Re: Walter 'Red' Parham

[Pat Missin <pat@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Tim Bennett wrote:
>>
>He was extremely talented. I can certainly hear the TB in his first position
>playing...
>
>I was thinking he probably switched to pucker to do the dog howls/woofing
>and the chicken clucking. 

Good point - the chicken cluck is probably much easier to do with a
pucker embouchure.

>That's probably because I couldn't do it from a TB
>embouchre. (I have no theories at all on the mule braying!)

I do that one by TBing the high bit, then pulling back to pucker for
the low part. That may or may not be how Parham did it, I don't know.

>Do you know of any other bluegrass players of comparable ability? Excluding
>the modern guys...

Well, he's not really a bluegrass player. His style is similar in many
respects to DeFord Bailey, Doc Watson, etc. That fascinating twilight
zone where Anglo-American and African-American influences collide.

 -- Pat.