Stardust -- a reinterpretation

Enjoy this video. What cool stylings of this great 1927 jazz-pop song by Hoagy Carmichael.

Congratulations to Michael Ammons and the Hotshots!

Congratulations to Michael Ammons and the Water Street Hotshots for winning this year's Grafton Blues Challenge last weekend. They were the only acoustic group on the bill and took away top honors. Now it's on to Memphis for the International Blues Challenge.

Good luck!

Tonewoods

I've never thought too much about the wood my guitars are constructed of, except from a visual aspect. I have a beautiful flamed maple parlor from Larrivee, for example. It's fun to play, and great to look at. So I hadn't thought about guitar materials outside of the woods we're all familiar with: rosewood, spruce, mahogany, maple. But if you start looking into the guitars of the 20s and 30s, you see guitars constructed from other woods, like oak and birch.

Recently I began the early steps into having a 1920-30s Stella-style guitar built for me by a Wisconsin luthier. One of the choices I had to make was the wood from which the back and sides of the guitar will be constructed. I could have gone with the old standard, mahogany. I have several "hog" guitars now, so I'm quite familiar with the sonic qualities of that tonewood.

But I discovered a few things during my research on the internet concerning tonewoods for guitar.
(1) Guitar players, and perhaps to a lesser extent, luthiers themselves, have a very narrow idea of what makes a good tonewood.
(2) Oak, despite the fact that it was commonly used decades ago, is held in low regard, primarily, I believe, out of ignorance.
(3) There do exist tonewood "heretics" out there who are all to happy to experiment with alternative woods.

One such heretic is luthier John Calkin. I discovered his article "The Heretic's Guide to Alternative Lutherie Woods" in which he claims that the whole concept of a tonewood is a hoax.

"First of all (and speaking from a steel string guitar perspective), let's discard the notion that some species of wood make good instruments and that others don't. The concept of a tonewood is a hoax. Of the few things that we can do to a guitar and still call it a guitar, changing the wood it is made of will have the least impact upon the quality of the sound that it produces."

It is a thought-provoking article for those interested in this sort of thing, and I recommend reading the entire article via the link provided.

Then I came across a site by Neil Harpe, Stella Guitars. Neil is helping to save and revive many old guitars, including the old Stellas which I am interested in. On his site, he shows us the reconstruction of an oak-spruce Stella. Well, that pretty much sealed the deal for me -- my Stella repro is going to be oak and spruce, with reproduction fingerboard inlays like the Stella in Neil's restoration. Here is a photo of the finished restoration -- visit Neil's site for some great info, Stella shirts, reproductions of classic guitar catalogs, much more.

For Sale: Martin D12X1 12-String

UPDATE: SOLD!!!!!!!!!

This Martin 12-String is one of their more "budget" guitars, using solid spruce for the top, but laminate on back and sides. Hardshell case. Purchased a few years ago. Currently sells new for $600.

Write to sheboyganblues (at) mac.com for details if interested.

For Sale: Martin 000-28

UPDATE: ON CONSIGNMENT AT HENRI'S MUSIC IN GREEN BAY!!!!!!!!!
Martin 000-28 guitar, Sitka spruce top, Indian Rosewood back and sides, Martin hardshell case. Purchased 2005. Currently sells new for $2400. Email for details and price at sheboyganblues (at) mac.com.

Slow Season

I haven't been very active on this blog lately -- just not much going on.

There have been some notable blues deaths: John Cephas (shown at left) just passed away, and a few weeks ago Snooks Eaglin died at age 73.

I haven't made it to any local concerts -- I just can't take the smoke any more (damn smokers!) -- though I do have tickets for the Blue Note 70th Anniversary concert at Lakeland College later this month:

To mark the 70th anniversary of Blue Note Records, the premier label in jazz, an all-star band featuring some of the finest musicians today is traveling the world celebrating this rich catalog of music. Led by Blue Note Records artist and pianist Bill Charlap, the group will explore classic tunes by Bud Powell, Thelonious Monk, Horace Silver, Herbie Hancock, Lee Morgan, Wayne Shorter and many others. Joining Charlap in this talented ensemble will be Ravi Coltrane on tenor and soprano saxophone, Pat Martino on guitar, Lewis Nash on drums, Nicholas Payton on trumpet, Peter Washington on bass and Steve Wilson on alto saxophone.

I've been playing my guitar, working out Reverend Gary Davis' version of "I'll Fly Away," a challenging version in the key of G. That's about it.

A Sign of the Times

As another sign of the times the Hal Leonard Corporation has withdrawn its support for the Jazz Series at the Pabst Theater. Unless another sponsor is found, which is very unlikely, there will be no Jazz Series this year. This is unfortunate, as I've enjoyed the great talent the series has brought to Milwaukee the past years (see some of my old posts on concert reviews).

Archie Edwards

I just ran across this bluesman, Archie Edwards (1918-1998). He's a bit rough around the edges -- guitar playing-wise -- but I'm enjoying his CD, The Toronto Sessions, Vol 1, recorded in 1986.

In June of 1986, Archie Edwards was in Toronto to perform a concert and was persuaded by producer Serge Sloimovits to go into the studio. The result was enough songs on tape to produce two albums, but the songs were never released. When Fred Litwin founded NorthernBlues Music in 2000, he heard about this nearly forgotten musical treasure and approached Sloimovits, from whom he bought the master tapes. The result is this historic CD.

Check him out if you enjoy really downhome Piedmont blues.

Hand Me My Travelin' Shoes: In Search of Blind Willie McTell

Last December I purchased this book about Blind Willie McTell. At that time I wrote:

I have mixed feelings about this book thus far.

The first six chapters had my eyes crossed a few times trying to keep all the genealogy straight. Michael Gray, the author, goes into excruciatingly painful detail on the search through all the records to trace the relatives of Willie McTell, and cites tedious census entries. Perhaps entertaining for true genealogists, but terribly boring for a reader like myself. I would rather Gray had gone straight to the results, but then the book wouldn't have been as long, I guess. A genealogy chart might have helped keep things straight and made his narrative easier to follow.

So thus far, a hundred and some odd pages into the book, I'm disappointed. But don't get me wrong, if you're a lover of this music and Willie McTell's music in particular, it's still worth slogging through all the census lists and political sniping. And looking on the bright side, it can only get better from here -- I hope.

Well, I'm still struggling with this book, and my opinion now is that this is a waste of time. I've read a lot of praise for this book on other blues-related websites and forums, and I just don't understand it. You've heard the expression, "the book was so good I couldn't put it down." This is one book, once started, is hard to pick up again. A more boring, plodding, narrative I can't imagine. It is a morass of census data, geographical minutiae, and personal political sniping at the Republican administration:

He was buried at Zoar United Methodist Church. Its postal address is Stapleton (which is in Jefferson County), but it's on Zoar Church Road, which is, appropriately for Reddick, just inside Glascock and only half a mile from Warren and a further mile from McDuffie.

What? I would have been satisfied with the first sentence, I didn't need a detailed map. This is what the book is like -- endless meandering and pointless description. Then there's the author's personal political sniping, entirely pointless, but apparently since it's his book he feels a need to vent his own Bush-derangement, even though it adds nothing to the story he's trying to tell and simply detracts from the narrative:

Library staff see all the corner-cutting and encroaching bureaucracy, but what I see is that, discounting small obduracies in small branches, the library system in America stands for all the civilized values that George W. Bush and the boyz-in-the-hood equally would destroy at a stroke if they could.

As far as I'm concerned, the author has taken what should have been an entertaining story and turned it into an unreadable mess. I can't state this too strongly: I'm sorry I wasted the money and time on this literary abomination. And I haven't said that about too many books in my life. It's no surprise to me that no American publisher has picked up the rights to this book yet. And to think I had to pay a premium to get this book shipped from England! What a waste!

Have A "Blue" Christmas

One of my favorite CDs for this time of year is "Blue Yule: Christmas Blues & R&B Classics," a compilation of blues and R&B tunes fitting for the season. 

The disc includes songs by John Lee Hooker, Louis Jordan, Detroit Junior, Lightnin' Hopkins, Sonny Boy Williamson, and Charles Brown, among others.

This is a good antidote to the same old canned Christmas music which seems to be everywhere. Give me these blues tunes AND a little Handel and Bach -- and I'm good for the season!

That'll Never Happen No More

Here's a really nice version of the Blind Blake classic by John Jackson, circa 1970.

And where can I get a pair of socks like that? Wow.

A Nice Little Ditty

A nice little version of a Buddy Moss tune. Love the overalls.