[Harp-L] Re: impact players/Norton Buffalo

[Bobbie Giordano <bobg@xxxxxxx>]

In December, 2003, I wrote this on HarpTalk in answer to a question
about this solo:

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The "Runaway" solo is a series of eight 2nd position licks using four
harps, not just one... I believe it's F, Eb, Db, and C harps in that
order, then "essentially" repeated, but with the individualized
ornaments and the final note run up at the end, etc.

He spoke with me about it at SPAH [as I'd brought my copy of Bonnie
Raitt's Sweet Forgiveness LP with me for him to autograph - the only
one on it! ;)] and he told again how he was sick as a dog that day
and hardly in any mood to go into the studio.  But he did, and did it
in one take, too, as I recall.  But only after he had repeatedly
rejected the way the producers were trying to get it done.  Finally,
he just basically said, "Look, I have an idea what might work; let me
just go for it and see what happens."  Voila! "Runaway"!!
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In the jacket of my copy of Bonnie Raitt's "Sweet Forgiveness" LP with 
"Runaway" on it, I keep a copy of this [below] edited version of a post
sent to Harp-L years ago by a fellow named Stew Crossen who interviewed 
Norton about this solo.  No clue what Stew is doing these days, but he
was a DJ in Connecticut for awhile with a Sunday Night Blues show online,
and did various interviews.  I suppose maybe this was one of them... 
Enjoy the info!

=[BOBBIE]=

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To: Harp-L
From: bfstew@... (Stew Crossen)
Date: Sat, 10 Aug 1996 13:52:05 -0400
Subject: Re: runaway - reply

<...>

In a recent conversation I had with Norton he told me this:

"Well, Runaway that I did with Bonnie Raitt was kind of interesting.
I was on tour with Steve in 77, we were playing the forum in Los
Angeles and I got this message at my hotel. Urgent, please call. So I
made my phone call for Bonnie and I had met Bonnie a few times and we
had played some together, jammed a little bit. I really loved her
playing, still do. They were trying to put this record together. So,
I went by the studio and took a listen to what they were doing and I
said I had to pick up some other harmonicas, so lets schedule for a
couple of days from now. So a couple of days later, I came down with
the most horrible case of the flu. I had a 100 and something odd
degree fever.

But when I was thinking of Runaway, I was thinking of that Del
Shannon (Norton imitates the solo) you know a real dorky solo! So I
went in there and this track is grooving pretty good, but for some
reason in my head, I got this Del Shannon thing going on and I'm
trying to play chromatic on it and it's just not working. By then
they'd already tried Tom Scott on sax. They'd tried Billy Payne on
keyboards. They'd tried Bonnie on guitar and just hadn't come up with
anything and I'm out there doing this dumb stuff on chromatic and
it's just not working. So, they're ready to shine me on and I'm just
sweating. I'm feeling horrible and not telling them that I'm sick. So
they're about ready to cut me loose and I said "Look, I'll tell you
what. Let me do what I would do if this was my record". And it takes
four harmonicas to play that song the way I did it, and it's twice
through, so it's eight harmonicas. Eight harmonica changes anyway.
So, I put all my harmonicas all out ready to go, and they start the
tape and I got my eyes closed and just playing the s**t and when I
look up, they're just jumping up and down and screaming gin the
studio and just raving about it.

That was it. I think I might have cleaned up one little spot on it.
The rest is what you hear. But they'd already printed the record
cover. Because they were so far behind on production that the first
40 thousand or 50 thousand albums that came out, didn't have anybody
credited for the harmonica. So all these people were playing it, well
you know, Buttefield had played with Bonnie on something before hand
and Junior Wells had also recorded with Bonnie on some stuff in the
past. So all these people, all these DJ's across the country played
Runaway, which got a lot of airplay. It was the first song that she
got that cracked that market open. All these people are trying to
figure out who the harmonica player was. A lot of them thought it was
Butterfield. A lot of them thought it was Junior Wells. And then
they're hearing it's Norton Buffalo.

Who's Norton Buffalo?"

<...>

Beef Stew