Topic: Curley Weaver's Guitar Playing: Queries and Tips

[LB]

This is an MP3 of where I am at after a few days of practice here and there. I haven't mastered it but it's beginning to sound more like it should. I still have to loose some of the bounce and get his vibe but that will take time.

Play MP3 sample

[uncle bud]

Hi LittleBrother - It's definitely starting to sound like Curley. That treble riff he's doing using the high G on the 6th string as a pedal seems to repeat as he goes through the G G7 C C sequence. Also I think he's doing some stumble bass once he comes out of that part, a la Blind Blake, although in this case it makes me think more of Blind Boy Fuller. More like the attack is just ahead of the beat, and the stumble through to the next string is almost an afterthought, barely there. I'll listen again more carefully.

[LB]

Thanks Uncle Bud, I am hearing more and more. I have two versions on my Ipod now. One version called "trixie" even steps through the bass notes and chords in a more jazzy method. This song has more twists than Chubby Checker. I think it's improving every day. I am not only trying to get those stumbles but also the smooth jazzy rhythm he gets while singing. Thanks for your insight. I am trying to slowly apply all you guy's tips which are very helpful.

LB

[alanhan]

Hey, forget about the tune for the moment - what a guitar!!!!!!
kay kraft, fanatastic!!!!

[Le Trompeur]

It amazes me just how knowledgable the people on this forum are!!
Perhaps some of you can lend me a bit of help.

I have a CD that has a tune titled Sweet Petunia that I would like to learn to play.  I think it may be in Open G.

Does anyone know how to play it?
Does anyone know anything about the guy playing it?

[dj]

Does anyone know anything about the guy playing it?

You don't give the name of the performer.  Is it Curley Weaver?  Is the CD Document 5110 "Georgia Blues (1928 - 1933)?

[Le Trompeur]

Does anyone know anything about the guy playing it?

You don't give the name of the performer.  Is it Curley Weaver?  Is the CD Document 5110 "Georgia Blues (1928 - 1933)?

It is by a guy named Curley Weaver. 
Thanks for the tip I will place it in the subject heading.

[dj]

There's an 8 1/2 page biography of Curley Weaver in Bruce Bastin's Red River Blues.  The book is still in print.  If you're at all interested in Weaver, or more generally in any of the blues performers from the East Coast of the United States, you should get this book.

The short version of the bio:  Weaver was born in 1906 in Newton County, Georgia.  Around the age of 10, he learned guitar from his mother (who also taught the Hicks brothers, better known as Barbecue Bob and Charley Lincoln).  He moved to Atlanta at the age of 19, where he played with the Hicks brothers and the harmonica player Eddie Mapp.  In 1930, he recorded with Barbecue Bob and Buddy Moss as the Georgia Cotton Pickers, and in 1933 with Moss and Fred McMullen as the Georgia Browns.  He recorded duets with  Buddy Moss, Fred McMullen, Clarence Moore, and Blind Willie McTell throughout the early 1930s, and again with McTell in 1949.  He died in 1962.  I'll quote the last paragraph of Bastin's biographical sketch:

"Ten years later when collecting information on Weaver and his associates I heard not one unpleasant word about him.  People recognized his music with unaffected delight and remembered him with affection.  It is fitting to leave the final word to Buddy Moss: 'I think (people) liked Curley best [of Barbecue Bob, McTell, and Weaver].  Curley was a guy, he could really raise behind you and he could take up the slack.  You didn't have to wait for him.'"

[Johnm]

Hello Le Trompeur,
Welcome to Weenie Campbell.  I think Curley Weaver is actually playing "Sweet Petunia" in G position, standard tuning.  When he goes to his IV chord, C, you can hear him pop a pick-up note in the bass, B, and then hit the root of the IV Chord, C.  Were he in Spanish, that C note would be found at the fifth fret of the fifth string, very inconveniently located.  There are other sounds, as well, that indicate G, standard tuning, rather than open G tuning.
All best,
Johnm

[Johnm]

Hi all,
I merged four threads dealing with Curley Weaver's playing into one Curley Weaver Guitar Playing thread.  Except for the initial post, none of the posts' titles have been changed, for ease of following the discussions.
All best,
Johnm