Topic: Bukka White

[sweatsavesblood]

Greetings, folks. Leave it to me to have my first post here be asking for something. Dig the forum, I must say. Lot of knowledge kicking around and it's the blues. Gotta love it.

I've been trying to work out some Bukka White tunes lately and this seems to be the place to find out. I'm concentrating on District Attorney Blues & When can I change my clothes. DA Blues sounds cross tuned, maybe Open Dmin with it a little flat but some of the notes just seem too awkward for that to be.

From what I've found Bukka played in mainly open Em, maybe Open Dmin in the early stuff. The rediscovered stuff I heard he did a lot of vestapol and spanish because he found it easier and saw some other cats doing things he liked in those tunings.

Any suggestions for working these tunes out? I'm sure w/the tuning I should be able to hammer it out. Appreciate any and all in advance.

Ekim

[Slack]

Welcome Ekim!

[Johnm]

Hi Ekim,
"District Attorney" and "When Can I Change My Clothes" are both played out of E position in standard tuning, but tuned a minor third low, with the sixth string sounding at C#.  They are certainly great songs and performances.  For a discussion of Bukka's early recordings you can go to a review of the Document CD of his pre-rediscovery recordings located in the Reviews Board.
All best,
Johnm

[waxwing]

Welcome, Mike, (Ekim -G-)

I'm not an expert on Bukka White, but I have heard Terry Robb mention several times that it was just the other way around, that some of his early stuff was in Vastapol (Open D, E or whatever) and that in his rediscovery phase he was enamored with the way Lightnin' Hopkins used the repeating hammer-on (in E standard, really) so he started using Crosstuning (Open Dm, Em or whatever) to have that hammer-on tremolo available. You can see in many of the videos of him playing that he plays entire pieces with his index finger holding down the first fret of the third string except when he's up the neck. For instance, check out the video of him playing Avalon [Edit - Er, make that Aberdeen] Blues (where he spanks the neck and body) and you'll see what I mean.

All for now.
John C

[sweatsavesblood]

Hey folks, appreciate the info. It's certainly opened a few things up. Thanks again.

For instance, check out the video of him playing Avalon [Edit - Er, make that Aberdeen] Blues (where he spanks the neck and body) and you'll see what I mean.

John, I have seen that. Great video. I've got the Newport DVD as well and he has some killer guitar work on that. You can tell the people around know something serious is going down when he's playing.

Ekim (and yes, that's my real name )

[robertbidochon]

Did somebody play the Bukka White's song "shake 'em on down"?
I think it's in standard tuning but I don't realize how he play the bass... there is two guitars?
thank you

[blueshome]

There are 2 guitars on "Shake 'em on Down. The second is played by that oft quoted player "unk".