Topic: 10-bar songs

[Rivers]

I don't recall us ever discussing 10-bar forms, feel free to merge if there's something else already going. I just noticed when it came around on the juke Leadbelly's version of Duncan & Brady occupies 10 bars. This song has long been a favorite of mine; no luck as yet coming up with my own convincing version.

Leadbelly's take is pretty interesting when you start counting bars. He's pretty strict on packing it into 10 bars during the verses, and spins it out a bit on the breaks. Being so formal on the verses gives it a definite tension that suits the song, relieved by the uneven breaks. Anyway, just an observation.

[Johnm]

Hi all,
Mississippi John Hurt's "Spike Driver Blues" is a 10-bar form also.  It's something you don't run into a lot.
All best,
Johnm

[Rivers]

Wow, I'd never noticed that, even having played it for ages. Great spotting there.

[Johnm]

Hi all,
I had occasion to transcribe the Rev. Davis tune, "Save Your Money, John D. Rockefeller" recently, and found that is a 10-bar tune.
All best,
Johnm

[Johnm]

Hi all,
In working on "Funky Butt", which uncle bud noted recently is John Hurt's version of
Buddy Bolden's Blues", I discovered that it has a 10-bar form, which consists of two 2-bar phrases which are played and repeated, followed by a 2-bar wind-up.  Here is a version of Bolden's song with Jelly Roll Morton singing it and Sidney Bechet taking a great soprano sax solo:





All best,
Johnm

[jtbrown]

This isn't a country blues example, but I recently noticed that Bob Wills's version of "Fan It" reduces what would otherwise be a conventional 12-bar structure to 10 measures, essentially by dropping measures 7 and 8.  Recent renditions of the song by Willie Nelson, Geoff Muldaur, and Pokey LaFarge have a similar structure, presumably because they are imitating the Wills version.  I don't know whether Wills originated this 10-bar form or copied it from someone else, but it imparts a very distinctive feel.  (The Frankie "Half-Pint" Jaxon recordings of "Fan It," which are the only other ones I'm familiar with, are 12-bar blues.)

Todd Brown