Holidays and Life Get In the Way (In a good way!)

Still playing, not a lot of time though!

Why?

My wife and I had a baby boy the other day. Maybe someday someone I can teach the blues.

More posts are coming....

Want Some Great Blues Music?

I'm a lucky guy.... I married a Librarian!

Why lucky? Well, librarys often have large collections of CD's. And being a Memphian, our libraries have large collections of blues music.

So, I had my wife check out a bunch of good music today....

I currently have:

Best of The Blues - Live at "Newport In New York" - BBKing, Muddy Waters, BigBoy Crudup, etc
Blues Breakers - John Mayall with Eric Clapton
The Road We're On - Sonny Landreth
Skin Deep - Buddy Guy
Live In Chicago - Luther Allison

Good stuff, great to listen to and great to learn from!

So get on out to your local library and see what they have. You might be surprised!

Two Great Blues Mandolin Sites

Two more great online resources that I found via Youtube and Google.....

http://www.mandolinblues.de/  This site is by a guy by the name of Rene. His site is very informative, and truly fun to peruse. Also, Rene's Youtube channel is quite good, as he is quite a good player! Very worth time spent.

http://www.mandolinblues.com/ Rich Delgrosso's site. What can I say. Delgrosso is a true scholar of the blues. Most importantly, he is also a scholar of the mandolin blues. Delgrosso spent time with Yank Rachell and others, and I think that adds an element of authenticity to his mandolin blues, but blues comes from the soul and Delgrosso has that in spades. I know Delgrosso comes to Memphis fairly often, so maybe with a little luck, I'll get to meet him someday.

Makin Progress.....

I've spent the past couple of weeks practicing the blues in G. I've found a couple backing tracks on I-Tunes which seem pretty good. I can play along with them and solo over the top, or practice my rythm work.

The backing tracks are in an album called "Blues Jam Tracks". Artist is Matthews and Maz.

The other two things I've been working on are playing both electric and acoustic blues, and finally moving the blues scale around the fretboard. That is one of the beauties of blues played on the mandolin - the scale can be moved up and down the fretboard as well as left and right (higher lower) - I really love that fact!

With that, I guess its nearing time for me to put something up on Youtube of my own doing...... hmmmmm

Happy Birthday To Me!

I'm lucky I have a very understanding wife. She also happens to be a guitarist!
So for my upcoming birthday this year (couple weeks from now), She 'bought' me a new amp.

I've had a Crate 2x10 monster of an amp since the early 90's. Fun amp. Big sound, has chorus and reverb built in. Unfortunately, to get the tone I like when playing the blues, I have to turn the gain up a pretty good bit while leaving the volume bottomed out. Even with that, its loud enough to vibrate the glass in the house - no fun for those not playing the mandolin/guitar!

I started looking for something that I could play my new e-mando on. I wanted something that I could get good sound out of while not turning up insanely loud. I was also interested to try something with a number of effects built in. Final detail was I want something I can carry around easily (vs my 80lbs Crate) and something that could be battery powered.

I looked at the Line6 Spider, Fender Mustang and a few others, but none really knocked me over.

In the end, I selected a Vox DA5 practice amp. More features than I'll use, but most importantly, good tone. Many effects, most of which can be mixed in some fashion, along with 11 tone setups. Inputs for things like my Ipod for jamming along, or a Mic. The amp is battery powered or I can plug it in. Finally, it has an output setting on the rear - .5amp 1.5amp or 5amps. Each setting gives a different power level, while reducing the output volume!

I'm still figuring out exactly how I like it, but so far it is a sharp little package! Even has a bit of 'Brit' to it.

Oh yeah, it was an Ebay purchase used, so I paid approx 30% of new, and it looks absolutely brand new.

Kid Man Blues - Bert Deivert

Kid Man Blues - Great album from Bert Deivert. The album starts with a song called 'Going Down South' and that is what it does. The album dives right into some delta sound and that delta sound permeates the album. The album finishes with 'The Nongharn Blues'- a great acoustic blues track with prodigious mandolin and slide playing that captures a feel of loneliness.

Ok, excuse my poor attempt at putting into words what I think about a great album! Download it on Itunes and see for yourself.

For those of you who have not seen Bert's stuff on Youtube, check out the video below. Great blues mandolin playing!

Bert has also done some nice how-to's on his Youtube channel. I'm going to try them out and see if I can keep up....

She's Got The Devil In Her

GREAT song to play electric mandolin with. Song is in the key of G and so the G blues scale works perfectly with the song. Chord progression is GCD. Easy to follow fun to play along with. Give it a try.



Mandolin Cafe On Demand

Mandolin Cafe On Demand, if you've not tried it yet, you need to.

Simply put, it is a great setup. You see the video you want, buy it and download it.

After years of books and trying to play from them, the MCOD setup is great. If you are a person that learns by watching and doing rather than reading, then it is even better.

So far, I've only downloaded Bluegrass related Mandolin videos, but everyone of them has been great. The play along video for jamming which I got is excellent. Playing along with that video truly made me comfortable enough to head to my local jams.

I'm looking at downloading the Steve James Blues Mandolin 1 video soon.

How I Got Bitten By the Blues Bug

I grew up in a musical family. Dad was a trumpet player (I eventually played Trumpet as well) and Mom played the Oboe and the piano.... My mother's uncles could play anything. Seriously, anything! I also spent most of my life in Memphis TN, the home of the blues.

On a trip to my grandmother's while still in gradeschool, my grandmother bought me a harmonica at the local drugstore. I honked and tooted along on that thing endlessly..... annoying anyone within earshot.

At 11, while on a vacation, we stopped in a little side of the highway Arkansas stripmall and in the stripmall was a music shop. The owner inside sold harmonicas and I bought one. He took the time to teach me blues harmonica bending to get proper blue notes, and while I was there, it really 'clicked' for me. Rapidly after that, I quickly got better playing blues harmonica - and as I learned I became a fan of the blues.

One blues man in particular caught my ear - Stevie Ray Vaughn. So with that, I had to get a guitar. Tragedy hit me however as I managed to cut off one of my fingers on my left hand. Not completely off, but I almost lost it. The doctor suggested learning guitar as a way to rebuild my hand and make it work again. So I bought a guitar.

Not long after, I was trying my hardest to sound like SRV and play the blues. I listened to WEVL blues shows in the morning and listened to every influence that guys like SRV, Kenny Wayne Sheppard and Eric Clapton listed in interviews with them in magazines. I was not as good a blues guitarist as I was a good blues harmonica player.

The final step for me came in college. I was lucky enough to meet a guy named Kent Dushane (sp?) He is a Dobro playing blues man who learned from the greats. His skill was wonderful, and from him, I managed to learn to play bottleneck/slide blues in open tunings on the guitar. Again, something I'm not great at, but can play a handful of tunes on....

So a year ago, I bought my first mandolin and very soon after had figured out the blues scales on the mandolin and began researching mandolin blues. That takes me to here....

Yank Rachell - one of the originals

Yank Rachell truly was one of the originals. He started on a bowlback and eventually moved on to a Harmony Batwing mandolin with a pickup. I think to many, Rachell's sound is what blues on a mandolin should sound like.

If you'd like to get something off of I-Tunes, then Yank Rachel - Blues Mandolin Man is one to get.

And a Youtube search will yield a lot of great clips. Below is one I like a lot from when Rachell was still younger and had a lot of energy.

Ry Cooder, Goin' to Brownsville

If you were like me, growing up in the home of the blues (Memphis and the delta) and loved Ralph Machio movies, then you probably loved Crossroads. Cheesy movie, but fun watching Machio go off against Steve Vai. And if you knew a little something back then, you knew it was actually blues virtuoso Ry Cooder playing the guitar against Vai. I say Cooder won  - and of course that was the plot of the movie.....

What I did not know is that Ry Cooder also played mandolin..... Hence Goin to Brownsville (which is not far from where I live now).

Texas Blues Shuffle from Rene

Here's a little blues lick from Rene. Texas Blues Shuffle. Sounds great on acoustic

12-bar Blues from Youtube.

Great vid. I had figured this progression out many months ago when I first started trying to play blues on the mandolin, but Billy does a great job explaining it and fleshing it out.

Disclaimer - this is Billy's work, I'm only re-sharing so its easier to find....

The Blues Bird - Blues Mandolin

So I looked at all the electric mandolins on the market. There are a ton out there, Mandobirds, Schwabs, Ryders etc. Unfortunately, they were all a little rich for my blood (except the Mandobird, which looked like it needed a new pickup to make it viable). If you want to see a bunch of great electric mandolins, then check out http://www.emando.com/

Then I found Moongazer Music. A great guy named Tom Morici runs it. He's a 40+ yr veteran of the lutherie business. He runs a website http://www.moongazermusic.com/ where he sells electric mandolin kits and their parts. His site is great. He allows you to buy individual tuning machines instead of sets. Bridges just for emando's and a great variety of emando pickups. Tom's kits are top notch and look really good.

I wanted a little more however and wanted to design my own. To that end, I designed the instrument in CAD.

I then contacted Tom and purchased wood blanks and all the parts needed to build the mandolin. He even provided a partially completed neck. Tom was also great in providing advice on the build.

I started building in the fall and ended up with a killer little instrument. It turned out beautifully, and the tone is exactly what I was hoping for. I was gunning for a little bit of Buddy Guy grit and that is what I got. I run the BluesBird through a Crate 2x10 amp and it sounds really good.

The BluesBird has construction just like a Fender Thin-Line Telecaster. She has an alder body capped with a fiddleback maple cap. The neck is maple with a rosewood fretboard and a Moongazer corian nut. The blank for the pickguard came from Japan and holds a Moongazer/Almuse MG4 pickup wired for coiltapping.

I love this little electric mandolin!!!!!

So what do I play....?

So what am I trying to learn mandolin blues on? I've got several instruments which I've been using for some time now and some new ones.....

I started playing guitar when I was in my mid-teens. I learned on this Epiphone Strat copy. Over time, I modified it to run some genuine PAF Gibson Humbuckers that were given to me by a fraternity brother in college. I've since updated the pickguard and wiring. I still play it a fair bit....

I also happen to play blues harmonica. Have since I was 12. I am not very technically proficient, but I can make it wail....



But this is a Mandolin Blues Blog... So what mandolins do I play?

My first was a Kay Model 68. Was pretty rough when I bought it, so I restored it fully. It turned out pretty nice and I enjoy the loud sound. Not a tone monster... just a volume monster....

Next up is my oval hole mandolin. I purchased a Michael Kelly Legacy Oval. Another instrument which needed a pretty good bit of work to be playable... Nut job, Saddle adjustment and fitting, truss rod adjustment and fret filing in a couple areas. But it is a very nice instrument now.

For traveling, I have a travel mandolin. Fits in my carry-on and is fun on trips. I've enjoyed it. I also upgraded the tuners on it to Grovers, as well as adding pau abalone dots.

Finally, this fall, I built my first electric mandolin. I built a 4 string I called the Blues Bird. This one gets its own post.....





First Post.....

So this is my first post in my Mandolin Blues Blog. I decided I wanted to put this up for a few reasons. First off, after playing guitar for 20 years, I'm now learning the mandolin. I've been playing for 1 year now and have decided to learn to play the blues on it. Second, there are a lot of good resources out there on the web to teach blues mandolin and I want to use this blog to capture some of them. Finally, I am hoping that blogging about what I'm doing will add an element of commitment to what I'm doing. I know myself well enough to know that when others are watching, I take things more seriously and commit to them more....