Re: [Harp-L] What is the minimum blues band?



At 12:15 PM 5/26/2007, Richard Hunter wrote:
(Note: the leader of "Treat Her Right"'s next band after that, "Morphine", had no guitar--just 2-string slide bass and baritone sax. Now that's an original sound. Great, too.)

Andy Statman and I had a band in the early 70's called the Bluebirds. The instrumentation was harp, mandolin, dobro and bass. No guitar. That forced us to really be creative with the arrangements, and I still get email from old friends who remember that band fondly.


The bassist got really interested in dobro, so sometimes the main dobro player and I would sit out completely and let him do Mack The Knife with Andy on mandolin, and of course no bass. Andy may have played clarinet or tenor sax on some numbers, I can't recall anymore, I would have taken over as the rhythm instrument, with the harmonca. I LOVE playing rhythm harmonica. We only gigged locally and never recorded. We broke up when Andy got busy with Dave Bromberg.

Leaving out the bassist and/or the guitar players can really teach you alot about how to fill out a band sound. When you get it right, the audience sticks around, when you don't they don't.

Also, leaving out instruments within your set lets you change colors and feelings, and give your set more of a 'show' feel. Last summer I did a gig where, for one song, the great drummer Sinclair Lott and I played a one chord thing, with Sinclair playing on a very sparse kit. Though this was not by any means the first time that combination was used, it sure kicked the audience up to the next place.

Buddy Miller played what he called an 'alto guitar', which was an electric guitar downtuned by a register I think, on the vonBrellas recording of Whoa Back Buck. We didn't use any bass on that cut, and the alto guitar filled everything out nicely, though filling things out nicely is Buddy Miller's stock in trade.

But the original question is about the minimum pieces for a blues band. I suspect that means the guy with the question doesn't mean a duo, but rather something that people in the audience would agree was a band, White Stripes notwithstanding. In that sense, a really strong bassist with guitar and harp would probably qualify. The real key in smaller bands, no matter how they're constituted, is to make very, very sure that each song has its own personality.

If you've got more than two slow blues, practice them all together -- that way you'll won't be able to fool yourself about whether they sound too much alike, which they should not, and you'll be able to start developing strong details that will give each song its own very distinctive magic.

The audience is king, keep them interested and excited. A small group is the best way to learn how to make each blues song, no matter what tempo, sound distinctive. Richard Hunter can play a show with just harmonicas and never repeat himself even once.

So by all means, try some small configurations out. There is no rule book that says what a blues band is or is not.





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