The Prix Pictet is an annual search for photographs that communicate powerful messages of global environmental significance under a broad theme. This year that theme is „earth‟. Nadav Kander was nominated for his series of photos, Yangtze, The Long River Series, 2006-07, documenting the rapidly changing landscape and communities of China‟s Yangtze River, from its mouth to source.
Nadav Kander
The photographers were selected from a shorlist of twelve of the world‟s leading photographers: Darren Almond, Christopher Anderson, Sammy Baloji, Edward Burtynsky, Andreas Gursky, Naoya Hatakeyama, Nadav Kander, Ed Kashi, Abbas Kowsari, Yao Lu, Edgar Martins and Chris Steele-Perkins.
Chris Steele-Perkins
Making the formal presentation at an awards dinner at the Passage de Retz in Paris, Kofi Annan, honorary president of the Prix Pictet said that the photographs were a compelling call for action to tackle climate change, the most serious humanitarian and environmental challenge facing the world today:
“Only weeks separate us from the decisive negotiations on climate change in Copenhagen. We are confronted with the vital need to prepare the political momentum necessary for a fair and effective post-Kyoto agreement. The images in front of us remind us of the fragility of our planet and the damage we have already done. When we see these photographs we cannot close our eyes and remain indifferent. Through our actions and voices, we must keep building the pressure to secure urgent action at Copenhagen and beyond.”
Naoya Hatakeyama
The exhibition of the Prix Pictet 2009 Shortlist will be at the Passage de Retz, Paris, 23 October – 23 November 2009.
The Prix Pictet 2009 publication, Earth, was launched at the opening of the Prix Pictet 2009 Preview exhibition at Purdy Hicks Gallery, on 6 October 2009. Writing in the foreword to the book Kofi Annan says ‘This book contains a collection of stunning images from some of the world’s best and most original photographers. Together, these photographs highlight the beauty of the earth we share.But they also expose the damage, deliberately or carelessly, we are inflicting on our own environment.’
Betty Mason editor at WIRED has produced some good blog posts which invite us into NASA photography as well as NASA/HUBBLE pics -here are some samples:
Some islands first (see the site for detailed captions):
Onekotan Island, Russia
An island within an island was created after a big eruption around 9,000 years ago caused the peak of Onekotan’s volcano to collapse, forming a caldera that subsequently filled with water.
Bahamas
A Selkirk Islands
Indonesian islands
Alaskan volcanic island
Now from this moderate scale we swoop to the furthest galaxy and colliding black holes:
Colliding black holes HUBBLE?NASA
The new camera on the Hubble telescope is really making inroads on our understanding of space (difficult to comprehend for most of us earthlings) at whatever level the photos are beautiful pieces of art. Remember that this year is the International Year of Astronomy .
JKCSO41 galaxy cluster NASA
Captured by NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory and combined with data from infrared and optical telescopes, this image shows the farthest galaxy cluster ever detected. Designated JKCS041, the cluster is located 10.2 billion light-years from Earth, beating the previous distance record by a billion light-years.
And to another scale -photomiscroscopy:
Male sex organ
These two photomicrographs are from Nikon’s small world competition (the male sex organ is from a plant of course!)
protein
Wired science is worth a look for its ’science in a hurry’ outlook and great photographs.
Many people are frustrated writers, wanting to write ‘that novel’. Others see beautifully published ‘coffee table’ photography books and wish they had the money to produce such a thing. You may have even started to think that ‘publishing is dead”.
Well it seems that publishing has now become more democratic and allowed many others into the fold by using online and digital technology.Print on demand (POD) publishing has become popular because of changes in technology and of course the use of digital cameras and new home based software. It also makes use of reduced warehousing costs and unnecessary large print runs.
Take Mic, he has written a novel (still unpublished) has been working hard on his photography for some time, filling many hard back photographic albums at home and even venturing into a web site ( mic warmington pbase) but just last week he sends all his friends an email ‘I ‘m published’ .
Mic Warmington has been able to publish a wonderful testament to his colourful abstract images and without leaving him thousands in debt.
out of the corner of my eye. Mic W.
sea or sky? mic w.
and one of my favourites:
Mic says about his work:
I have often thought of my photographic work as “Sketching with a camera”, often highlighting and abstracting unnoticed details in the environment.
Is it difficult? It demands some thought and some creativity but the process is relatively painless.
Download software from Blurb (with In-design templates) or upload your files as pdf using your own design/publishing software(e.g. InDesign, PageMaker , Quark).
Add photos (300 dpi or more), artwork and text. Photos really should be of the best quality (viewed at 100%) as the page is less forgiving than the screen.
Order one book or many- (they start as low 3.95 pounds/5 dollars)
Choose between different cover types and book sizes
Design for up to 440 pages using standard paper, or up to 160 pages using Premium Paper , Promote and sell your work on Blurb.com and keep 100% of the markup.
Online publishing is not so new -many traditional publishers can help you publish books and market them,like instantpublisher but often you still have to have a guaranteed production of say 25-100 copies. What is good about sites like blurb and lulu is that you can produce just one copy if you want.
There are even competitions for the best books of the month.
If you want to share that book with a few close friends they can go directly to the site and order just one more copy. People are now publishing their blogs as they have invested so much time in writing and publishing they want to produce a legacy in hard copy.And of course what a better present than to give a book of personalised text and images which will be quite unique (remember you can order just one copy or have a limited edition). What about a cookery book of your best recipes?And your dissertation? What about your own travel book?Wedding photographs?
lulu can also provide you with your own ISBN number and bar code. As an estimate Lulu could manufacture one copy of a 100 page hardcover book with full colour images for about 18 pounds (22 Euros,35 USD). You can decide the markup but lulu will take about 20% of the ‘profit’ after you have paid the manufacturing costs. Probably for a colour photobook I would choose Blurb, but if you are publishing a novel, with mainly black and white text then Lulu might be the better option.
Both lulu and blurb offer good tutorials to take you through the whole process and can also help with marketing if you want to go down that road (many just publish single copies for their own use rather than sell). Artists have produced books of their own work to show as their own portable gallery – good for getting exhibition space.
There are other providers like Appleiphoto books but lulu and blurb seem the most user friendly and cost effective, at the moment.
I am sure this will be a fast growth area – so keep an eye on new providers.
Some other publishers for photobooks include snapfish and mypublisher(20 pages,colour photos-$34.75).
Shipping – be aware that the cost of shipping one copy to Europe may cost as much as $20 with a reduction for more copies. PhotoBooks are zero-rated for VAT in the U.K. Shipments to other European destinations may be subject to VAT and additional taxes, duties or other customs fees upon delivery.
Of course there is the GREEN option – publishing e books only -
Yudu is the choice for green publishing. All publications are in e-format and the company is carbon neutral. Perhaps we need to encourage some of the self publishers to offer elephant dung recycled paper and bamboo fibre covers ( I am serious! )
Recently I posted an article about the Maison Européenne de la Photographie. I thought I would extend my coverage of photography and Paris to include the upcoming Paris Photo. If you can’t get to Paris in November, you should at least visit the website (in English) or the French version, if you prefer, to catch up on the photographic news around Paris (which will also help you if you are lucky enough to visit Paris).
First, some of the details of the event:
WHAT?
Paris Photo, the world’s leading event for photography, presents a panoramic overview of photographic expression spanning the 19th century to the present day.
- 89 galleries and 13 publishers from 23 countries
- 31 first-time exhibitors
- Seven new countries will be represented (Iran, Lebanon, Morocco, Portugal, Russia, Tunisia , UAE)
- 75% of the participants are non French
- 38,000 visitors expected
- 500 international photographers
WHEN?
Dates : Thursday 19th November – Sunday 22nd November, 2009 Opening: Wednesday 18th November 7:00 pm – 10:00 pm (by invitation only) WHERE? Venue: Carrousel du Louvre, 99 rue de Rivoli, 75001 Paris, France
Métro : Palais Royal / Musée du Louvre Station (Lines 1 et 7)
Bus : Palais Royal Station (théâtre de la Comédie-Française n°21, 27,39, 81, 95)
Opening hours :
19th November from 11:30 am to 8:00 pm
20th November from 11:30 am to 10:00 pm
21st November from 11:30 am to 8:00 pm
22nd November from 11:30 am to 7:00 pm
General admission : 15 € / 7.50 € for students and groups, free for children under 10.
If you go the press tab you can get an idea of the range of photographic genres, themes and more..
hasan sarbakhshian
Mohamed Bouroussa
Mark Cohen
Lalla Essaydi
Abbas
And on the website there are links to other galleries and exhibitions:
To attempt to put on a Fellini exhibition means to go back to the sources of Fellini’s art and studying and revealing its processes of transformation, alteration, borrowing and accumulation. The result is a set of strata combining filmic elements, photographic documents, magazine presentations of the event, TV images and works by artists.
This exhibition is resolutely multidisciplinary. It sets out to offer a new grid for reading Fellini’s films.
Dolce Vita
The event and the historical fact, History and anecdote, biography and fiction are the materials that, by means of confrontations, echoes and dialogues, Fellini used to built his distinctive narratives and original visual environments.
Showing the creative context of Fellini’s work in an exhibition means showing the nature of his creative mechanisms.
While many now legendary scenes have come to be seen as perfect incarnations of Fellini’s prolific imagination, it now looks as if a more thorough analysis of the context will offer a fresh point of view on his work. Such a hypothesis sits well with Fellini’s own inclinations. Trained as a caricature artist in his youth, for a while he earned a living by doing portraits of GIs on leave, and all through his life he would show the same visual acuity, the same ability to gather so much more than images in his freeze-frames of reality.
The exhibition at the Jeu de Paume affords a glimpse of Fellini’s creative mechanisms by showing his unique ability for absorbing the real.
It comprises mainly photographs and drawings by Fellini, original film posters, period magazines and excerpts from his film.
Exhibition curated by: Sam Stourdzé
WHERE?
Concorde
1, place de la Concorde
75008 Paris
métro Concorde
information: 01 47 03 12 50
12/10/2009 – The Mairie of the 5th arrondissement, in collaboration with the Centro Italiano per le Arti e la Cultura, presents the photographic exhibition from the Giov-Anna Piras Foundation for contemporary art and photography “Click! 99+1 chefs-d’oeuvre de la photographie”, from October 30th to November 28th 2009.
The aim of the event, on the occasion of Paris Photo, is to offer a chance to catch, in a single place, the 20th Century photographic masterpieces.
This selection of close to one hundred vintage prints of work by the German photographer (1876-1964) provides a spectacular typological and topographical overview of his era.
9 Sept – 20 Dec. 09 Tuesday to Sunday, 1 pm to 6.30 pm and Saturday from 11 am to 6.45 pm, late evening on Wednesday until 8.30 pm. Centre Pompidou, The subversion of images. Surrealism, photography, film 01/10/2009 – The exhibition at Centre Pompidou presents a panorama of surrealist photography: an anthology of exquisite works by Man Ray, Bellmer, Cahun, Ubac, Boiffard and Tabard, as well as previously unseen images showing surrealist uses of photography (Artür Harfaux, Benjamin Fondane, Léo Malet, Victor Brauner…)
Man Ray
24 Sept. 2009 – 11 jan. 2010 – Wednesday to Monday, 11 am to 9 pm, late evening (exhibitions only) on Thursday to 11 pm
Musée du quai Branly, 165 years of Iranien Photography 28/09/2009 – As part of Photoquai, 2e biennal exhibtion of photographs from around the world, the Musée du Quai Branly is dedicating an exhibition to Iranian photography and shows works starting from the earliest days during the Qajar era, through to wartime photo reportage and images by decidedly contemporary visual artists. 22 Sept – 22 Nov. 09 – Tuesday, Wednesday and Sunday from 11 am to 7 pm,
Thursday, Friday and Saturday from 11 am to 9 pm.
Apart from the photographic exhibition -this is a great museum to visit.
Even if you are not walking the streets of Paris – worth browsing the sites. Bon voyage,virtuelle!
We’re calling on people around the world to organize an action on October 24 incorporating the number 350 at an iconic place in their community, and then upload a photo of their event to 350.org website.
We’ll collect these images from around the world and, with your help, deliver them to the media and world leaders. Together, we can show our world and it’s decision-makers just how big, beautiful, and unified the climate movement really is.
To help you take part in October 24’s international day of climate action, we are:
Lifting public awareness on the need for an international climate treaty to reach 350
Assembling a coalition of hundreds of organizations committed to this vision of a more sustainable world
Connecting you with others in your community and across the planet who are building this movement
Providing on-line resources and tools that make pulling together an event easy
Linking your October 24 event with hundreds of other actions at iconic places around the world
Leveraging the day of action for meaningful political change
350.org is an open-source campaign: it’s your ideas, input, and energy that will make October 24 and this movement for change a success. Have something to contribute? Contact Us.
After viewing the vids…and if you are interested check out if there are any activities/events going on in your area take some photos and upload them.
On October 24th, the 350.org website will have a dramatic change-over, and will be used to collect and display photos from around the world. On October 24th, just visit 350.org and it will be very clear how to submit photos, videos, and stories from your action via a simple webform.
If you’d like to submit a photo now, just submit them as attachments in an e-mail to photos@350.org — in the subject line, please include the action location (city and country) and in the body please include a description of the photo(s).
We hear a lot about the ‘amplified’ blues harp greats such as Little Walter and James Cotton (thanks Muddy!) but less is known about more acoustic blues harp players from before 1950’s. So this posting charts a few of the players who blazed their own trail and provided a fertile ground for others to play and dance upon. Let’s start with the more famous John Lee Curtis ‘Sonny Boy’ Williamson who really did change the status of the blues harp and prepared the ground for the explosion of amplified blues harp playing in Chicago in the 50’s.
What is interesting about SBW I is that he straddled the transition between acoustic harp and amplified harp, made many innovations but was not able to capitalise on them as much as SBTII (Aleck Rice Miller). John Lee Curtis Williamson was born near Jackson, Tennessee in 1914. His original recordings were considered to be in the country blues style, but he soon demonstrated skill at making the harmonica a lead instrument for the blues, and popularized it for the first time in a more urban blues setting. He has often been called “the father of modern blues harp”.
Williamson taught himself the harmonica as a child, influenced by great players like Will Shade and Hammie Nixon from nearby Memphis. At age eleven, he received his first harmonica as a Christmas gift from his mother. According to his half-brother, T. W. Utley, when he was not chopping cotton, milking cows, or doing other farm chores, he was teaching himself to play the harmonica by listening to and playing along with records on an old wind-up record player. By the time he was sixteen, Williamson was jamming around Tennessee and Arkansas with guitarist “Sleepy John” Estes and mandolin demon James “Yank” Rachell.
By the time that he had reached his teens, he was already a master of the instrument. Using the name “Sonny Boy” Williamson, he traveled during the depression, performing with artists like Robert Nighthawk and Sleepy John Estes.
By the time that Williamson arrived in Chicago in 1934, he was a seasoned performer, already stretching the boundaries of harmonica playing.
“He played with all the rhythmic subtlety of the best country blues, slurring and wailing the harp notes, making the harmonica almost a single entity….But gradually the rural sound changed, as if the country boy was wising up to city ways,” wrote Giles Oakley, author of The Devil’s Music: A History of the blues.
His use of his hands and his imaginative fills fit well into the growing “urban” style of blues, increasing the level of expression the instrument could bring to a song. Williamson’s call-and-response method of alternating vocals with instrumental verses has become a blues standard. Of course call and response links back to the original cotton field hollers.
John Lee Williamson is regarded as a musician “who brought the harmonica to prominence as a major blues instrument”. He played a tremendous role in influencing the classic Chicago blues of the 1940’s and 1950’s. Among the artists he has influenced are Billy Boy Arnold, Shakey Jake Harris, Big Walter Horton, Little Walter, Dr. Ross, Junior Wells, and Johnny Young.
Pete Welding, on Blues Classic’s Album 21, described Williamson as “a forceful singer, popular recording artist, and the first truly virtuoso blues harmonica player, whose rich, imaginative solo flights resulted in completely re-shaping the playing approach and the role of his humble instrument in the blues.” Many of his songs are considered today as blues classics.
On June 1, 1948, John Lee Williamson was killed in a mugging on Chicago’s South Side, as he walked home from his final performance at The Plantation Club at 31st St. and Giles Ave., a tavern just a block and a half away from his home at 3226 S. Giles. Williamson’s final words are reported to have been ” Lord have mercy”.
His very first recording, “Good Morning, School Girl“, was a major hit on the ‘race records’ market in 1937. He was hugely popular among black audiences throughout the whole southern United States as well as in the midwestern industrial cities such as Detroit and his home base in Chicago, and his name was synonymous with the blues harmonica for the next decade.
Check out this documentary of the life of John Lee Curtis Williamson:
Some of the following text about some of the early blues harp players has been written by Pat Missin, who has a great ability for serious ethnomusicology and it is worth trawling his web site for all things to do with the history,present and future of the blues harp,harmonica and mouthorgan.
DADDY STOVEPIPE
Johnny Watson, alias Daddy Stovepipe was born in Mobile, Alabama, on April 12th 1867 and died in Chicago, November 1st 1963. A veteran of the turn of the century medicine shows, he was in his late fifties when he became one of the first blues harp players to appear on record in 1924. He later recorded with his wife, Mississippi Sarah, in the 1930s and spent his last years as a regular performer on Chicago’s famous Maxwell Street, where he made his last recordings (issued on LP as Collector’s Issue C-5527, now out of print).Maxwell Street was the home of Bo Diddley, Junior Wells, Little Walter, Uncle Johnnie Williams, Big Bill Broonzy, Papa Charlie Jackson, Arthur Crudup, Hound Dog Taylor, One-Armed John Wrencher, One-legged Sam, Snooky Prior, Sonnyboy Williamson, Muddy Waters, Howlin’ Wolf and countless blues legends.
Take a look at some of the historical footage of the rise and fall of Maxwell Street Chicago:
About the same time as he made his first recordings, another singer was recorded under the name of Stovepipe No.1. These two musicians make an interesting contrast. Both singers accompanied themselves on harmonica and guitar, but Johnny Watson gained his nickname from the stovepipe hat he wore, whereas Stovepipe No.1 (Sam Jones from Cincinnati) actually played a stovepipe, in a manner similar to a jug.
Daddy Stovepipe played the blues almost exclusively on his early records, but used a straight harp style more associated with white folk music. Stovepipe No.1 on the other hand used a bluesy cross harp style, but his issued recordings featured primarily non-blues material.
By 1960, when he was recorded by Paul Oliver, Watson’s repertoire had broadened following many years of busking throughout the country and he was performing such songs as “Tennessee Waltz”, though with an exuberance rare for a man in his nineties.
STOVEPIPE NO. 1 (SAM JONES)
Little is really known about Stovepipe No. 1. His real name was Sam Jones, he was probably from Cincinnati and he made his first records as a “one-man-band” in 1924, as did Daddy Stovepipe. Sam Jones in many ways was the opposite of Johnny Watson (Daddy Stovepipe). His solo records featured old-time tunes with bluesy cross harp playing, unlike Watson’s blues pieces with old-time straight harp.
As you can see he really did play a stovepipe -getting a sound out of it like a jug.
Sam Jones also played with other people (unlike Watson who recorded solo, or in the company of his wife). His work with David Crockett and King David’s Jug Band (along with his solo sides) is available on Stovepipe No. 1: Complete Recorded Works (1924-1950) & The Jug Washboard Band (1928)1.
DEFORD BAILEY
DeFord Bailey was born in Tennessee in 1899 to a musical family and at a very young age took up the harmonica. Crippled by a childhood attack of polio and unable to work on his parents’ farm, DeFord began to earn a living playing his harp on the streets of Nashville. Spotted by a talent scout at a harmonica contest in 1925 (DeFord came second to someone called J.T.Bland, playing a version of “Lost John”) he was invited to play on a radio show called “Barn Dance” later to be known as “The Grand Ole Opry”.
Until the early forties Bailey opened the Saturday night radio show with “Pan-American Blues”, a train imitation piece, but his departure from the show was in less than pleasant circumstances and he retired from music to become a shoe-shine boy.
He was persuaded to play the Opry again in the seventies, but never again recorded and died in July 1982.
Bailey was a very influential player, both through his records and his radio work, leaving an impression on such players as Sonny Terry (who recorded a version of Bailey’s “Alcoholic Blues”), the teenage blues harp virtuoso Eddie Mapp and white country harp player Red Parham. Of Bailey’s two recording sessions, eleven tracks have survived.
EDDIE MAPP
Eddie Mapp’s career is unfortunately rather typical of many blues players in the 1920s and 1930s – after making a few records, he was found dead in the street in Atlanta, Georgia, at the age of twenty. This means that he was just seventeen or eighteen years old at the time of his only recording session in 1929, in the company of guitarists Guy Lumpkin and Slim Barton and harp player James Moore. Mapp’s playing on these sides is very mature for such a young musician and covers a range of different styles.
RHYTHM WILLIE
Little is known for certain about the harp player who called himself Rhythm Willie. He recorded just two sessions under this name, in 1940 and 1950. He is also almost certainly the harp player on some records by the pianists Lee Brown and Peetie Wheatstraw. The harmonica on these pieces is often listed as by Lee McCoy. This could be Willie’s real name, or it could be due to confusion with singer/guitarist/harp player Robert Lee McCoy (who later became better known as Robert Nighthawk). Robert Lee McCoy did record some pieces with Peetie Wheatstraw, but his harp style is very different from Rhythm Willie.
Paul Oliver has suggested that Willie may have been a white musician, but I am not aware of any evidence to support this. Eddie Taylor, longtime friend and partner of Jimmy Reed said that he knew Rhythm Willie. Taylor claimed that Willie was alive in the 1970s and still living in Chicago, but was considered “crazy” and had retired from music, claiming that nobody understood how to play his songs.
Willie’s musical style is rather similar to harp players such as Blues Birdhead, but even more accomplished. Certainly there is a pronounced jazz flavour to his playing, showing a very definite Louis Armstrong influence in particular and this is underlined by his choice of material, particularly in his post-war recording of Gershwin’s “I Got Rhythm”. Willie’s speciality is cleanly played first position harp. In all the recordings of him that I have located, there is nothing played in the cross harp style, but this appears to have been out of choice rather than any lack of skill with the harp.
Willie Hood, known as Rhythm Willie the Harmonica Wizard, was a popular entertainer in Chicago, up until his death in 1954. His repertoire consisted of jazz-tinged blues and, apparently, pop standards of the time. Here, I have transcribed the opening measures to three of the tunes he recorded at a 1940 session, issued under the name “Rhythm Willie and his Gang”. These tracks have been reissued on “Harps, Jugs, Washboards and Kazoos 1926-1940″ (RST Records Jazz Perspectives JPCD-1505-21). “Boarding House Blues” is a typical example of Willie’s first position jazz style (everything he recorded, with the exception of “Breathtakin’ Blues” was played in first position, or straight harp), played here on a G harp. Upper octave first position is often referred to as “Jimmy Reed style”, but Willie was playing in this style in the 30s (or maybe even earlier) with a degree of sophistication that Jimmy Reed never achieved.
Lewis was born in Henning, Tennessee around 1890, and raised in the vicinity of Ripley. He was noted for being able to blow two harmonicas at once – through his mouth and his nose.
He played in local string bands and brass bands, and began playing in Ripley and Memphis areas with Gus Cannon. When jug bands became popular in the mid-1920s, he joined Cannon’s Jug Stompers and recorded for Victor Records areas with in January 1928.
The songs from that session included “Minglewood Blues”, “Springdale Blues”, and “Madison Rag”. Gus would spend his weekends in nearby Ripley, and it was here on a Sunday afternoon in that he met Noah Lewis.Noah introduced Gus to Ashley Thompson who played guitar and was only 13 at the time.
The Noah Lewis Jug Band included “Sleepy” John Estes on guitar and Yank Rachel on Mandolin. During the Nov 26 session they recorded New Minglewood Blues. It is this version that most resembles the verions performed by the Grateful Dead (see Roots of the Grateful Dead http://taco.com/roots/roots.html)
On a later recording with the Jug Stompers, “Viola Lee Blues”, he sang lead vocal and played a melancholy harmonica solo.
Viola Lee Blues (Take 1) by Noah Lewis
The judge he pleaded, clerk he wrote it
Clerk he wrote it down indeedy
The judge he pleaded, the clerk he wrote it down
If you miss jail fellas, you must be Nashville bound
Some got six months, some got one solid
Some got one solid year, indeedy
Some got six months, some got one solid year
But me and my buddy both got lifetime here
Fix my supper mama, let me go to her
Let me go to bed, indeed Lord
Fix my supper, let me go to bed
I’ve been drinkin’ white lightnin’
It’s gone to my head
Noah Lewis was also known as a heavy cocaine user (note cocaine was legal and endemic in Memphis pre-WWI)
Will Shade
Back in Memphis, Will Shade (born 2/5/89 in Memphis) had started the Memphis Jug Band. They became very popular in Memphis, often playing in Church Park. Shade was commonly called Son Brimmer, a nickname from his grandmother Annie Brimmer, because “son” is short for “grandson”. The name apparently stuck when other members of the band noticed that the “sun” bothered him and he used the “brim” of a hat to “shade” his eyes.
Shade himself played the guitar, the “bullfiddle” or washtub bass, and the harmonica, the instrument on which he was most influential. His pure country blues harmonica style served as the foundation for later renowned harmonicists like Big Walter Horton and both Sonny Boy Williamson I and II, and Charlie Musselwhite credits him as a mentor. He composed many of the band’s songs and sang lead vocal on a handful of their recordings.
The Memphis Jug Band was formed in the early 1920s to play parties, clubs, and dances. The band’s appeal was universal; they played for tips in Church’s Park (now W.C. Handy Park) on Beale Street, swanky affairs at the Chickasaw Country Club, and for conventions at the Peabody Hotel. The band played the park not only for tips but also to learn new songs from other jug bands, such as Jack Kelly’s Jug Busters (featuring Frank Stokes), the Three “J’s” (featuring Sleepy John Estes), Robert Wilkins’s four-piece outfit, and solo performers Gus Cannon (of Cannon’s Jug Stompers) and Jim Jackson. In testament to their virtuosity, the Memphis Jug Band obtained the most lucrative gigs, including political rallies and private parties for E.H. Crump, Memphis’ notorious mayor.
The Memphis Jug Band first recorded for Victor in February 1927 and over the next four years recorded 57 sides. By 1930 there were seven different jug bands active in Memphis. The Memphis Jug Band had become so popular, and large, that they would split into two versions and play two different gigs on the same night.
The Memphis Jug Band had a fluid membership during the nearly 40 years that it was active, recording under a number of names and in a variety of styles ranging from blues and rags to gospel. All the while, though, Will Shade was the backbone of the group, as he was the one responsible for finding new members to keep the jug band alive. The group’s best material came mainly from him; intelligently, Shade tried, whenever possible, to copyright his music under his name. Besides being the head of the band’s music, Shade was also in charge of the business affairs of the Memphis Jug Band, planning gigs and distributing money.
Various musicians recorded with the band from its first session in February 1927 to its final session in November 1934. These performers included Ben Ramey on kazoo, Will Weldon on guitar and mandolin, “Shakey Walter” Horton on harmonica, Charlie Polk on jug, Vol Stevens on banjo-mandolin (a banjo with a mandolin head), Jab Jones on jug, Hambone Lewis on jug, and vocalist Charlie Nickerson. In 1928, Charlie Burse joined the band as a permanent fixture on guitar and mandolin. The Memphis Jug Band frequently recorded with female singer Hattie Hart and with singer/guitarist Memphis Minnie on one occasion.
The Great Depression, coupled with a concerted police crackdown on gambling in 1930, caused hard times on previously wide-open Beale Street. The jug band craze also subsided in the 1930s, bringing fewer recording opportunities and smaller tips. The band tried to update to a jazzier sound for their final recording date, but commercial success had passed. The Memphis Jug Band’s best records epitomize the Roaring Twenties in Memphis.
Blues researcher Samuel Charters found Will Shade and his old cohorts in 1956 still playing together and released several field recordings under the Memphis Jug Band name. The band during this period usually included Shade’s long time friend Charlie Burse, whom Shade had picked up in 1928 as a vocalist and tenor guitarist, and sometimes included old rival Gus Cannon. Shade also appeared as an accompanist on Cannon’s “comeback” album, Walk Right In, recorded by Stax Records in 1963. Will Shade continued to put together jug bands in the 1940s, often with Charlie Burse. The two were rediscovered and recorded by. Will Shade died of pneumonia on September 18, 1966.
Being an amateur blues harp player it is great to have the opportunity to do a little research and share some thoughts about the greats.
A good starting point is to get a couple of Muddy Waters CDs and trawl through the different harp players that Muddy recruited and provided the space for them to grow, such as Sonny Boy Williamson, Little Walter, Junior Wells , Walter Horton, James Cotton,Charlie Musselwhite, Paul Oscher,Carey Bell and Jerry Portnoy just to mention a few. They dont all get into the top ten, but of course this is all subjective.
Just to make the link check out this great vid with Muddy and Sonny Boy Williamson:
Sonny Boy Williamson II (Alex Miller)was, in many ways, the ultimate blues legend. By the time of his death in 1965, he had been around long enough to have played with Robert Johnson at the start of his career and Eric Clapton, Jimmy Page, and Robbie Robertson at the end of it.
What is known is that by the mid ’30s, he was traveling the Delta working under the alias of Little Boy Blue. With blues legends like Robert Johnson, Robert Nighthawk, Robert Jr. Lockwood, and Elmore James as interchangeable playing partners, he worked the juke joints, fish fries, country suppers, and ball games of the era.
Check out Sonnyboy.com for more on his life and recordings
Known as the “Godfather of the Blues,” Junior Wells was able to grab an audience by the ears and take them on a musical roller-coaster ride with his own unique spin on the classic Chicago blues sound. Often performing alongside guitarist Buddy Guy, Wells enjoyed a lengthy career that spanned 50 years, his staggering harp solos and vocal interplay defining the Chicago blues harp sound at a time when the music was still shedding its country roots, taking the music to new heights of critical acclaim and commercial acceptance.
“If the harmonica is to blues what the saxaphone is to jazz, then Junior Wells is a post-bebop legend and one of the better players of the blues. He was along with James Cotton the last of a generation that grew out of Chicago in the late 40’s and early 50’s, when the blues scene featured such notables as John Lee Williamson and Rice Miller, Little Walter and Walter Horton.”
More than any other harp-slinger, “Little Walter” Jacobs owned the Chicago blues scene from the moment of his arrival in 1946, and through the end of the 1950s. A dynamic soloist, Little Walter created new tones and bright new textures with the instrument.
An underrated vocalist with a gritty, soulful voice, Walter was also a skilled songwriter and natural-born bandleader. The dominant blues harp player of the post-war years, Walter’s influence can still be heard in the music of harpists like Charlie Musselwhite, Rod Piazza, and Kim Wilson.
Some other comments on Little Walter:
Walter electrified the harmonica, transforming it from a back-up instrument to a solo voice, making it moan low or soar high into the stratosphere, like the greatest of instruments, making sounds the harmonica never made before.(Mac Walton)
“Any discussion of Muddy Waters and his harp players must start by focusing on the fiery young harp pioneer Little Walter Jacobs. After brief periods with Little Johnny Jones (better known as a pianist) and Jimmy Rogers (better known as a guitarist) on harp, Walter held the harp seat in Muddy’s regular performing band from around 1947 until 1952, and thereafter continued to appear on Muddy’s recording sessions whenever he was able until shortly before his death in 1968. Although in reality Walter and Muddy were not even part of the same generation of bluesmen – Muddy was born and raised in the Mississippi Delta region fifteen years before Walter, who was from Louisiana Creole country – they shared a musical telepathy that has seldom been equaled. Walter’s darting and swooping harmonica lines seamlessly intertwined with Muddy’s music, adding elements of melody, harmony, and notably, a sense of swing that had previously not been heard in the raw delta funk of Muddy and his peers. Some of the greatest moments in Chicago Blues occurred when these two titans joined forces, so it’s no wonder that both Muddy and Chess Records felt that the harmonica should continue to be a part of “the Muddy sound”
“James Cotton is one of the best-known blues harmonica musicians in the world, and certainly one of the best of the modern Chicago blues stylists, recognized for the power and precision of his playing.”
Musselwhite masters the old Chicago tradition and at the same time experiments like no one else does. Understanding what position he plays on certain tunes is an interesting challenge! This site is the new official one and features lots of info, soundbytes, and goodies to purchase.
Blues harpist Charlie Musselwhite rose out of the Chicago blues scene of the 1960s and, along with Paul Butterfield, helped bring blues music to a young white audience. His move to Northern California late in the decade brought the blues to the children of flower-power and, in the decades since, the artist has been an effective ambassador for blues music. More than anything, however, Musselwhite has helped expand the stylistic barriers of the blues, bringing elements of jazz, Tex-Mex, and even world music into his traditional mix of Delta and Chicago blues styles.
From one of his best and early albums ’stand back’ -you must listen to Christo Redemptor….
Paul Butterfield changed from playing the flute to playing blues harp and teamed up with Elvin Bishop and toured clubs where they met and played with the likes of Muddy Waters, Howlin’ Wolf, and Junior Wells.
“In the 1960’s in the blues clubs on Chicago’s south side, the Paul Butterfield Blues Band was setting off the first depth charges of what would come to be a worldwide blues explosion.
Butterfield played and endorsed (as noted in the liner notes for his first album) Hohnerharmonicas, in particular the diatonic ten-hole ‘Marine Band’ model. He played using an unconventional technique, holding the harmonica upside-down (with the low notes to the righthand side). His primary playing style was in the second position, also known as cross-harp, but he also was adept in the third position, notably on the track ‘East-West’ from the album of the same name, and the track ‘Highway 28′ from the “Better Days” album.
Seldom venturing higher than the sixth hole on the harmonica, Butterfield nevertheless managed to create a variety of original sounds and melodic runs. His live tonal stylings were accomplished using a Shure 545 Unidyne III hand-held microphone connected to one or more Fender amplifiers, often then additionally boosted through the venue’s public address (PA) system. This allowed Butterfield to achieve the same extremes of volume as the various notable sidemen in his band.
Butterfield also at times played a mixture of acoustic and amplified style by playing into a microphone mounted on a stand, allowing him to perform on the harmonica using both hands to get a muted, Wah-wah effect, as well as various vibratos. This was usually done on a quieter, slower tune.
Probably sitting more with the generation before the ‘electric’ harp players based in Chicago, Sonny Terry represents the last of the acoustic harp players.
“Whooping and wailing like a man possessed, Sonny Terry drew listeners into a sultry musical world populated with hot headed women and worried men. Though he often employed an ethereal falsetto voice, he was also capable of unleashing hair-raising hollers. His harmonica style was similarly compelling.
The North Carolina-born legend would vocalize through his harp, thus intensifying the plaintive moan of the instrument.”
“The Wolf began playing “folk blues” acoustic music when he got his first guitar in 1928. Influences include Charlie Patton and Sonny Boy Williamson (Rice Miller). Although he began in an acoustic style, he is best known for his loud and boisterous electric blues.”
“Walter Horton was considered by peers and fans alike to be a genius of the blues harmonica. He created a unique, fluid style that fused blues feeling with an uplifting jazzlike tone. The beauty that he created through his music was in striking contrast to the troubled life he lived.”
As for harmonicas, he used Hohner’s Marine Band. He was just as comfortable playing first position (A harp in the key of A) as with the more standard cross harp (D harp in the key of A). He did not do much with chromatic harmonicas. Although Big Walter could play in the style of other harp players (and was often asked to do so), he has no credible imitators. He is one of a kind.
“One of Chicago’s defining harpists (though often overshadowed by legends like Junior Wells)… Born in Macon, Mississippi on November 14, 1936, Bell moved to Chicago in 1956 with his godfather, respected blues and country and western pianist Lovie Lee.
After having taught himself to play harmonica at eight years old, he started taking lessons from Little Walter, and met Honeyboy Edwards. He remains an eloquent harpist with a commanding voice.”
And where would you put Billy Boy Arnold and George Smith ? Just add some more of your favourites and decide where they go in the top ten!
Adam Gussow, a great supporter of all those trying to learn and to improve their blues harmonica paying, suggests some criteria by which you should judge those who belong in the ‘top 10′:
ORIGINALITY. I call this the three-second test. If you turned on the radio and heard this player, could you tell within three seconds that it was them–assuming you knew their music to begin with? Lurking within what harp players call “tone” is the absolutely individuated voice, if you’re lucky enough to develop one.
INFLUENCE. Are the players in question central to the tradition of blues harmonica as it has emerged over the past 100+ years? Are they foundational in some way? Do they help modernize, consolidate, or conserve the tradition? Have they spawned imitators, including very good players who never escape their orbit? If you leave them off the list, has an injustice plainly been done? (John Lee Williamson changed the way everybody who came after him played harp. Billy Branch and Sugar Blue are, in very different ways, both the inheritors and modernizers of the Chicago blues harmonica tradition.)
TECHNICAL MASTERY. Does this player make music at a speed or with a complexity that sets him or her above the rest? (Little Walter in “Back Track” and “Roller Coaster,” James Cotton in “Creeper Creeps Again,” and Paul Butterfield in “Goin’ to Main Street” set a standard here, and Sonny Terry wins admission on the basis of pretty much any thing he’s every recorded. Sugar Blue raises the bar yet again. And please don’t forget DeFord Bailey.) Or, alternately, does this player have an extraordinary ability to hit the deep blues pitches, especially the so-called “blue third” that I discuss in many of my videos? (Junior Wells exhibits this sort of mastery.)
SOULFULNESS. In some ways, this criterion should lead things off. We’re talking about blues harmonica, after all, not basket weaving. We’re talking about an extraordinarily expressive instrument. The thing it seeks to express is a range of passions and moods, many of them very powerful and a few of them downright ugy. Does this player attack his or her instrument with ferocity that makes you shiver, or jump? Or with a late-night hoodoo-spookiness that makes you feel your own loneliness? Or with some magical combination of all those things that make you cry? (Howlin’ Wolf makes the Top-10 list for obvious reasons; so does Rice Miller, a.k.a. “Sonny Boy Williamson II.” Rev. Dan Smith, who may be less familiar to you, is the definition of soulful)
RECORDED EVIDENCE. In order to earn a spot on one of the top 10 lists , a player (or the partisans of a player) must be able to convince with the help of recorded evidence. Buddy Bolden was the greatest trumpet player ever to come out of New Orleans, many say, but he never made a recording. Obviously the best and most influential players can’t be fully summarized by 10 minutes’ worth of vinylized or digitized performances, and some players–John Lee Williamson in particular–don’t benefit from this exercise. Still, it has its virtues as a teaching tool and a way of guiding the conversation.
And if you want to learn blues harp playing then a good place to start is with Adam’s lessons on you tube and on his web site.
Try these lessons just to get you in the mood
and blues scale playing….
So listen to all blues harp players from the last 100 years (plenty of remasters around), as well as practising whenever you have a quiet moment -easy instrument to carry around so no excuses. And remember what Adam says -listen to a wide variety of music to understand rhythm and improvisation.
A small but perfectly formed gallery in the heart of Paris is certainly worth a look, and if you don’t like paying entrance fees for your art, go along at 5 .pm on a Wednesday to get free entrance.
At present there are two good exhibitions of Magnum photographers:
Ferdinando Scianna and Ara Güler.
Ferdinando Scianna
The first ever retrospective in France of Ferdinando Scianna’s work, this exhibition includes over 100 prints taken from several series produced from the 1960s onwards. These pictures have appeared in many books, such as Feste religiosi in Sicilia, Marpessa, Dormire, les Siciliens and Mondo Bambino.
FRANCE. Paris. Fashion show. 1989
A former student of literature and philosophy, Ferdinando Scianna is particularly interested in books. They form the natural and preferred medium for displaying his photographs, to which he likes to add accompanying text from writer friends. In 1963 he met the author Leonardo Sciascia, and they worked together on a number of publications.
Italian model MARPESSA
A member of the Magnum Photos agency, Ferdinando Scianna works in reportage, fashion and advertising photography.
A former student of literature and philosophy at Palermo University, Scianna is passionate about literature; books are the natural medium for his photographs, which he likes to show alongside a text by one of his writer friends. Always reluctant to explain his images, he prefers to paraphrase those who worked in parallel using their own words. This exhibition is a notable exception, including as it does his own memories and thoughts on his work and career.
ITALY. Sicily
For Ferdinando Scianna, photography is a way of being part of life. Organised thematically, this exhibition is designed to provide an insight into this approach.
Ara Güler
Born in 1928, Ara Güler began working as a reporter for major Turkish newspapers and international magazines in the 1950s. He became a major figure in Turkish photography and a renowned photographer worldwide, and joined the Magnum Agency in the 1960s. He carefully documented the rural and urban reality of Turkey, its archaeological and natural treasures, its traditions, and the first signs of its economic development. His work is part of the great humanist tradition, but it is aso imbued with a form of poetic realism that makes it uniquely powerful.
This exhibition is part of the Saison de la Turquie en France (Turkish Season in France) with support from the Paris City Council, Culturesfrance, IKSV (Istanbul Culture and Arts Foundation) and the Season’s patrons.
Ara Güler also became a correspondent for the foreign media. In his pictures from the 1950s and 60s reflect a sense of profound nostalgia. In Istanbul. Memories of a City (3) in which archive pictures are presented next to Orhan Pamuk’s childhood memories, Parnuk talks of hüzün, an Arabic word meaning melancholy and sadness, which he sees as “the strongest and most permanent sentiment in Istanbul over the last centuries”. This Istanbul, a nocturnal, misty city, is reminiscent of Serge Larrain’s magical views of Valparaiso.
The result is a view of a city that does not glitter with the prestigious remains of the Ottoman Empire but glows with another kind of light, that of glistening, rain-soaked pavements, twilight streetlamps, car headlights heading up to Beyoglu, and ferries disappearing into the mist along the Bosphorus.
Ara Güler is an amazing storyteller and his world is packed with references from literature, art and cinema, areas in which most of his friends work. ‘Our world was created by artists ; I looked everywhere for them and photographed them.
4). His fine portraits of Chagall, Calder, Bill Brandt, Orson Welles, Elia Kazan, Fellini, Bertrand Russell, Yasar Kemal and Orhan Pamuk, all part of the archives along with hundreds of other artists and intellectuals, reveal yet another aspect of his work and talent.
Although Ara Güler’s work is part of the great humanist tradition, his brand of poetic realism makes it uniquely powerful. HIs pictures are not just historic record of Istanbul. His shots of the city redolent with melancholy and his portraits of surprising presences make him one of the greatest photographs of the last century.
Today Ara Güler focuses on passing on the message of his “lost Istanbul” via countless books and exhibitions. Sitting in the Ara Café on the ground floor of the building where he grew up, he looks on with an amused eye as the world goes by, visitors come and go, and his fame continues to prosper. (text:Laura Serani, curator)
Quote: “To take a photograph is to align the head, the eye and the heart. It’s a way of life.”
I first caught the magic and creativity of H’Sao, in 2000, at the consultative meeting for nomads “Séminaire sous-regional sur l’éducation de base en milieu nomade de l’Afrique Sahelo-Saharienne, heldin N’Djamena, Chad. Guests included representatives of nomadic communities from as far away as Mauritania.
H'Sao Chad
I met ‘the family of friends, H’Sao, while helping to organise the meeting with the UNICEF representative Daniele Brady. We wanted a dramatic start to the meeting and had asked our singing friends to sing a song. With ten minutes before the start, we asked what would they sing? They were not sure, but in a couple of minutes they had made up a song linking the beauties and hardship of nomadic life as well as welcoming the guests in their own traditional way.
Half of the group came in from one doorway the other half from the other and as their voices rose they met in the middle of the room, greeting the guests with a chorus that stunned everyone. What a welcome and what a future they heralded for themselves!
Who are they?
H’Sao is a six-member family musical group from Chad whose music combines the rhythms of traditional Chadian music with western styles like jazz, gospel and R&B. Many of their songs are sung a cappella.
Caleb, Mossbass, Israel and Taroum RIMTOBAYE and their childhood friends, brothers Charles and Service LEDJEBGUE although originally from Chad, are now living in Montreal, perform original music inspired by Chad’s tradition, transmitting the sensitivity inherent in the melodies (N’Djamena) and the dances (Sai and N’Dala)
H’Sao embodies a blend of cultures and influences in outstanding performances. Their most striking feature lies in the stellar quality of their singing, their unified choir of voices, and the charming complicity between the performers.
After winning over audiences in the Francophone Games, they have toured extensively. With a first release on Quebecois label Mille-Pattes (Bottine Souriante), have performed worldwide, including in the United States, South Africa, Europe, Australia and New Zealand
Their self-titled debut album was released in 2003.H’Sao have evolved into an act renowned for filling concert halls.
It all started, seriously, for them in 2000
In October 2000, H’Sao is invited to the Fest’ Africa, at Pas-de-Calais (France). Here the group records their first demo. H’Sao is selected to represent their country at the Francophone Games held in Ottawa in July 2001. This event is an assembly of the top talents in sports and culture within the francophone worldwide community. H’Sao wins a bronze medal.
Caleb recalls:
« It was unimaginable, all the things that were happening to us. In Chad, being an artist is considered a minor trade. So, the fact that our music has been recognized internationally is a great accomplishment!
One of our biggest challenges as a group is to restore hope to young people in Chad, whose lives are undermined by constant wars. We want to prove to some of them that they can follow in our footsteps and to others that they can be touched by our music.
After the success of launching their first record at the Montreal International Jazz Festival:
It doesn’t get any tighter than family, and this band from N’Djamena, the capital of Chad, is a mariage of two : the Rintobayes, of the Sara people, and the Ledjebgues, of the Kabalaye group. Singing in dialect as well as French, Arabic and English, they thrilled a reviewer at a Montreal show last year. Their music is sacred, traditional, Afro-American and most of all, tight.
Originally from Bristol, UK, San Francisco based photographer, Adam Warmington has always been fascinated by images. He has spent 10 years in the film industry (even helping to make Aardman films) yet his true passion lies in stills, where he finds a greater challenge – to tell a story in one fraction of a second.
As a young traveler and observer he documents his own and others’ lives:
As a warm hearted people watcher he has also got his photographic eye open to breathtaking landscapes
So what about specializing?
Although he was always active in surfing circles it was the move to Ocean Beach,California, that acted as the catalyst for Adam’s career in surf-photography.
The combination of a close proximity to consistent waves and a gradual but warm welcome from the very tight-knit local community has allowed Adam to capture some unique and beautiful moments over the past few years. That, combined with frequent travel has let to his work being published in Surfer, The Surfers Path, Transworld, Water, Line Up, and Surfline amongst others.
So , a good eye, a passion or interest, and some determination to get up early, to grab the right light, to brave the cold wet days can all lead to specialising and getting noticed.
If you want to know more about Adam..and even his dad..here they are:
Support our young photographers!
Adam’s photos are on PBase and while there you might like to check out their magazine
