Story of the Blues
“Story of the Blues: From Blind Lemon to B.B. King” is a documentary on the history of the blues, tracing four styles in particular, Blues Form, Country Blues, Urban Blues, and Electric Blues and their influence and contribution to the creation of Jazz, Country, Rock, and other genres.
This film opens at the end of the Civil War Era and ends discussing the late 1950s. Unlike other music documentaries, this film goes more in depth as to the dynamics and musical technicality of the different blues styles rather than talking more about people and songs of the blues genre. Also, this documentary samples more music than interviews and dialogue, which allows the music to tell the story and truly enables the viewer to be enriched by experiencing the blues genre as it progresses over a near 100 year time span. During this 100 year time span, racism and segregation was still prominent. While this film discusses both white and black blues artists that were influential to the genre, it focuses more on the black artists, ending with BB King, the “King of the Blues.”
The film talks about how difficult life was for many black people, particularly after the abolition of slavery because many of them no longer could work, so they reverted to the streets; many of them played music in the streets with their “homemade” instruments. Robert Johnson, “King of the Delta Blues,” was mentioned as one of these street artists who learned to play an instrument and started traveling and playing to earn a living to get off the streets. The documentary also features early artists such as Blind Lemon Jefferson and Lonnie Johnson as well as classic influencers like Duke Ellington, Ma Rainey, Louis Armstrong, and Bessie Smith. The film gives insight as to the uniqueness of certain voices saying that tone and scatting is difficult to imitate, and black and white singers play the blues completely differently! It also informs us that Louis Armstrong was one of the first to use scatting in his music and was a fabulously skilled brass player and features an interview with Ma Rainey where she explains how unique blues are and how immensely difficult it is to repeat a song exactly. (bold names have images below of the artist)
Having began with no particular structure, the blues transformed into a still less structured form than say classical music, but structured form. The blues quickly took on the 12 bar blues form with verses and three stanzas. Some songs were played in minor keys, however most all songs written with 4 beats per measure were written in a major key! The majority of blues songs have lyrics with topics centered around love (as most music does), hardship, and depression and while time has changed the style of the blues as well as the geographic location of the blues, these subjects have remained.
The blues started in the streets of the South and moved from New Orleans to Chicago to Harlem and New York City to Memphis and continues to spread through the ages. Blues music went from street music to being played in clubs, speak easies, bars, theaters, and has been preformed in venues like Carnegie Hall. The film does not discuss the blues outside of the central and eastern US, but as the genre grew in popularity I feel as though it would have spread to the west eventually. Hollywood is where a lot of HipHop and R&B singers are today, and the blues did influence those genres as well as many others so it only makes sense that they must have ventured out west eventually.
Personally, I sometimes find blues music similar to jazz music, which makes sense because jazz music was influenced by the blues too! In fact, many Jazz players did not consider themselves or others true jazz musicians unless they could also play the blues?! The Blues genre has a culture of its own, and as with any culture, it tends to change over time. The blues genre, while staying true to its topics, has evolved with the times to incorporate less acoustic sounds and more electric and technologically enhanced sounds. The words never really changed in subject, however they did transform from set lyrics into scat/improvisation singing. The blues gave birth to new instruments like the washboard, jug, and kazoo! The blues originated with a simple guitar or piano background and changed to include electric guitars among other instruments; BB King was an immensely gifted electric guitar player.
I think that it is incredibly how one genre could influence the development of so many other genres as well as give birth to new instruments and singing styles as well! I am amazed by the transformation of the blues both geologically and musically over the years!
