Fwd: Re: A heated discussion on 'Race, Gender & the Blues'

[Harri Haka]

I had the priviilige of meeting Willie "Big Eyes" Smith two months
before he died. We talked about white singers with a black voice e.g.
Tom Jones. And Charley Pride and Ray Charles doing c&w. I doubt that
blues musicians were actually influenced by c&w and  all of us can hear
this on recordings and live shows. To be a smart ass, one might say that
every musician is influenced by Beethoven. But Chuck Berry gave his
answer to that question.
Harri


29.5.2012 6:09, Tom Hyslop kirjoitti:
> Harri,
>
>  Respectfully submitted, your position as stated is simply incorrect.
>
>  Every bluesman of a certain age that I have interviewed - including
> Magic Slim, Phillip Walker, Big Jack Johnson, John Primer, and many
> others - professed a deep and abiding love for country music. Whether
> it was an innate feeling for the style or the fact that it was all
> they heard on the radio, as has been mentioned, does not much matter.
> Howlin' Wolf cited the yodeling of The Singing Brakeman, Jimmie
> Rodgers, as the inspiration for his own vocalizations. Mel Brown
> toured with Tompall Glaser, just as he did with Bobby Bland; Glaser is
> a country artist. You can look it up. Or you can continue to believe
> what you want, rather than to face facts.
>
> Best regards,
>
> tom
>
> At 3:34 AM +0300 5/29/12, Harri Haka wrote:
>> Like I was saying, there was not a general interest for country music
>> among the wider black audience. It is of course natural for a talent
>> like B.B. King to have studied all genres including country and jazz.
>> But does any of this reflect on his actual playing or singing? He has
>> flirted with U2, Eric Clapton and others in the past years but I hardly
>> find a c&w influence on any of his recordings. Mississippi John Hurt is
>> greatly respected but he was a folk singer and story teller with a
>> natural connection to country music of his time.
>> Harri
>>
>>
>> 29.5.2012 2:35, jinxblues@aol.com kirjoitti:
>>>
>>>     Not wanting to take part in the c&w discussion more than to say
>>> that
>>>     there was never a general interest in country music within the
>>> black
>>>     community.
>>>
>>>     ------------
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>     This is absolutely not true.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>     Blues people growing up in the south in the 1930s and 1940s all
>>> listened to WLAC (Nashville) with its powerful signal.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>     B.B.King told me in great detail how he had listen to Gene Autry
>>> and Red Foley and Jimmy Rogers.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>     Mississippi John Hurt's "Let the Mermaids Flirt with me" is
>>> unmistakably Jimmy Rogers'"All Around the Water Tank" a/k/a "Waiting
>>> for a Train."
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Dick Waterman
>>> 1601 Buchanan Avenue
>>> Oxford, MS 38655
>>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
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