Country Blues > Country Blues Licks and Lessons

Tommy Johnson's Guitar Style--Queries and Tips

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Buzz:
Few years back, Paul Rishell taught this tune by TJ at PT blues camp: Drop D Standard, and used his thumb over, Country D on the low E.
Also Big Road Blues: The intro and verse base runs on D (dropped E) and D strings, running up from fret 1or 2 a few frets--I can't recall at this moment---sound cool in that tuning. ..and used his thumb over, Country D on the low E at times, I think. ;D

All best,
Miller.

crawley:
Thanks guys, I've got it now. It makes more sense that TJ would have played it in the 1st D position. I'm not sure what I was thinking. The capo really sacrificed the my guitars tone too.

Aaron

Johnm:
Hi all,
I know there has been an ongoing sort of minor question left hanging as to whether Tommy Johnson played "Canned Heat Blues" our of D position, standard tuning, Dropped-D tuning, or E position in standard tuning, as Houston Stackhouse performed it.  I was listening to the most recent Tefteller calendar disc, to "Alcohol And Jake Blues", which bears the same relationship to "Canned Heat Blues" as "Ridin' Horse" does to "Maggie Campbell Blues", which is to say, a musically identical piece with a different title and at least some different lyrics. 

The jury may still be out on "Canned Heat Blues", I suppose, but "Alcohol And Jake Blues" is clearly played out of D position in standard tuning, NOT Dropped-D, or E position in standard tuning.  The very first time Tommy Johnson goes to the IV chord, you can very clearly hear him playing the root of the G chord on the sixth string and the third of the chord on the fifth string.  This is not physically impossible in Dropped-D but is so impractical for the left hand that it may be dismissed as a possibility.  And given Tommy Johnson's predeliction for set piece arrangements, it would seem extremely doubtful that he would play the otherwise identical accompaniment for "Canned Heat Blues" out of a different tuning or position than the one he used for "Alcohol And Jake Blues".  I reckon he played "Canned Heat blues of D position, standard tuning, too.
All best,
Johnm   

waxwing:
Hey Johnm,

Reading Gayle Dean Wardlow's account of his interviews with Ishmon Bracey regarding the 1929 Paramount recording session in Chasin' That Devil Music, there is a strong possibility that Bracey was playing the guitar backing in order for the drunken Johnson to concentrate on the singing on at least a couple songs. Could Bracey have imitated Johnson's arrangement so well, and, perhaps not bothering to tune to Drop D, didn't mind hitting the G bass? Who knows. You can hear someone coaxing Tommy through the lyrics. Tommy certainly must have been pretty drunk for Bracey to remember the incident, including Art Laibley's anger at several spoiled waxes, a few decades later. At the session Johnson only recorded 6 sides, Bracey 18 (GDW), at a session that was meant to feature Tommy. And Jake and Alcohol Blues was very late in the session and Johnson's last extant recording (B&GR). Certainly all testimony should be taken with a grain of salt, but I'm not sure the tuning on this recording would be strong evidence of anything that Johnson recorded almost two years earlier.

He certainly was a sad soul.

Wax

blueshome:
If the guitar part is an imitation by Bracey it's a damn good one. In which case you expect him to also have the tuning down as well. Personally I think it sounds like TJ, but we'll never know.

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