Topic: Miller's Breakdown

[Johnm]

Hi all,
It looks like all of the responses are in on Carl Martin's "Badly Mistreated Man", so here are the answers.  Thanks to Prof Scratchy and Pan for participating.
   * Carl Martin did play the song out of E position in standard tuning, as both of you had it.
   * For the little tag that Carl Martin plays twice from :03-:08, he did this:  On the + of beat four in the previous measure, he slid into the fourth fret of the fifth string, doing a thumb drag-through from there into the second fret of the fourth string, which lands on beat one.  On the + of beat one, he slid into the fourth fret of the third string, hitting it with the thumb of his right hand.  On beat two, he played a triplet, brushing the fourth fret of the first string and the open second string on the first and third notes of the triplet and re-hitting the fourth fret of the third string with his thumb on the middle note of the triplet.  On beat three, he lands on a partial F#7, with his thumbing striking the third fret of the third string, and his index finger brushing the second fret of the second string and the open first string.  On the + of beat three he hits the first fret fret of the fourth string, doing a drag-through with it into the second fret of the third string on beat four, against which he brushes the open second string and the second fret of the first string, also on beat four.  On the + of beat four, he brushes an E chord with his index finger on the top three strings.  The left hand of this tag is just as Pan had it.  Carl Martin's time and execution is so spot on, it's as though the phrase just glistens.
   *  For the vamp behind is singing over the I chord at :10--:19, Carl Martin did the following:  On the fourth beat of the measure preceding the vamp, he plays a triplet, striking the fifth string at the second fret on beat four, sliding to the seventh fret of the fifth string for the second note of the triplet, and hitting the open sixth string on the last note of the triplet.  He then starts the vamp with a thumb brush of 7-0-0 on the fifth fourth and third strings on beat one.  On the + of beat one he hits the bent eighth fret of the second string.  On beat two he pinches the seventh fret of the fifth string and the open first string.  On the + of beat two, he hits the open second string.  On beat three he pinches the seventh fret of the fifth string and the bent eighth fret of the second string and on the + of beat three, he hits the open first string.  On beat four he hits the same triplet in the bass that he used to precede the vamp and starts it over in the next measure.  This is much as Pan had it, as well.  I think this phrase is akin to one Bill Broonzy plays in "Hey, Hey, Baby".
   * For the fill from :33-:36, Carl Martin does a thumb-struck slide into the third string at the fourth fret.  On beat two he does a triplet index finger brush of the first two strings open.  On beat three he re-brushes the first two strings open, and on the + of beat three he hits the second fret of the third string with his thumb.  On 4 +, he goes from the open third string to the first fret of the third string, both struck with his thumb, and on beat one of the next measure he picks the open first string.  Once again,  Pan was pretty much on it.

Wasn't Carl Martin a great player?  His playing had such a finish.  Can anyone think of a song with a longer lyric break than he takes after the solo on "Badly Mistreated Man"?  It is 24 bars long--that's long!  Thanks to Prof Scratchy and Pan for participating, and I'll post another puzzler soon.

All best,
Johnm 

[Johnm]

Hi all,
For anyone who was baffled yesterday by my answer to the second query in the Carl Martin puzzler, I caught my error when re-reading it last night and made a fix.  The description should now match the sound of what Carl Martin played better.  Sorry about that!
All best,
Johnm

[Johnm]

Hi all,
I've got another puzzler for you.  The song is "Hoot Your Belly", by Jimmy Lee Williams, and it is the title track of his Fat Possum CD.  No home should be without it.  Jimmy Lee was a farmer in Porlan, Georgia who was discovered and recorded by George Mitchell.  Thanks, George!  Here is the track:



Hoot your belly, give your backbone ease
Hoot your belly, give your backbone ease
Hoot your belly, give your backbone ease
Daddy ain't around, you can love just who you please

Mmmmmmmmmmm, mmmmmmmmmmmm
Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm
Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmm, well, well, well

Love that woman, just can't call her name
Love that woman, I just can't call her name
Love that woman, I just can't call her name
Married woman, but I love her just the same

Oh, ah, oh, ah
Well, uh-uh, whoa, uh, oh?

Goin', I'm goin', your cryin' won't make me stay
Goin', I'm goin', your cryin' won't make me stay
Goin', I'm goin', your cryin' won't make me stay
More you cry, now, further you're gonna drive me away

The questions on "Hoot Your Belly" are:
   * What playing position/tuning did Jimmy Lee Williams use to play the song?
   * Where did Jimmy Lee fret, and how did he play his signature lick, which he starts playing at about :03 into the song?
   * What chords does Jimmy Lee play in the course of the song?

Please use only your ears and your guitars to arrive at your answers, and please don't post any answers before Wednesday morning, January 21.  Thanks for your participation, and I hope some of you folks who have been following the thread but not posting will participate.
All best,
Johnm

[mr mando]

The video is not available to me, (maybe an oversees thing). Is this the same performance: ?

[Johnm]

Yes, mr mando, that is the same performance, so you could work from that one, too.
All best,
Johnm

[Prof Scratchy]

Hi all,
I've got another puzzler for you.  The song is "Hoot Your Belly", by Jimmy Lee Williams, and it is the title track of his Fat Possum CD.  No home should be without it.  Jimmy Lee was a farmer in Porlan, Georgia who was discovered and recorded by George Mitchell.  Thanks, George!  Here is the track:



The questions on "Hoot Your Belly" are:
   * What playing position/tuning did Jimmy Lee Williams use to play the song?
   * Where did Jimmy Lee fret, and how did he play his signature lick, which he starts playing at about :03 into the song?
   * What chords does Jimmy Lee play in the course of the song?

Please use only your ears and your guitars to arrive at your answers, and please don't post any answers before Wednesday morning, January 21.  Thanks for your participation, and I hope some of you folks who have been following the thread but not posting will participate.
All best,
Johnm

No takers for this one? I'm quietly confident, but think someone else should start the ball rolling! bnemerov??

[bnemerov]

My dear Prof.,
I've my hands full trying to harmonize those 17th & 18th C. tunes from your wee adopted country.
Dotted strathspey rhythms are already kicking my butt....I'll leave the Georgia farmer's playing to you.
best,
bruce

[Prof Scratchy]

Dinnae fash yer sporran wi' they daft tunes,  pal!

[frankie]

and now for something completely different...

I never did figure this one out too carefully, but it always sounded like std tuning, G position, with the signature lick played on the 2nd fret of the 4th ( D ) string essentially within the G chord (fretting finger is moved from the 2nd fret 5th string to the 2nd fret 4th string to play the lick). Picking hand thumb does the heavy lifting on the 4th and 6th strings and the index plays kind of an alternating drone on the high G note - 3rd fret, 1st string.

The whole thing is harmonized with 1st position G, C and D chords, seems to me.

[Slack]

Yes, mr mando, that is the same performance, so you could work from that one, too.
All best,
Johnm

Very cool though that it is a different cut... I had not heard this version.  Quicker tempo, not as distorted.  Thanks for posting Mr Mando!

[Old Man Ned]

I'm in agreement with Frankie.  Listening to this last night, standard G was as far as I got.  I'd written off dropped G tuning as I couldn't hear the low D anywhere on the 6th string.  What was puzzling me though is that I also wasn't hearing anything on the 1st and 2nd strings when the G chord is played....apart from the wee run right at the end of the tune.  Don't know why that should puzzle me, but it did.

[Prof Scratchy]

Yes, agreed - G/C/D with signature lick being a double hammer on 2nd fret of 4th string followed by two brushes of the top four strings of the G chord.

[mr mando]

Q: What playing position/tuning did Jimmy Lee Williams use to play the song?
A: Agree with frankie: std. tuning / G position

Q: Where did Jimmy Lee fret, and how did he play his signature lick, which he starts playing at about :03 into the song?
A: Agree with frankie: beat 1: thumb fret 3 on 6th string, beat 2: thumb strum strings 4, 3 and 2 open, beat 3: hammer from open 4th string to 2nd fret fourth string beat 3+: 1st string 3 fret, beat 4: like beat 3, beat 4+ like beat 3+.

Q: What chords does Jimmy Lee play in the course of the song?
A: starts on a G 1st Position chord, then, at 0:20 Em before switching to C7 at 0:21. Regular 1st position D chord at 0:27 followed by an F# (2nd fret 6th string) bass note. In the following run throughs of the form, he's not playing the Em anymore.

[Johnm]

Hi all,
Thanks for your responses on the Jimmy Lee Williams "Hoot Your Belly" puzzler.  Here are the answers:
   * Jimmy Lee did play the song out of G position in standard tuning, just as every one of you had it.  Well done!
   * Similarly, Jimmy Lee's signature lick lies very much as Frank, Prof Scratchy and mr mando had it.  He struck the third fret of the sixth string on beat one, on beat two brushes the fourth, third and a bit of the second string, all open, on beat three hammers with his second finger to the second fret of the fourth string, followed by the third fret of the first string, picked on the + of beat three.  On beat four, he re-strikes the fourth string with his thumb, doing a grace note hammer to the second fret of the fourth string, and on the + of beat four re-picks the third fret of the first string.  The tricky aspect of the signature lick has to do, I think with the two hammers to the second fret of the fourth string; the first hammer is very lazy, with the fourth string struck open on beat two and the hammer not happening until beat three--the second hammer is instantaneous, with both the open fourth string and the hammered second fret arriving on beat four, essentially.  It gives the lick a neat feeling of speeding up as it goes, and the grace note hammer on beat four gives it a little rhythmic snap that drives it right into its next iteration.  If you enjoy signature lick tunes, as I do, I think you might particularly relish Jimmy Lee's knack for coming up with memorable signature licks--with "Hoot Your Belly" and "Have You Ever Seen Peaches?", he has two of the most infectious licks you're ever going to hear to his credit.
  * The chords are in the main, simply G, C and D at the base of the neck, but in mr mando's version of the song, which as John D. noted is not the same as the version I originally posted, Jimmy Lee does hit a momentary E minor chord, and in both versions he does hit a C7 during the course of his rendition.
One of the things I have most admired and enjoyed about Jimmy Lee Williams' music, and especially his original tunes, since I was first introduced to them by blueshome at Blues Week one summer (thanks, Phil!) is the feeling I get when listening to him that so much of what he did was just for himself and what sounded good to him.  His non-verbal vocalizations, harmonizing with his slide, etc. just seem to give his music a special quality I wish I encountered more often elsewhere.  Thanks to George Mitchell for finding and recording him and for Fat Possum for releasing his music on CD.  And if you don't have his CD, get it!
Thanks to all of you who participated, and I'll post another puzzler soon.  I felt like everyone heard this one really well, could figure it out, and may yet do so.  And it's great to have an occasion to transcribe his lyrics to "Hoot Your Belly"! 
All best,
Johnm

[Johnm]

Hi all,
I have a new puzzler for those of you who are interested.  The song is "Hard Luck Man", as performed by Sonny Scott.  Sonny Scott is remembered, if he is remembered at all, as Walter Roland's duet partner on a number of really nice instrumental guitar duets, but I was surprised to find that he had more than a couple of titles released under his own name as well.  "Hard Luck Man", for that matter, is a duet, though it is not listed as such, and the seconding guitarist is pretty self-effacing, disappearing into his role.  I think Sonny Scott's playing on the song is unusually interesting and original, if not flashy, and wonder if it will strike any of you that way.  In the second verse, Sonny Scott pronounces hard-lucked, "hard-luck-ed".  Here is the piece:



SOLO (Spoken during solo:  Ah, Lord, have mercy on poor me!)

I can't sleep at night, baby, and the jinx does got poor me
I can't sleep at night and the, jinx does got poor me
And since my woman's been gone, then the blues won't let me be

Blues, blues, blues, don't worry my mind so long
Oh, blues, blues, blues, don't worry my mind so long
Because I'm a hard-lucked man, God, I ain't done nothin' wrong

My Mama told me, "Son, don't weep and moan."
My Mama told me, Lord, "Son, don't weep and moan.
These ugly women will be here, when you're dead and gone."

Lord, I been a dog in your family, mama, I been drove from door to door
I been a dog in your family, drove from door to door
Lordy, if my mind don't change, then I won't knock here no more

Lord, when I was a infant baby, lyin' in my Mother's arms
Ah, when I was a infant, Lord, lyin' in my Mother's arms
You know you told me, Mama, you wa'n't to going to do me no harm

I have more questions than usual about "Hard Luck Man".  Here they are:
   * What playing position/tuning did Sonny Scott use to play "Hard Luck Man"?
   * Where does he fret the fill he plays from :10--:15?
   * Where does he fret what he plays from :21--:26?
   * Where does he fret the fill he plays from :36--:43, and how does he negotiate it in the right hand?
   * How does he start his verse accompaniment from 1:05--1:06?
   * Where does he fret, and how does he play the fill from 1:40--1:49?

Please use only your ears and your guitars in figuring out your answers, and please wait until Wednesday, January 28 to post your answers so that plenty of people have a chance to listen to the track before people start posting answers.  Thanks for your participation, and I hope you enjoy the song and Sonny Scott's performance of it.

All best,
Johnm