Re: [Harp-L] Don Les and cross harp

[Rick Dempster <rick.dempster@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

I think it's partly generational (ie pre rock'n'roll) and would rather say
'cultural', rather than 'ethnic'.
Speaking of 'the old days' (say pre WWII) an Anglo from, let's say,
Virginia, might very likely dig  the filth of 'blues harp', because of
cultural experience, (the first 'blues harp player was Henry Whitter, a
white, from Virginia, I think)
whereas some college educated dood from Chicago probably wouldn't have.
(Eddie Lang - OK- of Italian background, but middle class - played same
great lowdown blues with Lonnie Johnson, though it was
a bit more polished than something out of the Mississippi Delta)
There was a 'blindfold' test, in Downbeat, back in the 'fifties, where they
play Larry Adler some Little Walter.
Wow! Talk about the scene for a clash of cultures! Well, Adler is at first
somewhat derisive, pointing out that Walter isn't playing chromatically,
and that he'd 'heard this kind of thing
before' but 'Preferred it when Sonny Terry did it'. Note: unamplified, most
notably.
Now that reminds me of Malcolm X saying that he admired Sidney Poitier for
not 'conking' his hair (like, say Muddy Waters ir the big 'Process')
but if Sidney had conked his hair, he wouldn't have made it in the movie
business back then, 'cause the white audience are going to want to
see a 'kneegrow' (as Malcolm would have put it) as a folk-heroic
share-croppin' field hand, not an uppity ghetto cruising cat. Kind of
ironic.
However, Adler then goes on to say that if Walter was playing
chromatically, he could possibly be the greatest harmonica player of all
time.
Good on ya Larry!
Anyhow, good stuff, Mick, Joe, et al. More discussion on Don please, not
Less (sorry, the pun problem is genetic)
RD

On 2 May 2013 10:47, Joseph Leone <3n037@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

>
> On May 1, 2013, at 8:18 PM, Mick Zaklan wrote:
>
> >   Great to see Don on YouTube.  He's a historically important harmonica
> > player, both on bass harp and diatonic.
> >   Though I don't necessarily agree with it, I've always been fascinated
> > with Don's beef (as espoused in Kim Field's "Harmonicas, Harps, and Heavy
> > Breathers") that cross harp and blues playing have "misled" diatonic
> > harpists into "learning from each other how not to play the harmonica."
>
> Yes, I remember he was very vociferous on that point.
>
> >   If I'm understanding Don correctly, he felt that since there were no
> > "wrong" notes in cross harp to be found while following a blues
> > progression, players were more likely to noodle their way around the
> > instrument, producing their own patterns.  Recycling them over and over
> > again.  Wallowing in this security blanket of riffs instead of actually
> > learning, apparently, the basics of music.  "You don't hear saxophone
> > players or piano players playing the blues like the harmonica players
> do,"
> > Don huffs.
> >   Well, this may be true but ignores the fact that serious blues players
> > draw from a completely different historical source of instrumentalists
> and
> > recordings than saxophonists, pianists, etc.  Naturally, they would play
> > the blues differently.
>
> I think a lot had to do with his surroundings. A Polish boy in Loraine
> Ohio is not exactly coming from a blues bent. I happen to
> be Polish and Italian, spent 9 of my first 18 years in Italy, and as the
> son of a diplomat, I could HARDLY be considered a genetic candidate for
> playing blues. It just isn't bred into me.
>
> >   On the other hand, as someone well known to this list once pointed out,
> > harmonica players probably pay less attention to the chords of a tune
> than
> > other instrumentalists do.  They do tend to fall back on their ears and
> > pre-conceived riffs.
> >   Don further gripes:
> >
> > If you ask a blues player what they're playing, they'll say, "One of my
> own
> > compositions."  All of a sudden, they're not only not musicians, but
> > they're also composers.  This is one of my secret peeves about the
> > harmonica people that don't take up the harmonica and think they did.  I
> > don't use cross harp as a blues, I use it as a musician would.  The field
> > has been wasted by all these people blowing cross harp but not playing
> > anything.
>
> And here's where I agree with you totally...and not with Don.
> >
> >   I think part of Don's rant was a generational thing, a blues backlash
> > that I myself have observed quite a bit at the conventions.
>
> I think it was  as much (if not more) ethnic than generational.
>
> >  Fortunately,
> > it's died down considerably from the early days.  Believe me, it was
> > nasty.
>
> Yes, it certainly could be tense at times. I went to my first convention
> in 91 and can remember some animosity displayed by older chromatic players
> and some older diatonic players. I happened to start on chromatic at 12
> 1/2 and diatonic at 16, so I played both. I never understood the rift. Sad
> when you consider it. Like we don;t put up with enough static? lol
>
> >  Personally I would cut Don a little slack because his statement was
> > made in 1993 or prior.  I would like to think that the myriad of
> > superb diatonic players we've had at the conventions since then would
> have
> > changed his mind on this.
>
> I think so. I did some playing for him at a Buckeye in the early 90s, and
> from then on, we were friends. He felt I was melodious (his term). But
> since I
> was (basically) imitating clarinet, maybe that's what he was picking up?
>
> >  But maybe not, I suspect that you could have
> > played a perfect Little Walter or Sonny Boy solo for Don and he wouldn't
> > have been impressed.  Because it didn't sound like something a 1940's
> > clarinetist would have dreamed up.
> >   Anyway, his position (once you strip away the insults) is an
> interesting
> > one and not necessarily without some merit.  Definitely a cantankerous
> guy,
> > that's for sure.
>
> He had a sense of humor that wouldn't swing with most people. It was dry,
> veiled insulting, out and out insulting, but sometimes warm. Maybe a sort
> of Don Rickles humor. Lots of wise cracks. Once I understood him, I
> accepted it and after that I found him funny. You had to look at his eyes.
> Jo-Zeppi
>
> >
> > Mick Zaklan
>
>
>


-- 
Rick Dempster
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