Blues and the origins of Rock (1)

This is a huge field so don’t take this as any attempt to be definitive.  Here are some clips that capture a few special and historically important performers.  A lot more Blues and Rock to come!

 

Rock was invented by a woman

Sister Rosetta Tharpe started as a Gospel singer.  She added blues tropes, a distorted electric guitar, and foot-stomping beats, creating something that would become rock and roll.  Throughout her career, she continued to perform Gospel music, mixed in with this new thing she was inventing.  She had both white and black fanbases, but could only perform for one or the other at a time because most venues were segregated.  Rock came to be dominated by white boys, so we’ve largely forgotten its origins in Black music. Even less well known is that its first practitioner was a woman.  Here is “Didn’t it Rain?”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y9a49oFalZE

Who invented the rock guitar solo?

Here is some of the earliest footage of what we would call the modern electric guitar solo. Complete with the swagger.  From Chuck Berry to the Stones and Led Zeppelin, they all owe a big thank you to Sister Rosetta Tharpe.  If you have never seen her, brace yourself.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qj3fpujjFis

 

 

Gloomy Sunday

This was actually a Hungarian song that was not written in a Blues style, but somehow Billie Holiday turned it into a definitive Blues song.  Some radio stations (including the BBC) refused to play the original because it had supposedly triggered waves of suicides. I’ve listened to it, and it's got nothing on Holiday's version. (See the text in the youtube clip if you want a more complete history.)  Holiday's life and death were almost unthinkably tragic. It's amazing she was able to give us what she did.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=50E3tL1YMeU

 

 

B.B. King and some friends

Where does one even start, regarding this clip?  People love to debate levels of greatness, and we all have our picks for best this or biggest that, but among the musicians who invented rock, it’s safe to say BB King was The King.  Who else could bring together a bunch of sidemen like this?  Buddy Guy, Albert Collins, Eric Clapton and Jeff Beck?  Are you kidding?  Crazy.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M0J_ffTcPv4

Another from B.B. King and friends: Buddy Guy, Eric Clapton and Jimmy Vaughan.  Born at roughly 10-year intervals, they represent four generations in the evolution of the blues into rock.  In fact, almost all of today’s popular music genres, from rock to soul, funk to surf-music, trance to hip-hop—owe a significant debt to the Blues.  Foundational rock musicians, including Hendrix, Clapton, Beck, Jimmy Page and many others, considered themselves bluesmen first.  Nerd note: Vaughan is the older brother of the late Stevie Ray Vaughan, and you hear some of the same heavy note striking that was a signature part of SRV’s sound.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F4OXrmxDp44

 

More from B.B. King and friends. This time it’s Clapton, Robert Cray and Jimmy Vaughan, wrapping up Crossroads 2010. I particularly love the contrast in their guitar styles: B.B. with his uniquely pure, fat, ringing notes; Clapton’s light, nimble touch; Cray’s haunting, plaintive tone; and Vaughan’s emphatic striking. Cray, like Buddy Guy and Jeff Beck, is often called “a guitarist’s guitarist” by other musicians. He could have had even more commercial success but always chose to explore new ideas.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SgXSomPE_FY

 

Janis Joplin.  No filters. No security. No post-production polishing. No bullshit.  What you see is just a fraction of what you get.  She broke a lot of barriers.  A woman, making it as a headliner in an overwhelmingly sexist business.  A white person who did the blues without stealing anything, because she WAS the blues, as much as any Black blues artist. A singer without a singer’s voice, who made you love her raw, broken sound. One of a handful of artists I don't listen to with other people, because she turns me into a mess. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7uG2gYE5KOs

One of the crazier things on youtube:  Jeff Beck and a few friends

Beck, of course, was one of the founders of the British blues movement (along with Mayall, Clapton etc.) and still makes a point of celebrating the blues masters who started it all. 

Buddy Guy played a key role in birthing modern rock.  He was a major influence on Beck, Hendrix and pretty much all the foundational rock guitar players.  The first song in this clip is a blues number that also really rocks, which is the point.  Billy Gibbons was an anomaly in Texas, an early experimenter with psychedelic rock who was himself influenced by Hendrix, for whom he opened several shows.  In the second number, he does a great cover of Hendrix’ Foxy Lady, with Beck playing rhythm.  Through it all, Tal and Vinnie crush it as usual. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B_dUJigRWfo

 

Jazz (1): Art Tatum

Art Tatum was described by other jazz greats as “terrifying”.  He was largely self-taught.  He was functionally blind, so he played entirely by feel.  Greats like Oscar Peterson later said that he had made them consider giving up playing.  Vladimir Horowitz felt himself to be an amateur next to Tatum (more on them below).  Tatum’s recordings show he was far more than a technical wizard—he captured beauty, whimsy, grandeur and pathos, sometimes all in one piece.  He only briefly flirted with ensemble playing; he was successful at it, but he was happiest playing alone, which he often did for hours after his official gigs. 

 

 

Classic: Tiger Rag

Here is a later recording of one of Tatum’s popular standards.  It’s a cover of an old Ragtime piece that reflects his early influences in stride piano and New Orleans jazz.  It was written for a whole brass and woodwind band.  Playing solo piano, he takes the original concept and transforms it into something rich and complex, while still bright and upbeat.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CaPeks0H3_s

 

We’re not in Kansas any more

One of my favorite Art Tatum recordings, a 1953 improvisation on Over the Rainbow, from the Wizard of Oz. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8KnptwcrbcA

Riffs and hooks in Classical music

What do you get when you pair one of the most lyrical Romantic-era composers with the greatest improvisational pianist alive?  First, check out the original “Humoresque” by Dvořák, published in 1894. You’ll hear little themes that sound familiar and make you want to listen to more—today they would be referred to as “riffs” and “hooks”.  They sound familiar because they have been constantly reused in a lot of popular music, right up to the present day.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WmAZoexenx8

 

Here is Art's take on Dvořák’s Humoresque:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qYcZGPLAnHA

 

 

Tea for Two

The legendary classical pianist Vladimir Horowitz was interested in jazz and improvisation, and wrote a series of variations on the old Broadway show tune “Tea for Two”.  He proudly played it for Art Tatum, whereupon Tatum sat down and improvised on it for an hour.  Horowitz asked when Tatum has written all of that and the reply was “Just now.”  Horowitz never performed his score.  This is probably Tatum’s most famous improvisation on an old standard.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fKb0Sc2lYVU

 

 

Art's Blues, with the Dorsey Brothers

One of the few clips of Tatum playing ensemble with a band.  Not just any band!  The Dorseys had reunited and were at the top of their game in 1947, when this movie was made.  Tommy Dorsey introduces this scene with the line "Let's go hear a real musician!" 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mVuE0ywwBO0

 

 

Great voices (1): Opera divas

These are all short pieces. Some are arias from full operas, others are songs composed to be sung in operatic style, ie., “opera-lite”.

Anna Netrebko burns down the house

Ah, Anna.  It is a real challenge to pick just one song by her.  I’m no expert on opera—I came to it late and have only seen a couple of dozen live full-length performances.  But I know what I like, and Netrebko’s thick, honey-molasses tone gives me the chills.  She is not without controversy.  In opera, love and romance have historically been abstract concepts, communicated entirely through the music.  Netrebko led a mini-revolt of sorts, bringing a physicality to her performances that is visceral and, yes, sexual.  Half the opera world hates it.  But opera was dying until the new generation of performers began breaking the old rules and adding some zest to the proceedings.  (The other thing that saved it, in spite of itself, was the growing popularity of opera-lite recordings by the likes of the Three Tenors, Il Divo, and Netrebko herself).

In this piece, Anna dances, spins, kicks off her shoes, throws roses to her admirers, and flirts outrageously with the First Violinist, all the while maintaining her astonishing tone and projection, without missing a beat.  It is a tour de force.

Barbara Bonney's bell-like voice

After Anna Netrebko, Barbara Bonney is my favorite soprano.  They are at opposite ends of the spectrum: Where Netrebko is dark and sensual, Bonney is bright and pure. But why is she so captivating? A sound lab once tested recordings of hundreds of voices, and reported that Bonney’s came the closest to a pure tone, like a bell. Maybe that’s it. I don’t know.

Brilliant new star

Slovak singer Patricia Janečková won a talent show at the age of 12, performed in various shows for a couple of years, then disappeared. It later turned out she was doing some serious training.  This is from one of her first appearances after she returned.  It is a difficult piece to sing, because the performer is miming at the same time.  She is 17 here.  Her tone and control are remarkable, though her voice is still developing. 

Patricia on fire

Here is Patricia Janečková in late 2019. Best comment: “Patricia knocked the conductor off his feet before singing a note.”

Patricia's turn to burn the house down

One more from Patricia Janečková.  We saw Anna do this song.  Here is the 18-year-old rising star putting her own stamp on it.  Note to all our twerking, titty-flashing pop stars here in the U.S.: You are pathetic and ridiculous.  THIS is how you burn the house down: 

How are you coping with the lockdown?

Here is how Patricia Janečková is occupying herself during the lockdown.  Somehow I don’t think this is how most of us are doing it.

Most beautiful aria?

Do you have a pick for most beautiful opera aria?  Song to the Moon has always been high on my list-I liked it as a kid, before knowing it was part of something called Opera.  There are many versions to choose from as well. For me, after listening to a lot of them, it came down to Anna Netrebko or Lucia Popp. I’m going with Popp. Something about the depth she brings to it, almost effortlessly. I’ll admit I may have been biased by her backstory as well—she died young, of ovarian cancer. You may want to have tissues handy.