Robert Johnson for Ukulele

Pippin said:

That's good and bad? Nope, that's Robert Johnson. There are a few reasons that blues artists, in particular, sounded so much the same from song to song... most were self-taught, limited vocal range, and a money-making style. RJ was struggling to feed himself. He did what every artist did, played what a live audience paid to see.

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You are right Pippin. My comment was not a critique of Robert Johnson, but of this book... And it was not meant as a negative critique, but rather just wanted people to know what they were getting. RJs music is largel E blues (on guitar), Open D slide and Open G slide. This book mostly focuses on one of these styles. For some who purchase the book, these songs are going to become repetitive. These are accurate transcriptions which is what I far prefer, but from another thread, the OP stated he was looking to move into fingerstyle playing. If one was looking for instrumental renditions of RJ tunes, this is not it, as cool kayaker pointed out. I am a tremendous RJ fan and have appreciated the comments you and drbekken posted. This music should be greatly respected and had this book translated this into if style solo pieces, I personally think it would have lost a great deal of soul.

I've liked the discussion. While Webby's comment was beaten up a bit, and although i dont agree, there is merit in what he said. There are two lines of thinking that have been explored. One is that this music is so tied into the culture and experience from which it was created that, while it can be appreciated, it can't truly be recreated outside that context. However, there is another that these "bluesmen" we're no different then the musicians of today. That they simply played the music folks wanted to hear and were just as likely to play other styles . I think the blues revival with Lomax and others supports this second interpretation. Many of these artist that were all of a sudden playing shows for 10,000 white college kids expressed being humbled, were excited to tell their stories and taught a few of these kids there craft.

I have two favorite musical experiences, both involving Harry Tuft and the Denver Folk Lore Center. Once I was there and started playing some Skip James. Harry heard this and poked his head out from the back saying that my playing sounded great. I appreciated the compliment, but it took on an entire new meaning when Harry told me he opened for Skip once in Philly. He shared with me a few stories of how they interacted and that scene at that time. From that experience I certainly have no problem with myself playing the blues and I sincerely don't think Skip James would have had a problem with it either.

However, when I ordered this book I even chuckled, because at the same time I ordered "From Lute to Uke". To justify playing those tunes, I have dedicated my to life stealing from the rich to give to the poor.

Luke El U said:

IMHO, A reading of Leroi Jones' (Amiri Baraka's) book "Blues People" might shed some light on webby's comments.
Classic blues are wonderful to listen to and interesting to study. But anybody in the 21st century posing as an
early-mid 20th century African-American blues musician would look and sound quite naive.

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The point is a good one and more than worth reflecting on. There is a long history of (mis)appropriation and exploitation of African-American music (and so much else, for that matter). There's lots there to take on board. And we should spend time with those realities.

The other side of the matter is that if you take the blackness out of American music, you wouldn't have much left. Robert Johnson's music (and the music of so many others who were, during their lives, kept outside the "mainstream" of our national life, whatever that may be) is integrally part of the American musical soul -- solid and prominent in the "great American songbook". Although I appreciate the point made, I don't see any benefit to keeping Robert Johnson and so many others on the "outside" of our lives.

I mean, if we can't sing one another's songs, what are our chances?

But, granted, it IS a complex set of issues.

:2cents:
N

jwieties said:

.....music is so tied into the culture and experience from which it was created that, while it can be appreciated, it can't truly be recreated outside that context.

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I've heard this over and over throughout my life (always from middle-class white people=ironic, isn't it?) and I just don't agree. By that same logic, unless you have lived under the same conditions/circumstances and in the same culture and time period as the blues artist, you can never understand the blues. If this were true, how come these same blues artists have embraced the singing and playing of people like Eric Clapton and Stevie Ray Vaughn? In my opinion, one of the best blues records ever is Albert King and Stevie Ray Vaughn's "Sessions." I don't think that Albert King would have recorded with SRV or that B.B. King would have recorded with Clapton if they didn't think that these white men, who never worked in a cotton field and led a life of true poverty, could create true blues music.

Do these folks think that you have to be living in dire circumstances to play and sing the blues? If so, B.B. King should have stopped playing and singing a long time ago. At least financially, he hasn't had any reason to be blue in years. Like someone else said a few posts previously, you don't have to be Austrian to play classical music. I don't see why people think you have to be a black person born into poverty to sing the blues.

I still sing the Partridge Family theme in the shower even though I'll never be David Cassidy.

My wife says I'm more like Rubin Kincaid. But without hair.

This is an interesting thread, and several of you have raised the issue that always evokes a strong personal response (and previous post) from me, and that is the argument that art is tied only to a certain people, place and time. For me this view denies one of the most important principles by which I live my life (if I may wax philosophical or personal for a minute) that -- deep down humans all have the same basic needs and wants. In fact, isn't the best definition of "great art" that which transcends cultural boundaries and appeals to what is universal among peoples and not what is distinctive between them? As for white middle class guys playing the blues, I don't think that people should be very quick to judge by skin color, culture or income (to reiterate a comment already made repeatedly on this thread --should no one but white Austrians be allowed to play Mozart). So I'm a middle aged, middle class white guy, am I not entitled to play the blues? Let's see, I'm also an only child raised by a single Mom (only saw my father twice in my life) who at ages 12 and 14 came home from school to find my mother unconscious lying in pools of vomit and excreta because she had tried to commit suicide from overdosing. Does that allow me to play the blues? But I've gone on to become a well known aquatic ecologist who has been paid to lecture on multiple continents. Hmmm, I guess that doesn't allow me to play the blues. I could go on but my guess is that everyone got the point by the last sentence <g>. I will say that music is one thing that has allowed me to express how I felt, from the high times to the low times throughout my life's journey, so the idea of denying that form of expression to anyone because of skin color, economic status, or culture, is anathema to me. It really feels like a form of fascism or totalitarianism. In a very real sense that's what so great about playing the uke (and I wish that I'd discovered the uke when I was 15 rather than 57) - it is a relatively inexpensive instrument (hence available to all economic classes) that is highly versatile (can play Mozart or Robert Johnson) that transcends social classes and hence, is a great unifier of people. "Uke on" and play whatever music touches your soul! Have a good weekend. g2

spoupard said:

I don't see why people think you have to be a black person born into poverty to sing the blues.

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And hell's bells, the blues' appeal is global and timeless because it speaks deeply to the human condition, right? There's a reason that greatness is great.

:deadhorse:

N

nbattaglia said:

And hell's bells, the blues' appeal is global and timeless because it speaks deeply to the human condition, right? There's a reason that greatness is great.

:deadhorse:

N

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...and ALL great music has some sort of underlying blues sensibilty; the need to express a complex set of emotions - joy, sorrow, rage, anger, need, deprivation, ecstasy, happiness, contention (you name some more) - maybe in the course of one single song, or even one single phrase. The human condition, or predicament, is extremely difficult to pinpoint. Music is here to help us make an attempt. If a musician plays music he loves, to the best of his abilities, what more can we ask? And what right do have to discourage him?

its looking like this book will top the best sellers list this christmas the way everyones buying it. Me included. also i'm white, half Irish half Lancashire and LOVE blues and country, and if it was'nt for guys copying Robert Johnson and the like, we'ed all be musical illiterates...................have a great christmas folks

Kimosabe said:

What would be really nice for us wannabe cottonpickers is for someone good to make a video of the song exactly as it is tabbed so that we can get the syncopation down.

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That would be brilliant. I got the book for King's Day (6th Jan) and have made a start on a couple of pieces that looked simpler. The trouble is that I am no music reader. I can tell you which notes I'm playing, but I am never sure if I have got the note durations and the rhythms right. Of course, if someone who reads music and tab fluently here says "Go listen to the originals because this book represents accurate transcriptions!", then Kimosabe & I's request might be superfluous.

.... But it'd still be nice if someone did the videos

Not all arrangement books have decent transcriptions of what was actually being played. Sometimes they change the key, or they make the notes easier and take away syncopations and what not, perhaps even remove notes. It just depends on the book. Do you want to play it exactly as in the book or exactly as it was actually played? If you'd rather play it as it was played, then why not just go have a listen to those songs, and use the book as a guide?

If you want to use just the book instead, and you're not sure of you're ability, then yeah...videos. I could tell you to subdivide the rhythm and all that, but ..yeah... Someone needs to post vids.

Barbablanca said:

That would be brilliant. I got the book for King's Day (6th Jan) and have made a start on a couple of pieces that looked simpler. The trouble is that I am no music reader. I can tell you which notes I'm playing, but I am never sure if I have got the note durations and the rhythms right. Of course, if someone who reads music and tab fluently here says "Go listen to the originals because this book represents accurate transcriptions!", then Kimosabe & I's request might be superfluous.

.... But it'd still be nice if someone did the videos

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I'm interested in learning how the arrangements in the book sound. Obviously, this would have helped if the book had come with a CD... or, as I said earlier, if the transcriptions are accurate of the originals (difficult considering it's 4 strings against 6 I know).

Nothing to brag about

webby said:

I just don't get the RJ thing, and white middle class folks in 2012 shouldn't be singing about how hard it is working in the cotton field BECAUSE THEY DON"T WORK IN THE COTTON FIELDS - It's a complete travesty - like the house of blues.

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Not sure if RJ actually picked cotton.

coolkayaker1 said:

I still sing the Partridge Family theme in the shower even though I'll never be David Cassidy.

My wife says I'm more like Rubin Kincaid. But without hair.

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That's it exactly! I love playing Hawaiian songs, but, I'll never be a Hawaiian. Whenever you play someone else's song you are kinda paying tribute to their contribution to music.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4eEK4M61y10

Rory Block

The Big Kahuna said:

'nuff said (and Ry Cooder is white too)

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Thought the Devil's front man was better, Beethoven be damned.

webby said:

I just don't get the RJ thing, and white middle class folks in 2012 shouldn't be singing about how hard it is working in the cotton field BECAUSE THEY DON"T WORK IN THE COTTON FIELDS - It's a complete travesty - like the house of blues.

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As far as I'm concerned, anyone can sing anything, provided they have the talent. Speaking of the blues, below is a funny set of rules about who can and who cannot sing the Blues. Very funny.

Requirements for singing the Blues

1. Most Blues begin, "Woke up this morning..."

2. "I got a good woman" is a bad way to begin the Blues, 'less you stick something nasty in the next line like, "I got a good woman, with the meanest face in town."

3. The Blues is simple. After you get the first line right, repeat it. Then find something that rhymes...sort of:

"Got a good woman with the meanest face in town.
Yes, I got a good woman with the meanest face in town.
Got teeth like Margaret Thatcher, and she weigh 500 pounds."

4. The Blues is not about choice. You stuck in a ditch, you stuck in a ditch - ain't no way out.

5. Blues cars: Chevys, Fords, Cadillacs and broken-down trucks.
Blues don't travel in Volvos, BMWs, or Sport Utility Vehicles.
Most Blues transportation is a Greyhound bus or a southbound train.
Jet aircraft an' state-sponsored motor pools ain't even in the running.
Walkin' plays a major part in the blues lifestyle. So does fixin' to die.

6. Teenagers can't sing the Blues. They ain't fixin' to die yet. Adults sing the Blues.
In Blues, "adulthood" means being old enough for the electric chair if you shoot a man in Memphis.

7. Blues can take place in New York City but not in Hawaii or any place in Canada.
Hard times in Minneapolis or Seattle is probably just clinical depression.
Chicago, St. Louis, and Kansas City are still the best place to have the Blues.
You cannot have the blues in any place that don't get rain.

8. A man with male pattern baldness ain't the blues. A woman with male pattern baldness is.
Breaking your leg cause you skiing is not the blues.
Breaking your leg 'cause a alligator be chomping on it is.

9. You can't have no Blues in a office or a shopping mall. The lighting is wrong.
Go outside to the parking lot or sit by the dumpster.

10. Good places for the Blues:
a. Highway
b. Jailhouse
c. Empty bed
d. Bottom of a whiskey glass

Bad places:
a. Dillard's
b. Gallery Openings
c. Ivy League Institutions
d. Golf Courses

11. No one will believe it's the Blues if you wear a suit, 'less you happen to be a old ethnic person, and you slept in it.

12. Do you have the right to sing the Blues?
Yes, if:
a. You older than dirt
b. You blind
c. You shot a man in Memphis
d. You can't be satisfied

No, if:
a. you have all your teeth
b. you were once blind but now can see
c. the man in Memphis lived
d. you have a 401K or trust fund

13. Blues is not a matter of color. It's a matter of bad luck.
Tiger Woods cannot sing the blues. Sonny Liston could.
Ugly white people also got a leg up on the blues.

14. If you ask for water and your darlin' give you gasoline, it's the Blues.
Other acceptable Blues beverages are:
a. Cheap Wine
b. Whiskey or Bourbon
c. Muddy Water
d. Nasty Black Coffee

The following are NOT Blues beverages:
a. Perrier
b. Chardonnay
c. Snapple
d. Slim Fast

15. If death occurs in a cheap motel or a shotgun shack, it's a Blues death.
Stabbed in the back by a jealous lover is another Blues way to die.
So is the electric chair, substance abuse, and dying lonely on a broke down cot.
You can't have a Blues death if you die during a tennis match or getting liposuction.

16. Some Blues names for women:
a. Sadie
b. Big Mama
c. Bessie
d. Fat River Dumpling

17. Some Blues names for men:
a. Joe
b. Willie
c. Little Willie
d. Big Willie

18. Persons with names like Michelle, Amber, Debbie, and Heather cannot sing the Blues, no matter how many men they shoot in Memphis.

19. Make your own Blues name Starter Kit:
a. name of physical infirmity (Blind, Cripple, Lame, etc)
b. first name (see above) plus name of fruit (Lemon, Lime, Kiwi, etc)
c. last name of President (Jefferson, Johnson, Fillmore, etc)
For example, Blind Lime Jefferson, Jakeleg Lemon Johnson or Cripple Kiwi Fillmore, etc. (Well, maybe not "Kiwi.")

20. I don't care how tragic your life: if you own a computer, you cannot sing the blues.

I just ordered it through Amazon. I had Amazon credit from their credit card, so it cost me nothing.

https://smile.amazon.com/gp/offer-listing/B009NOY7N0/ref=dp_olp_all_mbc?ie=UTF8&condition=all

Big Willie Johnson should sing I Ain't Lyin'

kauaijim said:

Check out "The Search for Robert Johnson" on DVD. Interesting connections between the book under discussion and some of the people identified in the film. The history of the original recordings of blues and the music of the South is fascinating. There was a lot of cross over between musicians in these groups as there was in jazz during the same period. Listen to Fred McDowell singing Amazing Grace.

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Excellent documentary on Netflix: The Devil at the Crossroads.