R L Burnside: Old Black Mattie

R L tells a cool tale about playing the blues.

RL Burnside - Blues Story - Poor Black mattie
Uploaded by fredozydeco

R L Burnside: Poor Boy Long Ways From Home

R L Burnside was one of those iconic bluesman that lived in the hill country of Mississippi. He and his large family have done more to keep alive the blues of Mississippi than anyone else. Here is some great footage of R L doing some classic blues.

R L Burnside: Feelin Good

R L Burnside recorded live!

R L Burnside - Feelin' Good
Uploaded by fredozydeco

RL Burnside: Rollin And Tumblin

Another clip of RL Burnside doing some of the great hill country blues.

RL Burnside: Big Boss Man

Classic blues from a classic bluesman! Mr. RL Burnside! BTW, the guitar player that looks lost is Dave Stewart formally of the Eurythmics. one of the keys to playing the blues is the ability to listen. Some blues cats have their own rhythm, and sense of melody. You really have to listen for them to go to the four, (musician talk for chord change) instead of just going where it is suppose to be. Some singers like John Lee Hooker might just vamp on the one chord until he felt like moving to the four chord. So you have to listen and go with the singer. In Kansas City, Little Hatch was like that, and his bands always were on top of it. It is a great way to learn the blues, because Hatch would play the same song different each time he tried it! In a way it keeps thing fresh, because you just don't know what they guy is going to do:-) However, one of the great things about playing with Jimmy Pryor, was that Jimmy had a great sense of time, and he never lost it. even when he was in his upper 80s he always was where he was suppose to be in a song, so it was very easy to play for him. Unfortunatly RL, Hatch, John Lee, and Jimmy have left us. God bless everyone of them.

r.l. burnside - big boss man
Uploaded by fredozydeco

RL Burnside: Poor Black Mattie

Another cool RL video. Burnside was one of the greats, and his family is keeping the blues alive. There are several videos of this set. I assume it was probably taken in his house in the hill country of Mississippi.

R L Burnside: Just Like A Woman

The late RL Burnside doing Just Like A Woman.

Artist of the Week R L Burnside

This week's artist of the week is R L Burnside. I chose R L because his family is featured in the current issue of Living Blues. R L's legacy lives on with a large number of kids who are carrying on his work, including Iowa's own Burnside and Reed. (however, I didn't notice them in my first quick scan of the magazine) I mentioned a couple of weeks ago about people lamenting the death of the blues, but this months Living Blues is proof positive that the blues is alive and well in the Mississippi Hill country. I also caught an episode of the PBS show Globe Trekker. Normally they travel to such exotic places like Africa, the jungles of Asia, or the heart of India, but last night they were trekking across the American deep south. They stopped in Clarksdale the heart of the Mississippi Delta, and sure enough in an old juke joint was an unknown blues band belting out hard core eletricfied blues like it was soaked in Mississippi moonshine. All I can say is the Blues Lives!