Tags
12 string, 12 string guitar, Alan Lomax, Barrelhouse Sammie, Blind Sammie, Blind Willie McTell, blues, Bob Dylan, Curly Weaver, Georgia Bill, Kate McTell, Mark Knopfler, Memphis Minnie, Mick Taylor, Pig and Whistle Red, Ragtime, Ruth Ellis, slide guitar
Blind Willie McTell (born William Samuel McTier; May 5, 1898 – August 19, 1959) was a Piedmont blues and ragtime singer and guitarist. He played with a fluid, syncopated fingerstyle guitar technique, common among many exponents of Piedmont blues. Unlike his contemporaries, he came to use twelve-string guitars exclusively. McTell was also an adept slide guitarist, unusual among ragtime bluesmen.(ref Wikipedia).
For me it is a personal liking of his music, particularly as I like 12 string guitar and I find his voice particularly striking.
Try this:
Broke Down Engine Blues
and a couple of years earlier -Travellin’ Blues
Recorded in Atlanta, Georgia, October 30, 1929.
Another of his early ragtime tracks:Warm It Up to Me
Statesboro Blues – some of the artists who have performed the song includes Allman Brothers Band ,Canned Heat Taj Mahal, David Bromberg, Dave Van Ronk, The Devil Makes Three and Ralph McTell,
Rough Alley Blues (1931) with Ruth Ellis
Blind Willie McTell and Ruth Willis – Rough Alley Blues
Close down your windows and let down all your blinds
Close down your windows and let down all your blinds
So the next-door neighbor, baby, won’t hear your best friend cryin’
Take it low down and easy, don’t let your bedspring moan
Take it low down and easy, don’t let your bedspring moan
So your next-door neighbor, baby, won’t hear you grieve and groan
Go wild, baby, I’m not scared to fear. (Aw, sing it, baby)
Go wild, baby, I’m not scared to fear
Then I’ll give it all to you, mama, like a Cadillac changing gear
I take it to my room and lay it ‘cross my big brass bed
I take it to my room and lay it ‘cross my big brass bed
I guess I’ll be my own singer, neighbours turn cherry red
(Play that thing boy. Aw,
Play that thing for me and miss Mary, ‘Cause it’s gettin’ good
It drove my partner out of town.
I wouldn’t have done it without that old Harris street corner)
It was a mean old miller that taught me how to grind
(Taught you how to twist too, I believe)
It was a mean old miller that taught me how to grind
And it was a married woman, mama,
Who learned me that old shun-shine
I’m going down this alley and get me two more drinks of booze
(They have police down there. They’ll sure arrest you)
I’m going down this alley, get me two more drinks of booze
Because I’m drunk now, mama, and I’ve got them old rough alley blues
(Stand by, people, if you wants to know it all)
Dark Night Blues
You might be wanting to know a little more about legendary Georgia blues-man Willie McTell -here is a documentary:
This video was created by David Fulmer for Georgia Public Television (1997) and is a part of the South Georgia Folklife Collection at Valdosta State University Archives and Special Collections.
South Georgia Folklife Project: http://archives.valdosta.edu/folklife/
Valdosta State University Archives and Special Collections: https://www.valdosta.edu/archives
And another song of the great BWMc – Searching the Desert for the Blues (1931)
Searching The Desert For The Blues
You may search the ocean, you might go ‘cross the deep blue sea
But mama, you’ll never find another hot shot like me
I followed my baby from the station to the train
And the blues came down like night and showered me
I left her at the station wringing her hands and crying
I told her, she had a home just as long as I got mine
I’ve got two women and you can’t tell them apart
I’ve got one in my bosom and the other one in my heart
The one in my bosom, she’s in Tennessee
And the one in my heart, don’t even give a darn for me
I used to say a married woman was the sweetest woman that ever been born
But I’ve changed that thing, you better leave married women alone
Take my advice, let these married women be
‘Cause their husbands’ll grab you, beat you ragged as a cedar tree
When a woman say, she love you ’bout good as she do herself
I don’t pay her no attention, tell that same line to somebody else
I really don’t believe no woman in the whole round world do right
Act like an angel in the daytime, mess by the ditch at night
I’m going, pretty mama, please don’t break this rule
That’s why I’m searching these deserts for the blues
I’m going, pretty mama, searching these deserts now
That’s why I’m walking my baby home anyhow
Lord, oh Lord
Lordy, Lordy, Lord
Oh Lordy Lord
Lord, Lord, Lord
When a woman say, she love you ’bout good as she do herself
I don’t pay her no attention, tell that same line to somebody else
Lord, Lord
Lord, Lord, Lord
And more ….Lord….Lord send me an Angel (1933)
And a nice uptempo number -Atlanta Strut (1929)
Great guitar work!
Scarey Day Blues (1931)
Recorded in Atlanta, Georgia, October 23, 1931.
Some slide work on this one:Savannah Mama
Recorded in New York City, September 18, 1933
Little Delia
McTell in 1949, performing a traditional ballad about the murder of Delia Green, a young girl from Georgia.
Some info about the song: http://weeniecampbell.com/mambo/index…
Delia, Delia, how can it be?
Say you love old rounders and don’t love me
Now she one more rounder gone
Delia, Delia, see that I’m all alone
Some of you rounders going to pay my way back home
Cause she one more rounder gone
Sitting on the housetop, high as I can see
Say you love those rounders and don’t love me
But she one more rounder gone
Delia’s poor mother took a little trip out West
When she returned, little Delia was lying in rest
But she one more rounder gone
Delia’s mother weeped, Delia’s father moaned
They wouldn’t have hated it so bad if that child had died at home
But she’s all I got and gone
Delia was a gambler runnin’ all around
She was one girl never let the deal go down
But she one more rounder gone
Rubber-tired buggy, double-seated hack,
Took little Delia to the cemetery but failed to bring her back
But she one more rounder gone
Delia was a gambler runnin’ all around
She was one girl never let the deal go down
But she one more rounder gone
Delia lookin’ high, Kenny lookin’ low,
Shot poor Delia down with that fateful 44
But she one more rounder gone
Delia, Delia, take no one’s advice
Last words I heard her say were, “Jesus Christ!”
But she one more rounder gone
Kenny he’s in the bar-room drinkin’ out of a silver cup
Delia she’s in the graveyard, may not never wake up
But she one more rounder gone
Judge said to Kenny, “What all that fuss about?”
“All account of a gambler’s tryin’ to put me out
But she one more rounder gone
Judge said to Kenny, “I’m gonna tell you an actual fact,
Son you go state till Delia come back,”
Cause she one more rounder gone
Lyrics from <a href=”https://phonelyrics.com”>phonelyrics.com</a>
The origin of this song may be this:
Late on Christmas Day, December 25th, 1900 a fourteen year old girl named Delia Green was murdered in Savannah, Georgia by a fifteen year old boy named Moses Houston. Houston shot Delia after an argument. The newspapers reported that the two had been romantically involved for several months but Delia had recently ended the relationship with Houston and was seeing another man.
Moses Houston stood trial for Delia’s murder in the spring of 1901, was convicted by the jury and sentenced to life imprisonment by the presiding judge. Moses served twelve years and then was pardoned by the Georgia Governor, John M. Slaton in 1913. Delia Green is buried in Laurel Grove Cemetery South in Savannah in an unmarked grave. Houston disappeared into the pages of history.
Rev Gary Davies played an early version of this song as well as Stefan Grossman and Bob Dylan:
and another great ragtime from McTell:” Southern Can Is Mine ” (1931)
And a song with his wife Kate McTell
This song :Mama let me scoop for you – is listed as sung with Ruby Glaze, who some think maybe his wife Kate McTell.
It was common to change your name -particularly if you were recording with different record labels.McTell traveled and performed widely, recording for several labels under different names: Blind Willie McTell (for Victor and Decca), Blind Sammie (for Columbia), Georgia Bill (for Okeh), Hot Shot Willie (for Victor), Blind Willie (for Vocalion and Bluebird), Barrelhouse Sammie (for Atlantic), and Pig & Whistle Red (for Regal)
We have had Ruth Ellis, Kate McTell and now another female collaborator -the great Memphis Minnie
Love Changing Blues
Another collaborator was Curly Weaver
Was Born to Die
Enjoy the guitar in the following song – Bell Street Blues
My Baby is Gone
I particularly like the rhythm of this song and the ragtime guitar
Kill it Kid
Wabash Cannonball – a traditional song possibly based on the idea that hobos imagined a mythical train called the “Wabash Cannonball” which was a “death coach” that appeared at the death of a hobo to carry his soul to its reward. The song was then created with the lyrics and music telling the story of the train.
Wabash Cannonball
Out from the wide Pacific ocean to the broad Atlantic shore
She climbs flowery mountain, o’r hills and by the shore
Although she’s tall and handsome, and she’s known quite well by all
She’s a regular combination of the Wabash Cannonball.
Verse:
Oh, the Eastern states are dandy, so the Western people say
Chicago, Rock Island, St. Louis by the way
To the lakes of Minnesota where the rippling waters fall
No chances to be taken on the Wabash Cannonball.
Chorus:
Oh, listen to the jingle, the rumor and the roar
As she glides along the woodland, o’r hills and by the shore
She climbs the flowery mountain, hear the merry hobos squall
She glides along the woodland, the Wabash Cannonball.
Verse:
Oh, here’s old daddy Cleaton, let his name forever be
And long be remembered in the courts of Tennessee
For he is a good old rounder ’til the curtain ’round him fall
He’ll be carried back to victory on the Wabash Cannonball.
Verse:
I have rode the I.C. Limited, also the Royal Blue
Across the Eastern countries on Elkhorn Number Two
I have rode those highball trains from coast to coast that’s all
But I have found no equal on the Wabash Cannonball.
Chorus:
Oh, listen to the jingle, the rumor and the roar
As she glides along the woodland, o’r hills and by the shore
She climbs the flowery mountain, hear the merry hobos squall
She glides along the woodland, the Wabash Cannonball.
I like this version of the traditional song ‘Motherless Children”
It is believed that he heard this from Blind Willie Johnson. The phrasing and the playoff with his guitar is particularly striking -great energy.
” Come On Around To My House Mama ” (October 1929)-hear him talk to his guitar!
Two vids of Blind Willie McTell talking to Alan Lomax and playing
In 1940 John A. Lomax and his wife, Ruby Terrill Lomax, a professor of classics at the University of Texas at Austin, interviewed and recorded McTell for the Archive of American Folk Song of the Library of Congress in a two-hour session held in their hotel room in Atlanta.[7] These recordings document McTell’s distinctive musical style, which bridges the gap between the raw country blues of the early part of the 20th century and the more conventionally melodious, ragtime-influenced East Coast Piedmont blues sound. The Lomaxes also elicited from the singer traditional songs (such as “The Boll Weevil” and “John Henry”) and spirituals (such as “Amazing Grace”),[8] which were not part of his usual commercial repertoire. In the interview, John A. Lomax is heard asking if McTell knows any “complaining” songs (an earlier term for protest songs), to which the singer replies somewhat uncomfortably and evasively that he does not.
I do like the Dying Crapshooter’s Blues -with some talk from Blind Willie
Another from his last sessions in 1949
A Married Man’s a Fool. For his last years although married he was living separately from his wife Kate as she was working in Fort Gordon, near Augusta, and he was working around Atlanta.
Blind Willie McTell only received $10 for his recording session with Alan Lomax -it was a real shame he could not benefit from the boom in ‘re-discovering’ blues musicians who recorded in the 1920s/30s.
BW McTell died of a stroke in 1959 (aided and abetted by diabetes and alcoholism) -just 4 years before Mississippi John Hurt was ‘discovered’ in Avalon in 1963. Musicians such as Son House,Sleepy John Estes, Bukka White and Skip James were also lucky enough to get real recognition and a little cash, in their later years, but not enough recognition for Blind Willie.
At least Bob Dylan recognised his talent: