Portal:Blues

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The Blues Portal

Blues is a music genre and musical form that originated amongst African-Americans in the Deep South of the United States around the 1860s. Blues has incorporated spirituals, work songs, field hollers, shouts, chants, and rhymed simple narrative ballads from the African-American culture. The blues form is ubiquitous in jazz, rhythm and blues, and rock and roll, and is characterized by the call-and-response pattern, the blues scale, and specific chord progressions, of which the twelve-bar blues is the most common. Blue notes (or "worried notes"), usually thirds, fifths or sevenths flattened in pitch, are also an essential part of the sound. Blues shuffles or walking bass reinforce the trance-like rhythm and form a repetitive effect known as the groove.

Blues music is characterized by its lyrics, bass lines, and instrumentation. Early traditional blues verses consisted of a single line repeated four times. It was only in the first decades of the 20th century that the most common current structure became standard: the AAB pattern, consisting of a line sung over the four first bars, its repetition over the next four, and then a longer concluding line over the last bars. Early blues frequently took the form of a loose narrative, often relating the racial discrimination and other challenges experienced by African-Americans.

Many elements, such as the call-and-response format and the use of blue notes, can be traced back to the music of Africa. The origins of the blues are also closely related to the religious music of the African-American community, the spirituals. The first appearance of the blues is often dated to after the ending of slavery, with the development of juke joints occurring later. It is associated with the newly acquired freedom of the former slaves. Chroniclers began to report about blues music at the dawn of the 20th century. The first publication of blues sheet music was in 1908. Blues has since evolved from unaccompanied vocal music and oral traditions of slaves into a wide variety of styles and subgenres. Blues subgenres include country blues, Delta blues and Piedmont blues, as well as urban blues styles such as Chicago blues and West Coast blues. World War II marked the transition from acoustic to electric blues and the progressive opening of blues music to a wider audience, especially white listeners. In the 1960s and 1970s, a hybrid form called blues rock developed, which blended blues styles with rock music. (Full article...)

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"Cross Road Blues" (commonly known as "Crossroads") is a song written by the American blues artist Robert Johnson. He performed it solo with his vocal and acoustic slide guitar in the Delta blues style. The song has become part of the Robert Johnson mythology as referring to the place where he sold his soul to the Devil in exchange for musical genius. This is based largely on folklore of the American South that identifies a crossroads as the site where Faustian bargains can be made, as the lyrics do not contain any references to Satan.

"Cross Road Blues" may have been in Johnson's repertoire since 1932 and, on November 27, 1936, he recorded two takes of the song. One was released in 1937 as a single that was heard mainly in the Mississippi Delta area. The second, which reached a wider audience, was included on King of the Delta Blues Singers, a compilation album of some of Johnson's songs released in 1961 during the American folk music revival. (Full article...)

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Albert King in concert, 1968.

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Quotes

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Blues is really America's finest art form and most dominant art form of the 20th century.

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— Georgie Fame

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Blues is a natural fact, something that a fellow lives. If you don't live it, you don't have it.

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— Big Bill Broonzy

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The blues is a low-down achin' heart disease
Like consumption killing me by degrees.

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— Robert Johnson, "Preaching Blues (Up Jumped the Devil)"

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When you lay down at night, turning from one side of the bed to the other and can't sleep, what's the matter? Blues got you.

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— Lead Belly

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The blues had a baby and they named it rock and roll.

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— Muddy Waters

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Publicity photo for Paramount Records, the only confirmed extant photograph of Patton, c. 1929

Charlie Patton (April 1891 (probable) – April 28, 1934), more often spelled Charley Patton, was an American Delta blues musician and songwriter. Considered by many to be the "Father of the Delta Blues", he created an enduring body of American music and inspired most Delta blues musicians. The musicologist Robert Palmer considered him one of the most important American musicians of the twentieth century.

Patton (who was well educated by the standards of his time) spelled his name Charlie, but many sources, including record labels and his gravestone, use the spelling Charley. (Full article...)

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The following are images from various blues-related articles on Wikipedia.

Image 1Deborah Coleman, 2009 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 2Joe Louis Walker, 2007 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 3Mamie Smith (from List of blues musicians)
Image 4Son Seals, 1977 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 5Bessie Smith, 1936 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 6Otis Rush, 1997 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 7Robert Cray, 2007 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 8Luther Allison (from List of blues musicians)
Image 9Corey Harris, 2006 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 10Big Joe Turner, 1955 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 11Paul Butterfield at Woodstock Reunion, 1979 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 12Lowell Fulson in Paris, 1980 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 13Roy Rogers, 2014 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 14Cedric Burnside, 2018 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 15Lead Belly (from List of blues musicians)
Image 16Master Kora maker Alieu Suso in the Gambia (from Origins of the blues)
Image 17Eric Bibb, 2006 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 18Big Joe Williams, 1971 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 19Junior Wells, 1983 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 20Alvin Youngblood Hart, 2009 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 21Jay McShann in Edinburgh, c.1995 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 22Ethel Waters, 1943 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 23Clarence "Gatemouth" Brown, 1999 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 24Eddie Shaw, 2015 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 25Susan Tedeschi, 2006 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 26Luther Tucker, 1964 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 27Hubert Sumlin in Montreux, 1978 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 28Pinetop Perkins in Paris, 1976 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 29Albert King in Paris, 1978 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 30Charlie Musselwhite, 2003 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 31Son House (from List of blues musicians)
Image 32Debbie Davies, 2019 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 33Kenny Neal, 2012 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 34Mississippi John Hurt, 1964 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 35Jimmy Burns, 2012 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 36B.B. King in Rome, 1984 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 37Mississippi Fred McDowell, 1972 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 38Robert Jr. Lockwood, 1982 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 39Bobby "Blue" Bland (from List of blues musicians)
Image 40An 1890s photo of the tourist steamer Okahumke'e on the Ocklawaha River, with black guitarists on board (from Origins of the blues)
Image 41A watercolor painting of a camp meeting circa 1839 (New Bedford Whaling Museum). (from Origins of the blues)
Image 42Shemekia Copeland, 2019 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 43Detail from cover of The Celebrated Negro Melodies, as Sung by the Virginia Minstrels, 1843 (from Origins of the blues)
Image 44Chris Thomas King, 2005 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 45"Sweet Home Chicago" performed at the White House with Barack Obama joining B.B. King on the chorus (from List of blues standards)
Image 46Kenny Wayne Shepherd, 2010 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 47RonnieEarl, 1996 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 48Buddy Moss in Georgia prison camp, 1941 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 49Jimmy Rogers, 1991 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 50Lonnie Johnson, 1941 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 51Henry Townsend, 1983 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 52Curley Weaver (from List of blues musicians)
Image 53Ma Rainey (from List of blues musicians)
Image 54Billy Boy Arnold (from List of blues musicians)
Image 55Willie Dixon at Monterey Jazz Festival, 1981 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 56Robben Ford, 2007 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 57Muddy Waters with James Cotton, 1971 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 58Buddy Guy, 2008 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 59George "Harmonica" Smith, 1980 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 60Sara Martin and Sylvester Weaver (from List of blues musicians)
Image 61Emancipation from Freedmen's viewpoint; illustration from Harper's Weekly 1865 (from Origins of the blues)
Image 62John Lee Hooker in Toronto, 1978 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 63Jimmy Witherspoon, 1974 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 64T-Bone Walker at American Folk Blues Festival, Hamburg, 1972 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 65Blind Lemon Jefferson (from List of blues musicians)
Image 66Freddie King in Paris, 1975 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 67Jimmy Rushing, 1946 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 68Memphis Minnie, 1930 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 69Dexter Allen, 2004 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 70Koko Taylor, 2006 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 71Eric Clapton, 2006 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 72Eddie Clearwater in Montreux, 1978 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 73Keb' Mo', 2012 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 74Lucky Peterson (from List of blues musicians)
Image 75Albert Collins at Long Beach Blues Festival, 1990 (from List of blues musicians)
Image 76Louis Jordan in New York City, 1946 (from List of blues musicians)