Re: [Harp-L] which came first?

[spschndr@xxxxxxx]

 In getting away with the major third, it seems like on the I chord, he mainly does only the 3/4D shake, which to me uses the minor third relationship between those two notes to suggest a minor tonality.  I've noticed that this interval sounds bluesier  or more minor against major seventh chords and minor chords, wherever you find it on the diatonic and move between it.  Like a 5/6B shake against a IV chord.
 
That 3D-4B-4D-and-back lick he does seems to happen mainly against the IV chord, where it might matter more whether the 3D has enough taken off its pitch to sound like a microtone of the IV chord's flatted seventh, rather than the minor third of the I chord.  It's a good question how purely major his 3D is on that tune, given the ability blues players develop to flatten the 3D a little even in passing.  I've read that there are microtones around the minor third that are in some sense the real 'blue third,' rather than than the precise minor third of the Western scale, which makes sense to me--it seems like blues players/singers have to master those microtones and handle that note flexibly in order to sound bluesy, and you can sure tell when a diatonic player has not learned that yet.  I thought that was true of all the blue notes, that microtones around the flatted fifth and seventh matter too, and that maybe that's what he is working with that riff.  How precise an Ab does it have to be, given where it is happening?
 
Obviously I like to think there may be a technical explanation of why a given 'feel thing' works, but don't have the formal training.
 
Plus he does clearly bend that 3Db when he stays on it at all long.  Not lingering, and the lower-pitched Bb harp, both seem to help also.  It's interesting to check the original version against James Cotton's version in A on Live and on the Move, to hear it handled with a higher-pitched harp.
 
Stephen Schneider
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