and getting either of those to sound as clean and soulful a sound as the "masters of blues" is not easy.

On Thu, Apr 7, 2011 at 12:58 PM, Neil Haverstick <microstick@...> wrote:
>
> Hey Chris...sensa humor here...just saw your line that "blues is not the most difficult genre around..." Wow...astonishing indeed. This shows me that you really don't know very much about blues at all....and no problem with that either, but didn't wanna let this slide by...because you might influence others to think the same thing, and that would be wrong. I'm betting, actually, that most folks on the tuning lists have very little, if any, experience with blues, folk, bluegrass, country, western swing, cowboy music, rockabilly, funk, R&B, etc...the more "rootsy" styles of American music...that's the impression I've gotten from being on these lists for the last 15 years or so. None of these styles are "easy," whatever that means; and blues least of all. After 45 years of playing all of these styles, to one degree of proficiency or another, I have a deep love and respect for all of them, and am still learning more about them.

Perhaps it's better said that it's easy to be expressive when playing
the blues. You can just open up and play what you feel, and that's
what the blues is known for... Doing that over something like Giant
Steps is a lot harder.

-Mike