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diferrence between types of blues

hi all!

so i'm playing my cbg some time and listening to a lot of blues.

can someone explain the defference between types of blues and how can I classify them by hearing? (delta, chicago, R&B, etc...)

can you point me out so a documentary ir something..

thanks

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Permalink Reply by William McCauley on October 5, 2011 at 4:28am

I have the cd of "Lightning In A Bottle" and it is one of my favorities, especially disc #2. Also must list Kenny Wayne Sheppard"s "10 days Out, Blues From The Backroads" (cd and dvd). It features a lot of old time blues artists, many of whom are no longer with us. And some damn fine performances.

Oily "Strat-O'-Nine-Tales" Fool said:

Skeesix, and everyone,

Ummmm...there's a rather large ton of blues documentaries (including Martin Scorsese's 7-films-by-7-directors 2003 epic, "Martin Scorsese Presents: The Blues," oddly enough referenced in Skeesix's links above) - those below were just sto...er, borrowed from the following site after a 2-minute Googling - and yes, I have seen a very few of these, but not many.:

http://www.documentarysite.com/?p=198

Alberta Hunter: My Castle’s Rockin’, 1988, Stuart A. Goldman.

American Folk Blues Music Festival, 3 vols., 1962-1966, Various, Hip-O.

American Roots Music, 2001, Jim Brown.

And This is Free, 1964, Mike Shea.

Big City Blues, 1985, St. Clair Bourne (RIP).

Bill Wyman’s Blues Odyssey, 2002.

The Blues According to Lightnin’ Hopkins, Les Blank, 1969.

Blues Divas, Robert Mugge, 2004.

Bluesland: A Portrait in American Music, 2002, Rhino.

Blues Story, 2003, Shout Factory.

Can You Hear the Wind Howl? The Life and Music of Robert Johnson, 1997, Peter Mayer, Shout Factory.

Chicago Blues, 1972, Harley Cokliss and Tak Fujimoto, Vestapol.

Cigarette Blues, 1985, Les Blank.

Deep Blues, 1991, Robert Mugge.

Devil Got My Woman: Blues at Newport 1966, 1966, Vestapol.

Eric Clapton: Nothing But the Blues, 1985, PBS Home Video.

Feel Like Going Home, 2003, Martin Scorsese.

Gimme Shelter, 1970.

Godfathers and Sons, 2003, Marc Levin.

Harmonica Breakdown: The Blues as Social History, Sonny Terry and Jane Dudley.

Hellhounds on My Tail: The Afterlife of Robert Johnson, 1999, Robert Mugge.

Honeyboy, 2002, Scott L. Taradash

John Lee Hooker: Come See about Me, 2004, Bob Sarles.

John Lee Hooker: That’s My Story, 2001, Jorg Bundschuh.

Josh White: Free and Equal Blues, 2001.

Juke, 1997, Yellowcat Productions.

The Ladies Sing the Blues, 1989.

The Land Where the Blues Began, 1979, John M. Bishop, Alan Lomax, and Worth W. Long.

Last of the Mississippi Jukes, 2003, Robert Mugge.

Lightning in a Bottle: A One Night History of the Blues, 2004, Antione Fuqua.

Piano Blues, 2003, Clint Eastwood.

Piedmont Blues: North Carolina Style, 2003, UNC-TV.

Pride & Joy: Story of Alligator Records, 1994, Robert Mugge.

Red, White, and Blues, 2003, Mike Figgis.

The Road to Memphis, 2003, Richard Pearce.

Say It Loud! A Celebration of Black Music in America, 2001, Nanette Burstein, and Brett Morgen.

The Search for Robert Johnson, 1992, Chris Hunt

Shine On: Richard Trice and the Bull City Blues, 1999, Dir. Kenny Dalsheimer and Jamie Hysjulien.

The Soul of a Man, 2003, Wim Wenders.

The Sun’s Gonna Shine, 1969, Les Blank.

Warming by the Devil’s Fire, 2003, Charles Burnett.

A Well Spent Life, 1971, Les Blank.

Where Lightnin’ Strikes, Mark Susman and Mike Snow.

Wild Women Don’t Have the Blues, 1989, Christine Dall, California Newsreel.

Not in the above list:

Delta Rising: A Blues Documentary, 2009, Michael Afendakis and Laura Bernieri

Iron City Blues, 2007, Big Mike Griffin (actually, this is also a biker film)

And, of course, Wikipedia contains a pretty nice set of discussions on the various flavors of blues; it makes for good reading.

The trick is finding the documentaries. Not very many are on YouTube. There are some for sale on video. All ya gotta do is harness the power of the Web...

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Permalink Reply by Wes "I'm Baaaaack" Yates on October 5, 2011 at 4:00pm

Yes, read this. even tho Wikipedia has a questionable reputation, but I think it does a MUCH better job than any as a quick online reference and overall I do trust it. MIND YOU, DO YOUR OWN RESEARCH! Wikipedia is a starting point.

-WY

Oily "Strat-O'-Nine-Tales" Fool said:

Tal,

Here's the blues genres as listed in Wikipedia:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_genres_of_the_blues

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Permalink Reply by Wes "I'm Baaaaack" Yates on October 5, 2011 at 4:21pm

When I studied the history of Jazz in college, we learned about the three basic forms of jazz [read: roots] -- New Orleans, St Louis, and Chicago. Now this also translates to blues, however blues does extend WAY beyond that. I'm not 100% sure of this, so its my opinion, but I think blues originated mostly from negro field songs and gospel (listen to gospel and mountain gospel and you will see a similarity to 'blues'). From that, Blues -- street music, and Jazz -- more of a formal musical arrangement as a band. BOTH rely on the performers ability to showcase talents in the form of improvisation.

'20s ragtime, New Orleans brass bands, St Louis bands, Chicago bands, lead the way for Jazz and Jazz Combos as well as Big Bands of the 30s and 40s up to the 50s. Which from there we see the advent of Rock and Roll. Its quite a convoluted but well rooted tree.

Now, any REAL Blues/Jazz expert will obviously disagree with me and with good reason, but basically, this is a rough evolution as I remember (25 years ago folks).

There is on Wikipedia, a number of genres of blues, all of which are unique. Piedmont blues (country blues) which is around my area (Blind Willie McTell, Pink Anderson, Floyd Council, Blind Boy Fuller, Sonny Terry, Etta Baker) are names from the Piedmont blues genre which is heavily influenced by ragtime rhythms and chord progressions. NOT the standard 12 bar blues for sure. But these are considered blues none the less.

Anyhow, I digress. Interestingly enough, MANY modern (60s-80s) rock bands rely on Blues rhythms. Led Zep. Aerosmith. ZZ Top. Eric Clapton (sorry Shane, but you know its true). All these and more _have_ to look back on the blues for inspiration. Blues in modern music is quite alive. I no f'ing idea what modern (90s-20s) R&B has to do with Blues. Its beyond me, but...

Good luck!

-WY

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Permalink Reply by Ron "Oily" Sprague on October 5, 2011 at 8:15pm

Wes "Moaning Mule" Yates said:

Yes, read this. even tho Wikipedia has a questionable reputation, but I think it does a MUCH better job than any as a quick online reference and overall I do trust it. MIND YOU, DO YOUR OWN RESEARCH! Wikipedia is a starting point.

-WY

Oily "Strat-O'-Nine-Tales" Fool said:

Tal,

Here's the blues genres as listed in Wikipedia:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_genres_of_the_blues

Of course! Wikipedia is merely convenient, and often has enough expert-moderated content to be useful as a starting point for in- depth research. For those playing at home, the original question, despite the differing opinions expressed, which BTW I respect, recognize and share, was "Can someone explain to me the the different types of blues, and how I can CLASSIFY them by hearing?" Already classified lists are therefore useful as starting points. One could go to the Library of Congress, and the Universities of Texas, North Carolina, Alabama, Mississippi, etc., for their extensively documented and catalogued field recordings, sheet music and interviews from the late 1800's through the 1970s, but that involves significant travel and expenses for most people. That's what makes the Internet so useful - you can pretty qUickly find loads of material, so much so that it's bewildering (and with Amazon and it's variants, potentially damaging to one's financial situation!) Wikipedia is by no means definitive; to be truly definitive, you'd have to either 1) have a musicological degree with specializations in jazz (and it's numerous sub variants), gospel, country, field hollers, black and white race relations, economic demographics, po-boy lutherie, sharecropping, juke joints, etc., 2) have been an actual practitioner of the various forms of Da Blooz, or 3) spend lots of passionately directed time and money digging into all of this - which, BTW, for any Clapton haters out there ( yes, I agree, after 50 years, he's no longer God - perhaps more a minor deity), EC has done, and is a huge blues musicologist that could wipe the floor with any of us without a guitar in the room.

Classification, and the reaching across the artificial boundaries that classification implies, is what human musicians and those who study them do. I hope your researches into the Blues become a lifelong study, tal. Good luck, and come back playing something you love for us.