Fwd: [Harp-L] Roots of Sonny Terry

["Winslow Yerxa" <winslowyerxa@xxxxxxxxx>]

Actually, Sonny was the single well-known representative of a long 
and rich tradition to bring that tradition to a wider post-war 
public. The old-time southern tradition of what I think of as 
landscape-and-call playing (trains, autos, and chases of foxes and 
escaped prisoners moving across landscapes, calls during chases and 
from lost people, along with imitiations of pigs, babies, etc,) 
included both black and white players such as:

De Ford Bailey
Kyle Wooten
William McCoy
Henry Whitter

and many others. Terry actually leared some tunes from Bailey, who 
was enormously popular as the one of the first stars of the Grand Ole 
Opry and probably influenced many players. I've been listening to the 
above four lately and am amazed at what they did - and at the tonal 
colors they could get out of a harmonica.

Pierre remarks that he thought only old--time French harmonica 
players could play that fast rhythm stuff. I take it he means French 
Canadians like Henir Lacroix, Louis Blanchette, etc. 

In fact, it seems like nearly all old-time players at one time 
understood that the diatonic harmonica was designed for alternating 
melody with chords in a rhythmic way and they developed this practice 
to a high degree of sophistication. This somehow got lost in the post 
WWII era, and rediscovering the amazing performances captured in 
Montreal, Memphis, and many other places in the 1920s and '30s can be 
a real eye-opener.

Winslow

--- In harp-l-archives@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx, tom ball <havaball@xxxx> 
wrote:
We've all talked quite a bit recently about how influential Sonny 
Terry was to all of us, and rightly so -- the man was truly 
amazing....

Ever wonder, though, who Sonny himself might have listened to?
Check out the 1929 recording of "Rain Crow Bill" by Henry Whitter:

http://www.karavanrecords.net/GGWhitter.wav