Re: [Harp-L] 100 Authentic Blues Harmonica Licks

[Winslow Yerxa <winslowyerxa@xxxxxxxxx>]

The categories are not so neatly defined. The more you know, the more the lines blur.

When the Saints Go Marching In ("the Saints") is not a jazz tune. It's a marching band tune from the New Orleans second line tradition. Early jazz owes a lot to that particular tradition, but also to many other contributing musical streams. The Saints is not a staple in the repertoires of most jazz bands, even though they could play it if bribed sufficiently.

Meanwhile, the song form (the underlying bar structure and chord progression) for The Saints can be found in many other American styles. Saints changes, as I call them, can be found in blues songs, country songs, and even in rock&roll tunes. Some tunes (and song forms, such as Saints changes, and 12-bar and 8-bar blues) move back and forth among styles. The treatment, not the song, can define the style in such instances.


When Johnny Comes Marching Home is in a minor key, so it doesn't work at all in first position without using overblows or a harmonica in a minor tuning. You can get away with playing it in second position by bending Draw 3 down a semitone, but it lies much more easily in third or fourth positions. If you're converting it to a major-key tune that's another story. But that's a "major" change to the song's character and should be acknowledged as such.

Winslow
 
Winslow Yerxa
President, SPAH, the Society for the Preservation and Advancement of the Harmonica
Producer, the Harmonica Collective
Author, Harmonica For Dummies, ISBN 978-0-470-33729-5
            Harmonica Basics For Dummies, ASIN B005KIYPFS
            Blues Harmonica For Dummies, ISBN 978-1-1182-5269-7
Resident Expert, bluesharmonica.com
Instructor, Jazzschool Community Music School


________________________________
 From: Harmonicology [Neil Ashby] <harmonicology@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: harp-l <harp-l@xxxxxxxxxx> 
Cc: Winslow Yerxa <winslowyerxa@xxxxxxxxx> 
Sent: Saturday, June 7, 2014 6:33 AM
Subject: Re: [Harp-L] 100 Authentic Blues Harmonica Licks
 

The word I was looking for is definitely "Jazz". While there are, as Winslow mentions "several flavors of blues", then the separate labels of "blues" and "jazz" provides some way to classify those various styles.

Some tunes might be jazz in the first position and blues as played in the second position; the tune "When Johnny Comes Marching Home" is such an example (which tune in the second position sounds more like "When Johnny is Carried Home").

The tune "When the Saints Go Marching In" is often included among "blues" but is definitely jazz.

By correctly using of the labels "blues" and "jazz" then these styles of music become much more clear.