Styles of Blues
There are many styles of blues, and they are best understood through regionalism. As stated earlier, the blues was born in the rural South, but it was quickly transformed into an urban musical style. Cities such as Chicago, Detroit, Memphis, St. Louis, Kansas City, Dallas, Austin, Houston, Louisville, Los Angeles, New York City, and New Orleans all contributed to the development of the blues.
After World War I and World War II, black musicians from the Delta and Memphis moved to northern cities such as Detroit and Chicago. This was called the “Great Migration.” Often this migration meant travel along Highway 51, which is a 1,286 mile stretch of road that connects La Place, Louisiana, to Hurley, Wisconsin. When Delta musicians arrived in Chicago, they began using amplifiers and soon the Chicago style was born. This sound was heavier and more plodding; even though it was still based around Delta techniques such as call and response (see Chapter 10).
In the mid-1940s, another migration occurred out of Texas. Blues musicians by the dozens left the Lone Star State to play on the West Coast. Most of these players landed in Los Angeles, though further migrations often took players to Berkeley and San Francisco. Significant Texas-born pianists who ventured westward include Little Willie Littlefield and Floyd Dixon. Soon, the so-called Texas style of blues merged into West Coast blues. This style was more smooth-toned and jazzy, and it contributed to the development of the black crooner tradition in the United States.
Other major styles of blues emerged in American cities, as you will read about in Chapter 11. Early on, Beale Street in Memphis became a melting pot for blues. In 1977, this street was declared the Home of the Blues by the U.S. Congress. New Orleans is a veritable “who's who” in piano blues, spawning such pianists as Jelly Roll Morton, Professor Longhair, Dr. John, and Harry Connick Jr. St. Louis was idealized in the eponymous “St. Louis Blues” by composer W. C. Handy. It was also home to the barrelhouse pianist Roosevelt Sykes and to the clever, Depression-era self-promoter Peetie Wheatstraw.
Barrelhouse piano was common in the rowdy drinking establishments of the South. It featured heavy, percussive, left-hand activity and was designed to make people dance. Barrelhouse — named after whiskey bars that poured directly from the cask — was the precursor to boogie-woogie.
In the ballrooms and saloons of Kansas City, swing was fashioned by pianists and bandleaders Jay McShann and Count Basie. Elsewhere, New York City was home to a chic, uptown style of jazz that drew heavily on the blues. This was probably best illustrated in the big band music of Duke Ellington and in the virtuosic stride styles of Fats Waller, Willie “The Lion” Smith, and James P. Johnson. Later in the book, you will read more about all these musicians and get the chance to play some of the licks and techniques that they employed in their music.
