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Dirty-South Blues Harp forum: wail on! >
Recommended Reading!
Recommended Reading!
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shanester
9 posts
Dec 20, 2009
12:33 PM
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Hey y'all, while reading the thread last night about "who owns the blues" it reminded me of an awesome book I read years ago called "Really the Blues", by Mezz Mezzrow.
The book is Mezz's musical autobiography of his musical life as a jazzman who loved the New Orleans sound and was instrumental in bringing it to Chicago where it was reconstituted into Chicago's sound.
Mezz was a Jewish man who identified more strongly with his black musical contemporaries than he did with Jewish or Anglo culture. When he was imprisoned for drugs he fought for being locked up with the blacks.
Fascinating book about a fascinating man and a marvelous window into the scene of the 20's and 30's. He even put a glossary of slang from the era that has resurfaced in hip hop today.
Any good required reading recommendations out there?
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Kingley
555 posts
Dec 20, 2009
11:03 PM
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Good books about blues and the harmonica.
Willie Dixon - I am the Blues. Great insight into Chess Records and all the great players.
Kim Field - Harmonicas, Harps and Heavy Breathers. The history of harmonica and some of it's greatest players.
Glover, Dirks and Gaines - Blues with a Feeling. All about Little Walter.
Adam Gussow - Satan's Apprentice and Journeyman's Road. Look who the author is. Nothing more needs to be said.
Steve Baker - The Harp Handbook. Although this is more of a reference book. This is a must have book for EVERY harmonica player. Filled with history, a discography, Positions, tunings, layouts, amplification and so much more. This book more than any other will expand your knowledge of the instrument and almost every aspect of it.
I'm sure there are many more I don't know about.
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Pimpinella
3 posts
Dec 21, 2009
12:57 AM
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Hi
I recently read "Mister Satan's Apprentice" and highly recommend it. It's really fun to read, with two timelines wound around each other very in a very clever way, starting and finally focussing the very moment when destiny strikes ;)
Get it!
Frank
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kudzurunner
884 posts
Dec 21, 2009
4:28 AM
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Mezzrow's book is a fascinating read, and it was an inspiration to me. I was a grad student when I wrote mine, trying to ready myself for a job market in which I figured I could professs "blues literature," although I was still figuring out what that was, and REALLY THE BLUES, as far as I could tell, was the only blues autobiography written by a white performer. My book became, ipso facto, the second. I'd be happy to have someone tell me I'm wrong about that and direct me toward other texts. I just couldn't find any, and I looked pretty hard.
Well, I take that back. ME AND BIG JOE by Mike Bloomfield was a short memoir--a very short, powerful memoir--of Mike's time with Big Joe. I just taught it in my grad course this term.
But apart from that, I couldn't find anything.
Later, Dr. John (Mac Rebennack) wrote UNDER A HOODOO MOON, which is very much in the Mezzrow tradition: a seriously blackened white guy, kind of a hipster, talks about his life in the criminal underworld.
I can't claim to have had that experience!
Mezzrow was the original hipster.
If you're looking for blues autobiography, there are a number of good bets.
BLUES ALL AROUND ME, by B. B. King
THE WORLD DON'T OWE ME NOTHING, by David Honeyboy Edwards.......
Hey, I tell you what: I'll work up a blues books section for this website. New Year's project.
Last Edited by on Dec 21, 2009 4:29 AM
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