Blue. Stomps, & Rags #28

[Ranald]

It's time for some blues from Bill Monroe (1911-1966). Bill was born into a musical family near Rosine, Kentucky, and reluctantly took up mandolin. His brothers insisted that he remove four strings so he wouldn't play too loudly as they played together (judging by discussions on Forum about needing more volume on mandolins, people must have had better hearing in the good ol' days). Monroe claimed that the fiddler and guitarist, Arnold Schultz, who introduced him to blues, had a significant influence on his music. Unfortunately, Schultz was never recorded. No doubt a great many of you know far more than I about Bill Monroe, the "Father of Bluegrass," and others can easily find biographical information, so I'll leave it at that (information from Wikipedia).

As mentioned earlier on the Forum, blues and its definitions are rather fluid despite attempts by "purists" to limit the term to, for example, 12-bar tunes with a particular set of characteristics. The American South was and is a particularly creative region musically, in part because of the mixing of African-American and European-American musicians, including Africans, West-Indians, British-Isles-, French-, and Spanish-Americans. Musical blending resulted in a number of new musical genres. Jazz emerged at the same time as the blues, and is closely related. Other southern hybrids include rock 'n roll, bluegrass, Cajun, and zydeco, all of which are, to different degrees, influenced by blues. Of course, musicians from differing styles interpreted blues according on their own influences and tastes, and their audiences' demands. In his book, School of Mandolin: Blues (Mel Bay), Joe Carr taught a couple of blues pieces in the style of Bill Monroe. Referring to early blues players, Carr, explained, "Generally, it can be observed that white performers tended to play the blues with a heavy 4/4 beat and did not use the eighth note triplet feel so obvious in much of the blues performed by black musicians. The mandolin music of Bluegrass founder Bill Monroe is a good example" (p.12). Below are a couple of examples, showing Monroe's approach to blues.

"Monroe's Blues" is a well-known blues tune by Bill Monroe. If the links don't work, search YouTube for "Bill Monroe - Monroe's Blues".

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_TG3gu2aIhE



And here's another, composed with, played with, and dedicated to Doc Watson. If the links don't work, search YouTube for "Bill Monroe and Doc Watson: Watson's Blues."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=soV1...58fxFF&index=5



For those who like a mystery, compare the above to the well-known song, "High on The Mountain" by Ola Belle Reed from North Carolina. As far as I can determine, both she and Monroe copyrighted the tune. The Monroe-and-Watson recording is from 1966. Reed recorded her song in 1973. This may or may not prove that Monroe and Watson composed the tune. We've seen before that authorship of tunes is often unclear, with plenty of borrowing and stealing or else thinking that one composed a tune that actually came from memory. Perhaps they just beat her to recording the tune. If the link doesn't work, search YouTube for "Ola Belle Reed: High on The Mountain". It's a good song, whoever wrote the tune.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RsRRY5k5Psg

[Jess L.]

Good stuff, as usual. Thanks Ranald.