When most people hear "the blues", the first image that probably pops into their mind is a middle aged African American man plucking away at his acoustic guitar on a porch somewhere in Louisiana. While many of the genre's forefathers may have fit that mold, it is a restrictive and inaccurate view of a diverse and rich form of music that is the root for almost all modern music. Those that maintain this stereotypical view of the blues and assume it is "grandpa music" are missing out on a lot.

Since the electrification of the guitar shot it to the forefront of three and four piece bands, music entered an evolutionary time warp not unlike that the quantum leaps in science and technology occurring at the same time.

Some of the pioneers during the 50's were B.B. King, Albert King, Muddy Waters and Robert Johnson. Chuck Berry was among the first to take the blues and kick it up a notch, speeding up the tempo and creating many rock riffs and techniques that are standard vocabulary today.

By the 60's and 70's, the blues had traveled across the pond to Britain. Bands like Cream, the Who, the Rolling Stones, and Led Zeppelin all traced their roots back to the blues forefathers. Even Angus Young of AC/DC, considered metal by many(the band always maintains that they are a rock band, not metal) has a very bluesy style of playing.

By the 80's, "Blues-Rock" had become indistinguishable from "Hard Rock". It wasn't until artists like Stevie Ray Vaughan came along and took blues back to it's roots.

Some modern bands that have bluesy overtones include the Black Keys and the White Stripes.

Saturday, February 5, 2011

Sonny Landreth

Sonny Landreth is a slide blues guitarist based in Louisiana. I recommend him because he a)sounds awesome b) has a unique technique/sound. Although he uses a slide, Sonny will also fully fret some strings with his free fingers lending a hybridized sound or the best of both worlds. Doing this fluidly modulates between chords/calls and responses. He also taps, slaps and picks the strings with his picking hand. He is without a doubt a blues guitarist, but some of his songs do seem to venture into country territory. Not a complaint, but an observation. Hearing Sonny speak naturally he is a bit of a bassist, but he sings in a sonorous head voice that blends well with his guitar.

One of his more popular and recent albums "From the Reach", is a collaborative effort with Eric Clapton, Mark Knopfler, Robben Ford, Eric Johnson and Vince Gill. As Sonny put it, it "something [he'd] always wanted to do". He mentions that they had all drawn from the same musical sources growing up, so they had a common ground to work off of, and it shows. Each guitar great throws in their flavor, yet the album does not lose any cohesiveness from track to track. I'd recommend this to any serious fan of the blues. 


Here are a couple sample videos:
Promise Land
and
Blue Tarp Blues
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1 comment:

  1. AnonymousFebruary 9, 2011 at 11:47 PM

    Hi Justin Brown,

    From your blog, I learned that Sonny Landreth is a unique slide blues guitarist because he has a one of kind sound. Not only does Sonny Landreth picks and taps the strings, but his singing also goes well with his guitar. He became known for his music album titled From the Reach because he collaborated with Eric Johnson and Eric Clapton. With different musical talents, each guitarist contributes to creating an original musical album. Even though he collaborated with others, Sonny Landreth was still able to create a music album that sounds cohesive.

    I also found out from researching that a slide blues guitarist plays the guitar by sliding along the strings. He resides in Mississippi prior to moving to Louisiana. Sonny Landreth also has a special way of playing the slide guitar because he uses his smaller fingers to slide along the strings to spare his other fingers to fret notes. The fret is the neck part of a guitar, and strings are also on the fret. The fret serves as a great template for the fingers to slide alongside to create music.

    Sonny Landreth participated in the crossroads guitar festival of 2007, which was a music festival, supports drug rehabilitation (treatment for drug dependency) in Antigua: an island in the Caribbean.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4oNFRWXDSA

    From,
    Audra Oul

    ReplyDelete

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