Any recommendation for blues playing on acoustic guitar?

[Bol]

I've never been a big fan of the blues music, and know nothing about it really. But yesterday, as I was driving, I was listening to Fresh Air on NPR, and Terry Gross was interviewing Phil and Dave Alvin who are blues singer-guitarists. Each played and sang a song with just his acoustic guitar and I found it fascinating. I thought the guitar playing sounded almost avant grade -- almost like Derek Bailey. I was wondering if people could recommend some good blues played on acoustic guitar, with or without vocals, and with or without any other instrumental backings. Thanks.

[Chuck Nessa]

No easy answer considering your starting point. The folks on the show played stuff based on '40s styled playing which evolved from earlier styles. Blues is basically a vocal folk music with instrumental backing/commentary. Fans brought up on rock focused on the guitar playing (because they had fingers and couldn't really sing) and this has distorted the history. Maybe Allen Lowe could elaborate.

Have I pissed of enough folks now?

[paul secor]

You might start with The Best There Ever Was (Yazoo) - http://www.amazon.com/Best-There-Ever-Was-Legendary/dp/B0000AGWIQ/ref=sr_1_1?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1404605370&sr=1-1&keywords=the+best+there+ever+was

It's an excellent compilation of acoustic blues from the 1920s and 30s, and it will give you a good taste of a number of performers and styles. If you hear music you like, you can move on from there.

If you're looking for more recent recordings, Mississippi John Hurt: Today! (Vanguard) - http://www.amazon.com/Today-Mississippi-John-Hurt/dp/B000000EJ2/ref=sr_1_5?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1404605700&sr=1-5&keywords=mississippi+john+hurt is worth checking out. I can't imagine that too many people wouldn't enjoy it.

And a more recent recording, Etta Baker: One -Dime Blues (Rounder) http://www.amazon.com/One-Dime-Blues-Etta-Baker/dp/B0000002ZG/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1404605950&sr=8-1&keywords=etta+baker+one-dime+blues has some very finger-picked guitar. This one is mostly instrumental.

This is a very, very small sampling of the music that's available. But it might be a start that leads you to new musical discoveries in your life.

[kh1958]

Here are a couple of my favorites of more recent vintage:

J.B. Lenoir, Vietnam Blues http://www.amazon.com/Vietnam-Blues-Complete-L-R/dp/B0000014PZ/ref=sr_1_1?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1404606419&sr=1-1&keywords=J.B.+Lenoir+Vietnam+blues

Smoky Babe, Hottest Brand Goin' http://www.amazon.com/Hottest-Brand-Goin-Smoky-Babe/dp/B00005N818/ref=sr_1_2?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1404606628&sr=1-2&keywords=Smoky+Babe

You can buy almost any blues compilation of 1920s/30s material on the Yazoo or Blues Image labels and it will be good.

[danasgoodstuff]

Since you mentioned Derek Bailey, I hear a connection to him in John Fahey, who recorded much besides blues, but whose guitar playing is pretty much blues-based. Also I think the guitar playing on Muddy Waters' Folk Singer is particularly fine - Muddy and Buddy Guy on acoustics.

[StarThrower]

You can go for the originals like Robert Johnson, Son House, Lightnin' Hopkins, Reverand Gary Davis, Blind Blake, Blind Willie McTell.

Or if you want high fidelity modern recordings, there are many fine players including Rory Block, Roy Bookbinder, Paul Geremia, Bob Brozman, and English guitarists who play folk and blues including Bert Jansch, John Renbourn, Martin Simpson. The Essential John Renbourn has quite a bit of good blues playing. Geoff Muldaur is another fine player and singer. Try his album, Password.

[Larry Kart]

[Peter Friedman]

Lightnin' Hopkins has long been one of my favorites.

[clifford_thornton]

First thing in this vein that I bought - after hearing/liking Fahey et al., and this certainly dates me to about fourteen or fifteen years ago - was a compilation that Revenant put out called American Primitive Volume 1: Raw Pre-War Gospel. Completely blew my mind. Though certainly far from knowledgable about the subject, I've dilettanted my way through quite a few prewar LP comps and haven't been let down once.

You might like Robert Pete Williams, whose guitar playing I have always found somewhat abstract. The Takoma LP is great.

[A Lark Ascending]

I love the sound of blues played by a skilled acoustic guitarist.

Another excellent contemporary American - Kelly Joe Phelps.

One of the 60s Brits who generally gets overlooked is Wizz Jones (though several of the big rock stars - Page, Clapton - credit him as an inspiration). Still playing today - saw him in spellbinding form last year.

Stefan Grossman has explored a wide variety of blues and related musics on guitar (sometimes with John Renbourn).

[Homefromtheforest]

I personally love John Fahey and Davy Graham for acoustic blues playing...and I'll second Clifford's recommendation of the "pre-war gospel" CD on Revenant...great stuff.

I'm a guitar player myself for 30 years now and for me nothing quite matches Fahey's taste, emotion, and sensitivity....

[Bol]

Thanks, everyone. I should have realized this before, but this is a bit dangerous -- getting interested in another genre of music!

[Neal Pomea]

John Fahey has a large catalog, so here are some recommendations for albums with more blues:

Blind Joe Death

Death Chants, Breakdowns, and Military Waltzes

Dance of Death and Other Plantation Favorites

Days Have Gone By

Voice of the Turtle

Of Rivers and Religion

Kottke, Fahey, Lang

The Great Santa Barbara Oil Slick

Red Cross

[StarThrower]

The Best Of John Fahey is a great introduction. You get a lot of music for the money.

One more guy I'll mention is Harvey Reid. He's been an independent artist from the start, and he currently has a large catalog of recordings on his own Woodpecker Records. I don't like to listen to blues only, and Harvey is a master of many styles, and he is also a great songwriter and instrumentalist. A good introduction would be his 2 CD live album, In Person. Here's a tune from the album, that is also on his DVD.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0pZbZgkhoP8

[Tom in RI]

I second the suggestion of Paul Geremia. I aso have a soft spot for Buddy Guy and Jr Wells, Alone and Acoustic. Another date I have enjoyed tremendously ove the last year is Hans Theesink and Terry Evans, Delta Time. It should be fairly easy to sample any of these online to see if they please.

[Tom in RI]

Another act to check out is Paul Rishell and Annie Raines. They have several cd's out. Not all acoustic but music of a very high caliber as far as I'm concerned.

Here's a sample of what they do:

[Hot Ptah]

Mississippi John Hurt's 1928 recordings strike me as essential.

Sylvester Weaver's "Guitar Rag", recorded in 1927, has to be heard. How did someone travel back in time many decades to 1927?

[kh1958]

And of course, any and all recordings by Lonnie Johnson (well, he does play both acoustic and electric guitars).

Edited July 6, 2014 by kh1958

[Larry Kart]

I particularly like this line from Big Joe's "Delta Blues":

Juanita's got ways like a rattlesnake,

Oh, man, she gets to the (indecipherable),

Once she starts to loving you,

It's too bad for the world.

I'd be grateful if anyone can fill in the word that ends the second line. Plainly it rhymes or half-rhymes (or less) with "world," but I can't make it out. The passage begins around the 1:18 mark in "Delta Blues" above.

[AllenLowe]

well, you guys summed it up. I would only plug my 36 CD set, Really the Blues? which has pretty much something of everything.

[paul secor]

If ragtime influenced blues guitar interests you, it's worth checking out Blind Blake. He was the best in that style.

The Best of Blind Blake (Yazoo) - http://www.amazon.com/Best-Blind-Blake/dp/B00004Y9XE/ref=sr_1_1?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1404677784&sr=1-1&keywords=blind+blake is a fine one - great music, great sound. Many of the present day finger pickers (though not Fahey) took a lot from Blake. No him - no them

[JSngry]

I particularly like this line from Big Joe's "Delta Blues":

Juanita's got ways like a rattlesnake,

Oh, man, she gets to the (indecipherable),

Once she starts to loving you,

It's too bad for the world.

I'd be grateful if anyone can fill in the word that ends the second line. Plainly it rhymes or half-rhymes (or less) with "world," but I can't make it out. The passage begins around the 1:18 mark in "Delta Blues" above.

"Squirm", rhymed with "worm", not "world".

"She gets you to squirm"..and it might be "world", but that's one of those blues words that sounds like what it sound like, don't worry about it, you know what it means, no matter, the sounds tells you what it means, and if it really needed a "word", it would be there. Instrumentalists do the same thing with notes.

[Larry Kart]

I particularly like this line from Big Joe's "Delta Blues":

Juanita's got ways like a rattlesnake,

Oh, man, she gets to the (indecipherable),

Once she starts to loving you,

It's too bad for the world.

I'd be grateful if anyone can fill in the word that ends the second line. Plainly it rhymes or half-rhymes (or less) with "world," but I can't make it out. The passage begins around the 1:18 mark in "Delta Blues" above.

"Squirm", rhymed with "worm", not "world".

"She gets you to squirm"..and it might be "world", but that's one of those blues words that sounds like what it sound like, don't worry about it, you know what it means, no matter, the sounds tells you what it means, and if it really needed a "word", it would be there.

He shoots, he scores! I'm more than willing to give up "world" for "worm."

[JSngry]

Per Chuck's dead-on comment waaaay up above, if you grow up hearing "country people" and or "Southern people" speak, it's not hard to hear at all. Same thing with any region and it's speech/vocal mannerisms, I suppose. I remember going to Sterling. IL every summer to visit my dad's side of the family, and there were times when I totally missed a word or phrase because I wasn't following the sound, it was not yet acclimated to me. That's why I dig regionality instead of mocking it, there's stories to be told just in sound/timbre/inflection/whatever. "Words" are, sometimes, a crutch for the overly literal-minded. Even when one reads, I believe one hears a voice, or voices, of the words, and it is not some "universal" voice that one is hearing. How could that be, anyway?

[Larry Kart]

Even when one reads, I believe one hears a voice, or voices, of the words, and it is not some "universal" voice that one is hearing.

Absolutely. When I read almost anything, I semi-literally hear (or discover in it, or give it) a voice, and that voice then tells me a great deal about what the text is saying. For instance, sometimes the tone of that voice modifies the ostensible sense of the text to such a degree that it more or less contradicts it. Always go with the voice.

Jazz is good training for this. So many distinct personal voices. The same notes from, say, Howard McGhee and from Fats Navarro are not the same notes.