[78-L] Evolution of 'rock 'n roll'

Tue Jan 12 16:31:23 PST 2010

Howlin' Wolf on Sun (and some of the later Chess recordings) rocks!!!! for sure...

Always loved Junior Parker and Pat Hare and several of the others you mention...

As for Calvin Newborn.....wow!! wild!!

It is written that Newborn performs on "Have you heard about the farmer's daughter?" by Tiny Kennedy recorded at 706 Union in 1952 as released for the 1st time on a Trumpet/Acoustic Archives LP c.1990....but it has also been attributed to Elmore James....sure sounds like James' non-slide work like the backing he provided for Sonny Boy Williamson and Willie Love on Trumpet...

Anybody know or have any opinions on this??

Cheers
Matthew
UK

________________________________
From: eugene hayhoe <jazzme48912 at yahoo.com>
To: 78-L Mail List <78-l at klickitat.78online.com>
Sent: Tue, 12 January, 2010 22:11:55
Subject: Re: [78-L] Evolution of 'rock 'n roll'

Hey, I'm not knocking Presley, I grew up on & still listen to his records, but have you heard Howlin' Wolf', James Cotton & Jr. Parker's Sun records? They were there first, far as I'm concerned, and it's there in the grooves (unless it's all based on race & marketing potential - after all Parker was a barker). 

Same studio, same producer & the guitarists create the solos that Scotty Moore (and later Roy Buchanon, James Burton, Mike Bloomfield etc..) copied. Damn if I know why Floyd Murphy isn't as well known as Pat Hare, let alone Scotty Moore, unless it's the obvious.. Don't forget that Jr. Parker and James Cotton were Presley's contemporaries & Memphis residents. Presley hung around these guys because they were local and he liked their music.. Paul Burlison of the Burnette Bros R & R Trio considered it an honor to sit in on the radio with Wolf. 

Listen to Howlin' Wolf's Sun records and tell me they aren't r'n r, especially the mystery soloist on Keep What You Got (seems like Calvin Newborn is the latest name I've heard bandied about) - I might lobby for it as the greatest r 'n r guitar solo in history, 
And I'm not claiming they were 1st either. Wynonie Harris had been mixing country & r & b & jazz for years. Gatemouth Brown's another T-Bone Walker based guitarist that didn't want to be pidgeon holed. And they weren't first either.

There was a reason Hendrix called his band the Blue Flames, in homage to  Parker. Cotton's guitarist Pat Hare created heavy metal guitar in that same studio with Cotton Crop Blues. Lightnin' Hopkins is the earliest I've heard use feedback, in the mid '40s, Nightmare Blues. I've read that B.B.  King considers Ike Turner the King of Father of r 'n r - seems to me B's got pretty good credentials, lot better than mine. It ain't about the hits, no matter what the year - it's about what's in the air - there were many, many non-hits and many non-recording musicians too, for that matter. There are way too many elements thrown together in the r 'n r mix for any one artist or record to contain them - the instrumental & vocal vocabulary was built over decades of dialog between all kinds of sources - haven't seen Les Paul mentioned by anyone either. And what about the 'R&B' tenorists that guys like Rudy P. modeled themselves on? Jacquet, Willis Jackson, Arnett
Cobb, Freddie Mitchell, Noble Watts, Hal Singer, Jimmy Forrest, Paul Bascomb etc., etc. etc.,? Texas, Memphis, LA, NO, NYC, Chicago, Philly, it was all those places and more.

Gene

--- On Tue, 1/12/10, Erwin Kluwer <ekluwer at gmail.com> wrote:

From: Erwin Kluwer <ekluwer at gmail.com>
Subject: Re: [78-L] Evolution of 'rock 'n roll'
To: "78-L Mail List" <78-l at klickitat.78online.com>
Date: Tuesday, January 12, 2010, 2:36 PM

Well it *can* be pinpointed to a few recordings..

For example Elvis versions of Blue Moon of Kentucky, Mystery train, Baby
let's play house, My Baby Left me, Heartbreak Hotel simply had no precedent
in music despite being (except Hotel) being covers. They were created
because and despite older musical styles....

They create their own universe in a way Charlie Parkers Koko did.

On Tue, Jan 12, 2010 at 8:24 PM, eugene hayhoe <jazzme48912 at yahoo.com>wrote:

> He wasn't trying to copy anyone.
>
> Then where did the song come from if not Ike Turner, Brenston & co.? To me,
> your argument is specious, given Haley's record of R&B covers. Further, I'd
> say that trying to pin it down to a single song is a foolish game to begin
> with, given the extensive musical miscegenation going on anyway. Also,
> given, as you admit, the many differing forms of primarily Black music upon
> which the music was built (gospel, blues, jazz, swing, vocal group harmony,
> etc..), spread over many years, the idea of linking it to one performance
> seems silly.
>
> If you want to define musical forms by race, then that's your business, but
> I'm not going for it; to my mind it's a lot more complicated than you're
> letting on.  If your point is that white people could hear Bill Haley and
> tell that he was white, not black, and hence more marketable to white people
> than Jackie Brenston, that's not a point I'll argue. But I'm not going for
> anyone's argument that the one who copies someone else (which most
> definitely includes covering a song) hence becomes the originator.
> Popularizer perhaps, innovator even, depending on the manner of
> interpretation, but originator, nope.
>
> Country music was the final ingredient needed to turn black music into rock
> 'n' roll. Few blacks played country music, but Chuck Berry admitted doing
> so, which is why I consider him to be the first black rock 'n' roll artist
>
> What about the Orioles & Crying in the Chapel?  Ida Red/Maybellene is very
> old news indeed, but that does not disenfranchise the Black artists who came
> before from their work (nor was Berry the first to add country, the
> apparently loathed on this list Louis Jordan and the vocal group The Ravens
> were there first, to name just two).  Musicians in bars play what people
> want to hear, Howard Armstrong (Louie Bluie), a black man from Tennessee
> used to play Polish, Irish and other European ethnic music in the 'bars of
> Chicago in the 1930s, cause that's what the patrons wanted - does that make
> him a r 'n r'er? No.
>
> Also sounds like you're saying that horns and piano r 'n r (say, Little
> Richard, Fats D., Lloyd Price, Longhair, Big Jay McNeely, etc.) isn't r 'n r
> cause there are horns and other things that hadn't been used in 'country'
> music since the days of Jimmie R. & His Georgia Crackers (NY session men
> Mannie Klein, et al) or western swing.  I'm not going for that. Ever listen
> to Charlie Christian, T-Bone Walker and Floyd Murphy? Very little that they
> played was not copied by later guitarists, even if they had never heard of
> them, that is how influential they were. Haley shared a guitarist with Benny
> Goodman. I have and have heard Haley's early records, I don't understand why
> you are so reluctant to give people credit for what they have done. Haven't
> seen the name of Jordan and Haley's  later producer Milt Gabler here either
> - he allegedly stated that he was trying to copy Jordan.
>
> country, gospel, jump, R&B, and blues  The self-righteous historians try to
> give blacks credit for rock 'n' roll the same way Wynton Marsalis talks
> about jazz.
>
> ?????????????????????????????
> The historical record isn't clear enough? Which one is not Black music?
> Black people have been denied their role for a long time; how often is
> Sylvester Weaver credited as a 'father of country music ' for his c. 1923
> Guitar Rag? Or DeFord Bailey?
>
> Sounds like you've had this discussion before, and seem to have a bit of a
> grudge about it. Sorry. I can understand why a Black person wouldn't go for
> what you're saying, even though I'm white (and not so much of a Wynton
> fan).  I'd echo Johnny Otis here- 'why do white people have such a hard time
> giving black people credit for what they have done?'  I've got no problem
> with that, if that makes me 'self-righteous' or a Marsalis-ite, so be it.
> I'd rather be that than the alternative.
>
> Gene
>

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