Re: [Harp-L] First Position Blues Solos?/ listen to Gwen Foster

[David Payne <dave@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Tony, you need to check out Gwen Foster. He is the all-time First position bluesman, in my opinion. Any study of first position blues really needs to start with Gwen. He's ground zero for recorded first position blues and I'm not sure he's been bettered, or even equaled on first position. He's a wizard, I think the greatest blues harp player before the Chicago sound. Somebody knows a better BLUES player from the 1920s, I'd love to hear it. Even on the wax cylinder, you can hear the tone pouring out of these stock harps he plays. I can only imagine what it might sounded like in person. 
We've hammered this out on Harp -L before and the only second-position harp piece we've been able to come up with from Gwen is Sideline Blues. Everything else is 1st position.

Here's some songs you can listen to streaming audio of:
"My Sweet Farm Girl" Gwen Foster on 1st position blues harp, Clarence Ashley singing. 
http://honkingduck.com/rams/41d47f81e1d6f5f1813e8801b4636b94.ram
(this is a MUST listen to), lyrics one euphemism after another, "I plow her land, then I sow my seed," etc., you think "how'd they get away with this back in the 20s?" But they could get away with a lot of sexual explicitness back then. Ashley sang about that stuff all the time. A thread on that could go on forever, there's a lot of that in old music, Jimmie Rodgers makes it perfectly clear what kind of pistol he packs for the ladies in "Pistol Packin' Papa" etc. 


Bay Rum Blues 
http://honkingduck.com/rams/b08069800c285196842821847b54e87e.ram

Wilkes County Blues Foster by himself, no accompaniment
http://www.juneberry78s.com/otmsampler/374%20Gwen%20Foster%20-%20Wilkes%20County%20Blues.mp3
Black Pine Waltz, Foster by himself. 
http://www.juneberry78s.com/otmsampler/373%20Gwen%20Foster%20-%20Black%20Pine%20Waltz.mp3

O.K., here's that one 2nd position position piece, also with Ashley. Sideline Blues. The sexual metaphors are not so raunchy as the ones in "Farmgirl," but they are there.
http://honkingduck.com/rams/c386632a278a6393ede82540b2457146.ram