Re: [Harp-L] Re: Blues Grooves

[Ken Deifik <kenneth.d@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

With all this excellent discussion of existing grooves, here's a bit of 
history and a challenge for the highly ambitious:

History: Every single one of those grooves was an invention of 
musicians.  Real live people created those rhythms, often quite 
intentionally.  Some were refined from older grooves, some were very new 
ideas in their time.

For instance, though it's not really considered a standard blues groove, 
the groove on Al Green's record Let's Stay Together was compelling enough 
to make it a huge hit and frankly, a standard recording.  That groove was 
invented, created, written by the drummer Al Jackson who is mainly known 
for his work with Booker T and the MG's.  He is known to have sat in his 
studio with his kit for many, many hours, developing and sweating, in order 
to come up with that groove.

It's so good that Al Jackson is credited as one of the writers on Let's 
Stay Together.  This is verrrrry uncommon.

The drummer Bernard Purdie, who works with our very own Rob Paparozzi, has 
invented some of the most influential grooves of the age.  You get the 
idea, grooves are musical composition.

The producer Jerry Wexler wanted to hear a new groove from the Stax band 
during a Wilson Pickett recording session, so he went out on the floor and 
demonstrated The Jerk, a popular dance up in NYC at the time.  Wexler and 
the Stax band invented an immortal new rhythm at that session.

My impulse to point this out comes from the thought that some of the newer 
musicians on this list may see a list of blues grooves and think, well 
that's it, that's the bible, there's nothing new to do.  But frankly, the 
study of the grooves that exist already is a fantastic thing because not 
only does it give you a wide vocabulary of rhythms to choose from --- but 
it gives you the tools to invent your own grooves.

This is a worthy goal, too.  Too many recordings and bands use the same ol' 
grooves over and over.  Frankly, when a record is boring, it's often 
because you've heard the groove on too many other recordings, probably done 
better.

So here's a project for you newer players: master a groove on the Harp-l 
list of Blues Grooves with your band.  Really master it.  Listen to the 
best example and COPY them.

And once you've got that groove under your belts, experiment with altering 
it.  Try lots of different changes.  Most will suck.  Then you'll hit one 
that KILLS.

That's how it's done.

K