Playing the saxophone What are the unique aspects to playing blues compared with other genres?

[Pete Thomas]

What is different about blues? Different things to practice (or not). Different ways of approaching a performance? There may be some obvious points but maybe some less obvious.

Discuss...

 

[turf3]

Well, what do you mean by "blues"?

Robert Johnson?
Bessie Smith?
T Bone Walker?
Muddy Waters?
John Lee Hooker?
Louis Jordan?
Elvis Presley?
Stevie Ray Vaughan?
Woody Herman (The Band that Plays the Blues)?
Leadbelly?
Eric Clapton?
Tracy Nelson (please, say no)?

 

[dexdex]

Concert E and concert A.

 

[Grumps]

Boredom, for the most part. Extreme boredom.

 

[turf3]

Boredom, for the most part. Extreme boredom.

Well, if you're talking about rumpty-rumpty guitar pentatonic wankery in E, much beloved by high school students, yeah, for sure.

But there's an awful lot of stuff you can call "BLUES" beyond that stuff. It's just that people who insist on remaining stuffed in that little rock and roll shaped box can't hear it.

There are three common things called "blues".

1) An entire genre that is closely related to jazz and rock, but whose practicioners make a point of claiming they're not jazz and not rock and roll.

2) A song form, twelve bars call and response in its most basic form, that's used in pretty much every subdivision of popular music.

3) A general feel (the dreaded "blues scale") that can be tastefully applied here and there in popular music, or can be slathered all over the music like pouring ketchup over everything on your plate.

 

[Pete Thomas]

Well, what do you mean by "blues"?

I suppose the discussion is more about what you mean by blues. It’s open to all angles.

 

[Grumps]

Well, if you're talking about rumpty-rumpty guitar pentatonic wankery in E, much beloved by high school students, yeah, for sure.

No. That's at least honest. I was talking about the rest of it... that doesn't go much elsewhere. I mean... we're stuck though, aren't we? As sax players it's a viable platform for us so we fantasize accordingly. Still the same three chords though. Beneath it all.

 

[cappers]

What is different about blues? Different things to practice (or not). Different ways of approaching a performance? There may be some obvious points but maybe some less obvious.

Discuss...

Reads like a second year uni music exam question I'm still in Foundation year - deferred!

I know a blues when I hear it though. Something to do with being broke and down, holes in your shoes, your woman's run off with your hound dog and your car's been taken to the pound.

 

[turf3]

No. That's at least honest. I was talking about the rest of it... that doesn't go much elsewhere. I mean... we're stuck though, aren't we? As sax players it's a viable platform for us so we fantasize accordingly. Still the same three chords though. Beneath it all.

Well, it's not just three chords always. If you check out what Charlie Parker did with the purported blues platform, for example. It's really not that tough to find examples of blues where there's a different chord every bar.

 

[Pete Thomas]

It's really not that tough to find examples of blues where there's a different chord every bar.

And yet in that case some people would not recognise that as blues.

 

[turf3]

And yet in that case some people would not recognise that as blues.

Well, now we get into the three things that are called "blues". If Charlie Parker plays a 12 bar three-legged call and response form with plenteous chord substitutions and a "bluesy" feel a la KC in 1939; then someone says "that's not blues" - well, that's because the same vocabulary word is being used for two things. Bird and his bandmates would say "whaddya mean it's not blues? it's 12 bars, and it's fonky as all hell" - but if you say "that's not blues" then what you're really saying is "this does not fit within the performance practices of the genre that calls itself "BLUES" and fervently rejects any idea that it's a form of jazz or of rock".

So, three different meanings, one word.

And for that matter, how do you cope with something like "St. Louis Blues" which has three strains only one of which is a 12 bar three legged form - or "Basin Street Blues" which doesn't have the 12 bar form anywhere in it. I mean, you'd kinda figure Mr. Handy had some clue...

And where do you put, say, Cab Calloway?

 

[thomsax]

Boredom, for the most part. Extreme boredom.

I don't find, as Rock & Roll saxophone enthusiast, boring. I think it's just lots of fun. I encourage everyone to get a tenor and start playing the blues.

" I find that many sax players who are into Jazz, Funk, Fusion or Pop music end up taking gigs in Blues bands because they could use the work and it's considered easy. What most don't know is that there are many saxophone stylists in Chicago Blues that developed unique approaches to group playing either as a small sections or by themselves". Sax Gordon-

 

[Grumps]

Well, it's not just three chords always.

I wrote they're beneath it all.

" I find that many sax players who are into Jazz, Funk, Fusion or Pop music end up taking gigs in Blues bands because they could use the work and it's considered easy. What most don't know is that there are many saxophone stylists in Chicago Blues that developed unique approaches to group playing either as a small sections or by themselves". Sax Gordon-

There it is. That fantasize accordingly thing...

 

[Pete Thomas]

And for that matter, how do you cope with something like "St. Louis Blues" which has three strains only one of which is a 12 bar three legged form - or "Basin Street Blues" which doesn't have the 12 bar form anywhere in it

Although a lot of blues has typical 12 bar structure, I don’t see that as a defining factor

And where do you put, say, Cab Calloway?

All depends on which song.

But I tend to think there’s are songs that you can more or less call The Blues, 100%. Others may be or have varying degrees of bluesness. Which will often be subjective.

 

[cappers]

Well, if you're talking about rumpty-rumpty guitar pentatonic wankery in E, much beloved by high school students, yeah, for sure....

.... A general feel (the dreaded "blues scale") that can be tastefully applied here and there in popular music, or can be slathered all over the music like pouring ketchup over everything on your plate.

@Turf please explain the above for a novice.

My teacher and band director advised me to learn arpeggios and chord tones and imrovise using those as a basis and adding notes for colour and movement.
Other schools of thought I've seen suggest that beginners stick to pentatonic or blues scale notes as they are a safer bet. Can one not use them and add colour using other notes?

Apologies if this diverts away from 'What are the blues?'

 

[MikeMorrell]

What is different about blues? Different things to practice (or not). Different ways of approaching a performance? There may be some obvious points but maybe some less obvious.

Discuss...

Good question!

What I've learned (through a couple of series of 10-week 'jazz improvisation workshops is that:
- 'Blues numbers' (often following a typical 12-bar I, IV, V chord pattern) can sometimes vary in terms of the chord pattern and the number of bar
- Singing/Playing 'The Blues' can often just be a question of content (song) and intent; Leadbelly's song 'Take take this hammer' is played over exclusively major chords
- There's are 'major' and 'minor' Blues scales which include - and often emphasize 'Blue notes'
- The 'Pentatonic Scale' works for both major and minor scales
- Depending on the song/tune 'Blue notes' can be emphasized (prolonged) to create a sense of 'musical tension' before resolving them up to (for example) a fifth.

My advice (to relative beginners) is to first learn the 'Pentatonic Scale' (five notes) in the keys you often play in. Then learn more about the 'minor blues scale' which will introduce you to 'blue notes'. And finally practice the 'major blues scales

These are IMHO 'the basics'. Learning to play 'The Blues' is IMHO a combination of:
- intuitively knowing which keys to depress for any major/minor 'Blues chord''
- your personal expression of the specific Blues song/tune that you're playing on sax

FWIW, I play in a Blues/Rock/Pop band. Some of the 'Blues numbers' that we play are pretty 'up-beat', others are medium tempo (relatively 'light' in content') and others are slower ballads with much 'darker' content. So although all of these songs fall (nominally) into the 'Blues' category, in practice I have to tailor my 'fills' and 'solos' to match each song.

The only way I've found of doing this is first to listen closely to the song, And 'absorb' what the singer and band are trying to express. And how I - as a sax player in a band - could add to this.

As a (very occasional) sax player who plays whole songs/tunes, I would still recommend 'listening first'. Even my Big Band MD always encourages us to listen to 'good' recordings (Blues or not). Just to 'absorb' the musicality.

Mike

 

[thomsax]

I love the blues. I use to play along/improvise with blues recordings ..... . Here is a good 12 bar blues shuffle in concert Bb.

View: https://youtu.be/0SVZ4cLwa3E?si=euecCCQ5N3roaLun

 

[Pete Thomas]

Still the same three chords though. Beneath it all.

Nope. Sometimes it’s a different three chords. And that can be one or two more than some modal jazz.

I don’t believe music can be judged at all by the number of chords.

 

[Pete Thomas]

I love the blues. I use to play along/improvise with blues recordings ..... . Here is a good 12 bar blues shuffle in concert Bb.

View: https://youtu.be/0SVZ4cLwa3E?si=euecCCQ5N3roaLun

Thanks for that. Long time since I heard it and it brings home to me what I dislike when I hear people say blues is easy. I’ve called myself a blues musician for a huge chunk of my life but I still have to take my hat off to the likes of Jr Walker, Lee Allen…

 

[Grumps]

Nope. Sometimes it’s a different three chords.

Now that, made my day. I am no longer bored by blues. For now. This particular moment. And not judging; just being honest in what it brings me. Otherwise.