Blues fiddle
Encyclopedia
Blues violin or fiddle originated as a variety of American fiddle
and is the expressive interpretive performance of a relatively standardized repertoire of music from the various blues genres (Piedmont, Delta, blues-rock, country blues) on a violin which may have been outfitted with a flattened bridge, an electric pickup, and different strings. Like all blues music it is based on expressive performance and human emotion. The blues is rooted in the African music of the American slaves who brought their music them from Africa. Many played the banjo but music quickly spread to the fiddle and the blues became a mix of western and African music. Violin, Sing The Blues For Me won Best Historic Blues Album of 2000, and according to its liner notes "violin played a significant role in the early history of recorded blues, with its crying vibratos and sliding notes creating a dramatic and soulful sound".
or a related blues progression, repeated. The chords used tend to be seventh chords of I, IV and V (root
, subdominant
and dominant).
with the supplemental “blue notes.” An essential quality of blues improvisation on any instrument is the ability to transpose licks from one key to another.
is not used as a routine method of making notes sound pretty. It is used for special effect, in some cases with exaggerated wide vibrato or in conjunction with slides and other techniques.
and Texas
. He is best known for his work as a blues musician, but embraced other styles of music, having "spent his career fighting purism by synthesizing old blues, country
, jazz
, Cajun music
and R&B styles"
He was an acclaimed multi-instrumentalist, who played an array of musical instruments such as guitar, fiddle
, mandolin
, viola
as well as harmonica
and drums. He won a Grammy Award for Best Traditional Blues Album
in 1982 for his album, Alright Again! He is regarded as one of the most influential exponents of blues fiddle
and has had enormous influence in American fiddle
circles.
(John Henry Creach, 1917-1994) played for Jefferson Airplane (1970–1975), Hot Tuna, Jefferson Starship, Jefferson Starship - The Next Generation, the San Francisco All-Stars (1979–1984), The Dinosaurs (1982–1989), and Steve Taylor.
Creach began playing violin in Chicago bars when the family moved there in 1935, and eventually joined a local cabaret band, the Chocolate Music Bars. Moving to L.A. in 1945, he played in the Chi Chi Club, spent time working on an ocean liner, appeared in "a couple of pictures", and performed as a duo with Nina Russell.
In 1992, he became one of the original members of Jefferson Starship - The Next Generation.
is a polished eclectic violinist and fiddle player whose depth of knowledge includes blues to a degree sufficient to win a distribution contract for pedagogic material in the field, however he is not a blues specialist. His promotional material nevertheless emphasizes the utility of his "deep knowledge of the violin... will help bring your fiddle playing to a whole new level. Using a “call and response” interactive teaching method, you’ll trade licks with Darol as you learn tunes, riffs and styles from the Mississippi Delta to blues-inflected bluegrass, bebop, jazz and even rock and roll." All of these styles are blended in a teaching aid entitled "Blues on the fiddle."
The fiddle is a perfect vehicle for the blues, with its slides and expressive, vocal-like intonation.
Anger draws on riffs from Sonny Rollins
’ riff blues Sonny Moon for Two. Another source for the Anger method is Cool Blues by Charlie Parker
, is "another great riff blues". “He rounds out this perhaps formidable assignment with "shorter but more complex licks with slides, triplets and other important stylistic moves".
African-American Fiddlers 1926-1949
Old Hat CD-1002
Reviewed by Ed Ward
is subject to the same influence that rock music embodies; just as the Rolling Stones, Eric Clapton
and Led Zeppellin drew upon Willie Dixon
and the Allman Brothers drew on Elmore James
, blues fiddlers such as Clarence Gatemouth Brown and Papa John have interfused with rock.
. However the music has extensions in Texas particularly Outlaws
such as Waylon Jennings
and Willie Nelson
who are associated with that distinctive Texas sound. Waylon was known to pick up a fiddle and Texas blues and blues rock musicians are legendary: Johnny WInter
, Stevie Ray Vaughn, and so many more at that can be viewed at the list of Texas blues musicians. Multi-instrumentalist Randy Crouch
plays fiddle and identifies as a blues man with a connection in the converging Oklahoma and Texas Red Dirt traditions.
(attributed to an area of Oklahoma City
called Deep Deuce
), Western swing
(attributed to Cain's Ballroom
in Tulsa
), and Leon Russell's
Tulsa Sound
from his Tulsa church-turned-into-studio. Like those three, Red Dirt music grew from a specific place in Stillwater. The place was an old two-story, five-bedroom house called "The Farm" - for two decades the center of what evolved into the Red Dirt scene. The house, located on the outskirts of Stillwater, was the country home of Bob Childers. Eventually Childers left The Farm, but the Red Dirt scene continued to grow and thrive. Childers said, "I found something in Stillwater that I just didn't find anywhere else. And I looked everywhere from Nashville to Austin. I always came back to Stillwater - it's like a fountainhead for folks trying to get their vision."
^ a b c Wright, Leif M. Greatness wears a big beard: World's best rock fiddle player also inspires. OK Weekend.com. July 20, 2007. Retrieved January 8, 2009.
^ Tryggestad, Erik and Colberg, Chris. Weekend Look: In town and around. The Oklahoman, November 3, 2006. Retrieved January 8, 2009.
^ a b c Blogspot.com. An Interview with Randy Crouch. Formerly published on the now defunct Texas Troubadours website. September 5, 2007. Retrieved January 12, 2009.
^ a b Critter, Chris B. The 'green' beginnings of red dirt. The Current, December, 2008, p. 68-9. Retrieved January 9, 2009.
^ Critter, Chris B. The farm that grew the red dirt. The Current, October, 2008, p. 14-5. Retrieved January 9, 2009.
^ Conner, Thomas. Guthrie folk festival "matures". Tulsa World, July 15, 2002. Retrieved January 9, 2009.
^ Woody Guthrie Folk Festival website. Sneak Preview of 2007 Woody Guthrie Folk Festival Entertainers. Retrieved January 8, 2009.
^ Reverbnation.com. Randy Crouch. Retrieved January 12, 2009.
American fiddle
This page is about fiddle music in the USA. For other North American styles, see Fiddle#Fiddling_styles.American fiddle playing began with the early settlers who found that the small viol family instruments were portable and rugged. According to Ron Yule, "John Utie, a 1620 immigrant, settled in...
and is the expressive interpretive performance of a relatively standardized repertoire of music from the various blues genres (Piedmont, Delta, blues-rock, country blues) on a violin which may have been outfitted with a flattened bridge, an electric pickup, and different strings. Like all blues music it is based on expressive performance and human emotion. The blues is rooted in the African music of the American slaves who brought their music them from Africa. Many played the banjo but music quickly spread to the fiddle and the blues became a mix of western and African music. Violin, Sing The Blues For Me won Best Historic Blues Album of 2000, and according to its liner notes "violin played a significant role in the early history of recorded blues, with its crying vibratos and sliding notes creating a dramatic and soulful sound".
Repertoire
Country dances, rags, stomps, and folk songs. Blues tunes typically consist of the famed twelve bar bluesTwelve bar blues
The 12-bar blues is one of the most popular chord progressions in popular music, including the blues. The blues progression has a distinctive form in lyrics and phrase and chord structure and duration...
or a related blues progression, repeated. The chords used tend to be seventh chords of I, IV and V (root
Root
In vascular plants, the root is the organ of a plant that typically lies below the surface of the soil. This is not always the case, however, since a root can also be aerial or aerating . Furthermore, a stem normally occurring below ground is not exceptional either...
, subdominant
Subdominant
In music, the subdominant is the technical name for the fourth tonal degree of the diatonic scale. It is so called because it is the same distance "below" the tonic as the dominant is above the tonic - in other words, the tonic is the dominant of the subdominant. It is also the note immediately...
and dominant).
Technique
Blues fiddle or blues violin utilizes the pentatonic (five-note) blues scaleBlues scale
The term blues scale is used to describe a few scales with differing numbers of pitches and related characteristics. See: blues.The hexatonic, or six note, blues scale consists of the minor pentatonic scale plus the 4th or 5th degree...
with the supplemental “blue notes.” An essential quality of blues improvisation on any instrument is the ability to transpose licks from one key to another.
Vibrato
In blues, vibratoVibrato
Vibrato is a musical effect consisting of a regular, pulsating change of pitch. It is used to add expression to vocal and instrumental music. Vibrato is typically characterised in terms of two factors: the amount of pitch variation and the speed with which the pitch is varied .-Vibrato and...
is not used as a routine method of making notes sound pretty. It is used for special effect, in some cases with exaggerated wide vibrato or in conjunction with slides and other techniques.
Proponents
- Lonnie Johnson
- Henry Sims "raw Delta blues"
- The Memphis Jug Band
- Nigel MacLean (Australia)
- Howard Armstrong, also known as “Louie Bluie,” whose career in music spanned seven decades.
Gatemouth
Clarence "Gatemouth" Brown (April 18, 1924 — September 10, 2005) was an American musician from LouisianaLouisiana
Louisiana is a state located in the southern region of the United States of America. Its capital is Baton Rouge and largest city is New Orleans. Louisiana is the only state in the U.S. with political subdivisions termed parishes, which are local governments equivalent to counties...
and Texas
Texas
Texas is the second largest U.S. state by both area and population, and the largest state by area in the contiguous United States.The name, based on the Caddo word "Tejas" meaning "friends" or "allies", was applied by the Spanish to the Caddo themselves and to the region of their settlement in...
. He is best known for his work as a blues musician, but embraced other styles of music, having "spent his career fighting purism by synthesizing old blues, country
Country music
Country music is a popular American musical style that began in the rural Southern United States in the 1920s. It takes its roots from Western cowboy and folk music...
, jazz
Jazz
Jazz is a musical style that originated at the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States. It was born out of a mix of African and European music traditions. From its early development until the present, jazz has incorporated music from 19th and 20th...
, Cajun music
Cajun music
Cajun music, an emblematic music of Louisiana, is rooted in the ballads of the French-speaking Acadians of Canada. Cajun music is often mentioned in tandem with the Creole-based, Cajun-influenced zydeco form, both of Acadiana origin...
and R&B styles"
He was an acclaimed multi-instrumentalist, who played an array of musical instruments such as guitar, fiddle
Fiddle
The term fiddle may refer to any bowed string musical instrument, most often the violin. It is also a colloquial term for the instrument used by players in all genres, including classical music...
, mandolin
Mandolin
A mandolin is a musical instrument in the lute family . It descends from the mandore, a soprano member of the lute family. The mandolin soundboard comes in many shapes—but generally round or teardrop-shaped, sometimes with scrolls or other projections. A mandolin may have f-holes, or a single...
, viola
Viola
The viola is a bowed string instrument. It is the middle voice of the violin family, between the violin and the cello.- Form :The viola is similar in material and construction to the violin. A full-size viola's body is between and longer than the body of a full-size violin , with an average...
as well as harmonica
Harmonica
The harmonica, also called harp, French harp, blues harp, and mouth organ, is a free reed wind instrument used primarily in blues and American folk music, jazz, country, and rock and roll. It is played by blowing air into it or drawing air out by placing lips over individual holes or multiple holes...
and drums. He won a Grammy Award for Best Traditional Blues Album
Grammy Award for Best Traditional Blues Album
The Grammy Award for Best Traditional Blues Album was awarded from 1983 to 2011. From 2001 to 2003 the award recipients included the producers and engineers as well as the artists...
in 1982 for his album, Alright Again! He is regarded as one of the most influential exponents of blues fiddle
Blues fiddle
Blues violin or fiddle originated as a variety of American fiddle and is the expressive interpretive performance of a relatively standardized repertoire of music from the various blues genres on a violin which may have been outfitted with a flattened bridge, an electric pickup, and different strings...
and has had enormous influence in American fiddle
American fiddle
This page is about fiddle music in the USA. For other North American styles, see Fiddle#Fiddling_styles.American fiddle playing began with the early settlers who found that the small viol family instruments were portable and rugged. According to Ron Yule, "John Utie, a 1620 immigrant, settled in...
circles.
Papa John
Papa John CreachPapa John Creach
Papa John Creach played for Jefferson Airplane , Hot Tuna, Jefferson Starship, Jefferson Starship - The Next Generation, the San Francisco All-Stars , The Dinosaurs , and Steve Taylor...
(John Henry Creach, 1917-1994) played for Jefferson Airplane (1970–1975), Hot Tuna, Jefferson Starship, Jefferson Starship - The Next Generation, the San Francisco All-Stars (1979–1984), The Dinosaurs (1982–1989), and Steve Taylor.
Creach began playing violin in Chicago bars when the family moved there in 1935, and eventually joined a local cabaret band, the Chocolate Music Bars. Moving to L.A. in 1945, he played in the Chi Chi Club, spent time working on an ocean liner, appeared in "a couple of pictures", and performed as a duo with Nina Russell.
In 1992, he became one of the original members of Jefferson Starship - The Next Generation.
Pedagogy
Darol AngerDarol Anger
-Career:Darol Anger entered popular music at the age of 21 as a founding member of The David Grisman Quintet. Anger played fiddle to David Grisman's mandolin in The David Grisman Quintet's 1977 debut. He co-founded the Turtle Island String Quartet with David Balakrishnan in 1985 and performed,...
is a polished eclectic violinist and fiddle player whose depth of knowledge includes blues to a degree sufficient to win a distribution contract for pedagogic material in the field, however he is not a blues specialist. His promotional material nevertheless emphasizes the utility of his "deep knowledge of the violin... will help bring your fiddle playing to a whole new level. Using a “call and response” interactive teaching method, you’ll trade licks with Darol as you learn tunes, riffs and styles from the Mississippi Delta to blues-inflected bluegrass, bebop, jazz and even rock and roll." All of these styles are blended in a teaching aid entitled "Blues on the fiddle."
The fiddle is a perfect vehicle for the blues, with its slides and expressive, vocal-like intonation.
Anger draws on riffs from Sonny Rollins
Sonny Rollins
Theodore Walter "Sonny" Rollins is a Grammy-winning American jazz tenor saxophonist. Rollins is widely recognized as one of the most important and influential jazz musicians. A number of his compositions, including "St...
’ riff blues Sonny Moon for Two. Another source for the Anger method is Cool Blues by Charlie Parker
Charlie Parker
Charles Parker, Jr. , famously called Bird or Yardbird, was an American jazz saxophonist and composer....
, is "another great riff blues". “He rounds out this perhaps formidable assignment with "shorter but more complex licks with slides, triplets and other important stylistic moves".
Blues fiddle discography
Violin, Sing The Blues For Me- VIOLIN, SING THE BLUES FOR ME
African-American Fiddlers 1926-1949
Old Hat CD-1002
Reviewed by Ed Ward
Rock violin or rock fiddle
Rock violinRock violin
Rock violin is rock music which utilizes violin in its instrumental lineup. This includes rock music only and does not include classical style music using melodic motifs from rock....
is subject to the same influence that rock music embodies; just as the Rolling Stones, Eric Clapton
Eric Clapton
Eric Patrick Clapton, CBE, is an English guitarist and singer-songwriter. Clapton is the only three-time inductee to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame: once as a solo artist, and separately as a member of The Yardbirds and Cream. Clapton has been referred to as one of the most important and...
and Led Zeppellin drew upon Willie Dixon
Willie Dixon
William James "Willie" Dixon was an American blues musician, vocalist, songwriter, arranger and record producer. A Grammy Award winner who was proficient on both the Upright bass and the guitar, as well as his own singing voice, Dixon is arguably best known as one of the most prolific songwriters...
and the Allman Brothers drew on Elmore James
Elmore James
Elmore James was an American blues guitarist, singer, songwriter and band leader. He was known as "the King of the Slide Guitar" and had a unique guitar style, noted for his use of loud amplification and his stirring voice.-Biography:James was born Elmore Brooks in the old Richland community in...
, blues fiddlers such as Clarence Gatemouth Brown and Papa John have interfused with rock.
Red dirt
Red Dirt Music gets its name from the color of soil found in OklahomaOklahoma
Oklahoma is a state located in the South Central region of the United States of America. With an estimated 3,751,351 residents as of the 2010 census and a land area of 68,667 square miles , Oklahoma is the 28th most populous and 20th-largest state...
. However the music has extensions in Texas particularly Outlaws
Outlaw country
Outlaw country is a subgenre of country music, most popular during the late 1960s and the 1970s , sometimes referred to as the outlaw movement or simply outlaw music...
such as Waylon Jennings
Waylon Jennings
Waylon Arnold Jennings was an American country music singer, songwriter, and musician. Jennings began playing at eight. He began performing at twelve, on KVOW radio. Jennings formed a band The Texas Longhorns. Jennings worked as a D.J on KVOW, KDAV and KLLL...
and Willie Nelson
Willie Nelson
Willie Hugh Nelson is an American country music singer-songwriter, as well as an author, poet, actor, and activist. The critical success of the album Shotgun Willie , combined with the critical and commercial success of Red Headed Stranger and Stardust , made Nelson one of the most recognized...
who are associated with that distinctive Texas sound. Waylon was known to pick up a fiddle and Texas blues and blues rock musicians are legendary: Johnny WInter
Johnny Winter
John Dawson "Johnny" Winter III is an American blues guitarist, singer, and producer. Best known for his late 1960s and 1970s high-energy blues-rock albums and live performances, Winter also produced three Grammy Award-winning albums for blues legend Muddy Waters...
, Stevie Ray Vaughn, and so many more at that can be viewed at the list of Texas blues musicians. Multi-instrumentalist Randy Crouch
Randy Crouch
Randy Crouch is an Oklahoma-based multi-instrumentalist. In eastern Oklahoma, Crouch is best known as a fiddle player. Although he has been referred to as "the world's best rock fiddler," Crouch also plays guitar and pedal steel among other instruments.-Biography:Growing up the son of a...
plays fiddle and identifies as a blues man with a connection in the converging Oklahoma and Texas Red Dirt traditions.
History
Oklahoma has been the source of several pop music movements that can be traced not only to a specific city, but a specific location within the city. Those music scenes include Kansas City jazzKansas City Jazz
Kansas City Jazz is a style of jazz that developed in Kansas City, Missouri and the surrounding Kansas City Metropolitan Area during the 1930s and marked the transition from the structured big band style to the musical improvisation style of Bebop...
(attributed to an area of Oklahoma City
Oklahoma City, Oklahoma
Oklahoma City is the capital and the largest city in the state of Oklahoma. The county seat of Oklahoma County, the city ranks 31st among United States cities in population. The city's population, from the 2010 census, was 579,999, with a metro-area population of 1,252,987 . In 2010, the Oklahoma...
called Deep Deuce
Deep Deuce
Deep Deuce historic neighborhood is a district in Downtown Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. It consists mostly of low-rise apartment buildings and formerly vacant mixed-use buildings and shops....
), Western swing
Western swing
Western swing music is a subgenre of American country music that originated in the late 1920s in the West and South among the region's Western string bands...
(attributed to Cain's Ballroom
Cain's Ballroom
Cain's Ballroom is a historic music venue in Tulsa, Oklahoma, built in 1924 to serve as a garage for one of Tulsa's founders, Tate Brady. Madison W. "Daddy" Cain purchased the building in 1930 and named it , where he charged 10¢ for dance lessons. The academy was the site of the Texas Playboys'...
in Tulsa
Tulsa, Oklahoma
Tulsa is the second-largest city in the state of Oklahoma and 46th-largest city in the United States. With a population of 391,906 as of the 2010 census, it is the principal municipality of the Tulsa Metropolitan Area, a region with 937,478 residents in the MSA and 988,454 in the CSA. Tulsa's...
), and Leon Russell's
Leon Russell
Claude Russell Bridges , known professionally as Leon Russell, is an American musician and songwriter, who has recorded as a session musician, sideman, and maintained a solo career in music....
Tulsa Sound
The Tulsa Sound
The Tulsa Sound is a musical style that originated in Tulsa, Oklahoma. It was a mix of Rockabilly, Country, Rock 'n' Roll, and Blues sounds of the late 1950s and early 1960s. Tulsa Sound artists include JJ Cale, Rocky Frisco, Leon Russell, Elvin Bishop, Roger Tillison, Gene Crose, David Gates,...
from his Tulsa church-turned-into-studio. Like those three, Red Dirt music grew from a specific place in Stillwater. The place was an old two-story, five-bedroom house called "The Farm" - for two decades the center of what evolved into the Red Dirt scene. The house, located on the outskirts of Stillwater, was the country home of Bob Childers. Eventually Childers left The Farm, but the Red Dirt scene continued to grow and thrive. Childers said, "I found something in Stillwater that I just didn't find anywhere else. And I looked everywhere from Nashville to Austin. I always came back to Stillwater - it's like a fountainhead for folks trying to get their vision."
Additional resources
b Glenn, Eddie.Fiddlin' Folk. Talequah Daily Press, June 25, 2007. Retrieved January 8, 2009.^ a b c Wright, Leif M. Greatness wears a big beard: World's best rock fiddle player also inspires. OK Weekend.com. July 20, 2007. Retrieved January 8, 2009.
^ Tryggestad, Erik and Colberg, Chris. Weekend Look: In town and around. The Oklahoman, November 3, 2006. Retrieved January 8, 2009.
^ a b c Blogspot.com. An Interview with Randy Crouch. Formerly published on the now defunct Texas Troubadours website. September 5, 2007. Retrieved January 12, 2009.
^ a b Critter, Chris B. The 'green' beginnings of red dirt. The Current, December, 2008, p. 68-9. Retrieved January 9, 2009.
^ Critter, Chris B. The farm that grew the red dirt. The Current, October, 2008, p. 14-5. Retrieved January 9, 2009.
^ Conner, Thomas. Guthrie folk festival "matures". Tulsa World, July 15, 2002. Retrieved January 9, 2009.
^ Woody Guthrie Folk Festival website. Sneak Preview of 2007 Woody Guthrie Folk Festival Entertainers. Retrieved January 8, 2009.
^ Reverbnation.com. Randy Crouch. Retrieved January 12, 2009.