Here's a video I made a few minutes ago. I am trying to get the hang of slow blues...most of what we play is fast (like boogies and fast shuffles) or not blues at all.
This is my 8 1/2 month video for my own tracking of progress in amplified harp. My c harp sticks a little..maybe time for a marine band!
Hi congaron, it's hard ain't it? Unfortunately there are not many examples of good slow blues tunes to learn from. Adam's Front Porch Blues is the one I aim for. I fall way short but sometimes I can do a great little slow blues improv but never when I've got the webcam or recorder on. Keep going, it gets a tiny bit easier everyday. ----------
i can't keep it in my head..the bluesy licks i hear seem to vanish when I slow down. The stuff below hole 4 especially...not sure why i can't cement them in there after watching stuff like the front porch video. It might be because our band is doing so much faster rock-based stuff. It's a challenge..I'll keep trying. At least I found a gear setup i like the tone of.
Well, it's time to tap your feet and count the time and remember to phrase more off the 2 and the 4. You gotta tap the foot to keep time and each tap 1/4 of 4/4 measure (1 bar). You gotta get the groove ingrained in your head and it's extremely important and stop trying to fill each and every hole and allow for empty space so the music can breathe. ---------- Sincerely, Barbeque Bob Maglinte Boston, MA http://www.barbequebob.com CD available at http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/bbmaglinte
The beat, big time! I can`t stress the importance of that and getting the chord progression and the groove heavily ingrained in your head so you don`t have to think about it unless you want to relegate yourself to the way too many harp players tend to do: SOLOS FIRST, EVERYTHING ELSE IS DEAD LAST AND THEN ALLOW YOURSELF TO BECOME A GROOVELESS WONDER. ---------- Sincerely, Barbeque Bob Maglinte Boston, MA http://www.barbequebob.com CD available at http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/bbmaglinte
it just takes working with it. i don't think you're doing all that bad with it.
one thing i do in a slow one with a band is, i try and do a bit of accent stuff and let the band establish the thing. maybe i do a i bar intro, or come in from the V, then some vocals, and let the guitar, keys, whoever, take a ride. then another verse of vocs, build some suspense, and let a solo out.
that jam track is ok, but what i learned with- REALLY learned with- was out live, with a jam band, someone else calling the shots, learning to be both on my toes and laid back. a lot of times a jam track is so dead on where a live band will know to hang off the back of the notes time-wise and give it that little bit of funk. it kind of relaxes things. to me especially important for a slow one. the slow tempo really accentuates this near-late hit thing. muddy was a master of it and imho he invented funk by doing this.
i don't know if you get what i mean. i do know that playing fast with the same guys a lot will stick you in a sort of rut that it's hard to come out of.
i'd say find some muddy, some slim harpo, lazy lester, and just catch how they treat a slow number.
and this may sound really goofy- close your eyes and give your full attention to the music, both the groove being laid down, and what you can add to it. you will find your gut knows better than your brain what to do and when. when i close my eyes all that exists is the groove and the harp. it's transcendent.
Ron, I saw the title of your post, and I deliberately decided not to read it right away. I've had a slow blues in my head all day, and I wanted to get it out before I even heard what you did. It's interesting to see how different our two slow blues' are from eachother! I really did not expect the backing track. For some reason, I have the idea that slow harmonica blues is solo harp or just harp and guitar... No drums anyway. And also it's interested that you amped it. I don't ever think to amp my slow blues for some reason... Probably I got all that from Adam's front porch. That's been my archetype for so long. I think your amped tone sounded good for a slow blues though!
Anyway, I liked yours. My only thing to add to what bbqbob said would be to watch the length of your long notes. They are varied and don't always end on the right beat.
Here's the slow blues that's been in my head all day. i don't want to hijack your thread, so I'll make a separate thread for folks to give me criticism.
Cool. Thanks for all the inputs. I will apply and modify and keep chugging.
Live is definitely different. The slowest number we do is quite a bit faster than the one i posted. I open it with a solo intro that gets great response from the audience. It is soulful and ballad-like, but the groove is faster than the one above. Then I just do fill licks and rhythm for the rest of it. Maybe call and response if the guitarist mood hits him....it happens. I want to see if i can get the guys to slow down some, as I like the amplified slow sound. We are about to do a side project where i can go acoustic into my vocal mic too..that will be a good opportunity to work on that with slow blues.
When you said the wrong beat Isaac...what is the right beat? I'm really new at the blues and don't really know the rules...if there are any. Our band is kind of morphing into southern rock/blues/rockin'blues. I am so new at harp and the blues in general i think i'm just making it up as I go sometimes...lol.
As for beats 2 and 4 for phrasing....I hear a lot of pickups to beat 1 and even 3 in blues soloing...also straight downbeat centered phrasing. I've been listening to BB king's bluesville since Bob posted about this and i haven't heard a single harp solo featuring beats 2 and 4 as the beginning of the phrasing....please elaborate. I know..the groove, but are you talking about pickups to beat 2 and beat 4? "1 and" or "3 and" type phrase starts? I don't hear any of that in Adam's front porch blues. Please explain so i can try this.
Isaac, it is cool to see the different perspectives. I frankly never even considered a harp-onlu slow blues UNTIL I heard Adam's front porch video. in fact, i didn't recognize the young man's take on it as the same one. It has been about 6 months since i watched that video and i wasn't good enough to even remotely simulate most of it at that time. In the meantime, i have heard and loved many slow blues numbers on xm satellite with full bands and a mix of amp'd and unamp'd harping. To me, it's just the speed of the music..not a harp-only thing.
Of course, music is flavored by whoever plays it. That's why i love it.
Jbone..good observations...thanks.
Last Edited by on Nov 19, 2009 7:47 PM
maybe I phrased it wrong.. What I meant was that some times, your long notes went just bit too long compared to what was happening on the backing track. Other times they were just fine... Perhaps it's becasue of the backing track--it constrains your choices for where to stop and start notes. Like I said, I'm used to slow blues being a solo thing, so there, the only limitation is in your head and where your foot is tapping... ---------- ------------------ The magnificent YouTube channel of the internet user known as "isaacullah"
My guess is that the band you play with is more of a rock band and everything they do is done WAY ahead of the beat and bands that play that way often don`t do well on slow blues and have to play that way or the groove will drag like hell to the point of being totally undanceable. You need to take much more time to woodshed with all of the masters not only with the solos, but even MORE importantly, THE GROOVE AND FEEL, something most coming from more of a rock background spend FAR TOO LITTLE TIME with and so far too often they and the groove never met. ---------- Sincerely, Barbeque Bob Maglinte Boston, MA http://www.barbequebob.com CD available at http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/bbmaglinte
Rock drummers 80% of the time usually have a very difficult time dealing with slow blues, especially if they tend to play ahead of the beat, and when they try to play behind or even on top for that matter, it can be a trainwreck because one of the most important things about blues drumming is the use of space and they have a tendency to try and fill up everything and try to push the groove, which you DON'T want happening. Too many of them think of blues drumming as being a human metronome that basically doesn't do much beside eat, sleep, and go to the bathroom and when they get "boot-camped" into learning how to really play blues from a drummer's perspective, they will quickly find out that it's a helluva a lot more difficult than it seems to be and that's a big reason why finding good blues drummers are extremely difficult to find.
A test for slow blues is the Ray Charles tune, "Drown In My Own Tears," which is not only played at about the slowest tempo on the metronome, on top of that, it is played FAAAAAAAAAR behind the beat, and even jazzman Dizzy Gillespie remarked on the record as to how difficult it was to play that because of those reasons and working with the amount of space necessary to pull it off is a humongous challenge, to say the least.
Trust me, it takes more than just 3-1/2 minutes to learn that, more like months and years of non stop woodshedding to learn it and when you're not familiar with that, it's gonna take a lot of working out of trainwrecks to finally get up to speed on that stuff.
If those guys are basically rock players, they may be good at rock, but for really playing blues, that may very well be in question. ---------- Sincerely, Barbeque Bob Maglinte Boston, MA http://www.barbequebob.com CD available at http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/bbmaglinte
our drummer is good at leaving space. I play congas a lot in our music and I play in the spaces...leaving the rest as space to me. He's good at slowing down without loosing the groove...we just haven't gone that slow, so we'll see what happens. Between him and the bass player, I'm confident they can lay down a slow groove. It will just take patience and practice and train wrecks, as you put it....been there, done that. Thanks for the inputs.
The first slow bluesy thing I recorded was just the harmonica. I added a few changes in Audacity to give it a sort of forlorn sound. The clip was really short, so I looped it. I know that probably crossed the 'cheatin' line. I think for slow blues, when you are just learning them, it might be easier to play without a backing track. Just tap your foot or rock your body and let yourself feel the music.
