Re: [Harp-L] Juke and Leap Frog

[harmonica@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx]

Hi, just a comment to this. When listening carefully to Little
Walter you hear a lot of pulls and slaps. And how he accompanies himself
between the phrases. Also on Juke, a lot. A style I think he had cause
played so much alone before with a band. In the opening of Too Late this
can be easily heard. Goes between the main playing to accompanies in the
low register. Without the slaps, pulls, tongue blocking and that kind of
accompanies impossible to catch Little Walter sound. If needed or
wanted. The "melodies" are easy to learn. These things really hard. That
is why "nobody" sounds like Walter. Cotton played and plays a lot of
Walters riffs etc. but without this Walter style. James has his own unik
sound although playing a lot of Walters phrases. So in this way worth
trying to play everything like Walter in Juke and other of his songs to
learn those things that can be useful sometimes even if you want to be
yourself with your own sound. This is how I feel. 

Helge


www.helgetallqvist.com  

On Mon, 1 Jun 2015 10:32:37 -0700, Patrick
Lines wrote: 

> I read an interview with James Cotton where he said he
thought it was 
> ridiculous that all these harp players were trying to
play Juke note by note 
> when live Little Walter never played it the
same night to night.
> 
> -----Original Message----- 
> From: The
Iceman
> Sent: Monday, June 1, 2015 8:56 AM
> To: dougharps@xxxxxxxxx
[1] ; harp-l@xxxxxxxxxx [2]
> Subject: Re: [Harp-L] Juke and Leap Frog
>

> I get the idea that LW may have always played his tunes somewhat
differently 
> rather than memorize and repeat - sort of a harmonica
Billie Holliday
> vie
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Doug
Schroer 
> To: Harp-l for posting 
> Sent: Mon, Jun 1, 2015 11:15 am
>
Subject: [Harp-L] Juke and Leap Frog
> 
> After listening once again to
the hit and alternate versions of "Juke" I
> think
> it is evident that
LW had a lot of phrases he could use to play over
> 12 bar
> segments of
an instrumental song. My view is that he would play to
> this
>
instrumental groove and use whatever phrases appealed to him at the
>
time.
> There are far more differences in the two versions than
similarities
> due to his
> use of different phrases or different
renditions of similar
> phrases for each 12
> bar segment.
> 
> Either
there was no one version of this song and he made it up
> as he went
>
each time, playing whichever phrase passed through his mind, or he
>
was
> forced to shorten his long live song to fit the record format.
Perhaps
> he
> would play a much longer version live that included many
more phrases
> than
> could fit on a record side.
> 
> My belief is that
his musical mind was full
> of ideas he could play over 12
> bar
segments, some his own, some riffs or
> melodies from other songs he
had
> heard played by horn bands, and he would just
> GO... and play.
>

> Without the "Leap Frog" riff on the record would he have had
> a hit?
I
> think so. That is a small part of the song.
> 
> Doug S.

 


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