Classifying the Blues

I'm no expert, but I always considered RJ "Delta Blues" - it'd be nice if someone could come up with an exhaustive list, from Delta Blues through Chicago Blues to country Blues with a few examples of each genre....

:D :D :D

Vic

Excellent question.

There are five main blues styles:
Chicago blues (Muddy Waters),
Delta blues (Robert Johnson),
Texas Blues (SRV),
Kansas City blues (Charlie Parker)
and West Coast blues (Charles Brown).

Characteristics
Chicago blues is probably the most popular and most easily recognized. There is generous use of loud amplification and slide guitar. The major scale is used quite a bit in this style and the template for chords often changes to dominant 9ths instead of 7ths.

Delta blues (or missisippi blues) is moslty acoustic. You'll know it when you hear it. Lots of Robert Johnson-esque walking bass lines and alternate picking is used.

Texas Blues is loud and aggressive. You've just gotta listen to SRV or ZZ Top or somebody to get a good idea of it.

Kansas city blues is kinda hard to classify for me. There are magnificent singers and harmonica players that are considered Kansas city bluesists. I really dont know how to explain this one.

West coast blues is know for the single string guitar solos. It is heavily influenced by jazz and usually employs the use of a four or five piece horn section. Its a sort of a shuffle feel and the guitar work is just clearly jazzy.

There are many other stlyes. But, these are the main ones.

Thanks so much for the run down.

I guess the ones I recognise from your descriptions are Delta Blues and Texas Blues. I am sure I have heard the others but the sound doesnt click with me from the descriptions. So, BB King would probably be more Delta blues?

Thanks again
Geoo

Hmmm. I think a lot of folks would call "Piedmont Blues" a major style.

I'm not much on classification systems, actually. They make odd bedfellows and leave out lots of others.

I'm not much on classification systems, actually. They make odd bedfellows and leave out lots of others.

I agree and I am not either but it does make it easier to tell a "teacher" what you are trying to learn. I guess I could explain it to him by referencing a particular artist but then I might leave out a whole series of artist that i am not familiar with.

Geoo

You also have some more.

Blues Subgenres you missed:
British Blues
Detroit Blues
Louisianna Blues
Memphis Blues
East Coast Blues (which encompassed Piedmont Blues)
Swamp Blues

Fusion Genres:
Blues-Rock
Jazz Blues

There's a lot of ways to peel an onion. You can also consider as genres Rock Blues (Hendrix, Santana, Page), Country Blues (Bukka White etc.), Swing blues (Brian Setzer), Jazz blues (George Benson).

B.B. is from the delta - but early on he imitated Texas blues players, and then moved to Memphis - where he studied with Bukka White. So like most contemporary blues musicians, he's got a broad stylistic background. Many folks put him in the Chicago blues category - perhaps because of his influence on the Chicago style.

Music taxonomy is not an exact science :)

While Charlie Parker certainly played blues inspiried jazz, and even did more than a few songs that can be strictly classified as 12-bar or 16-bar blues forms, it's pretty hard to call him a blues artist.

But, there certainly is a Kansas City blues style that is heavily influenced by the KC jazz scene of the time. It's a hard line to draw, but basically the line being found is the intersection between swing, bebop, and blues.

Folks like Basie, Parker, and "Hot Lips" Page, where really was playing jazz (and in the case of Paker, bebop before anyone knew it was bebop) it is probably more properly classified them as jazz musician. They really shone in the improvisational realm that is the hallmark of jazz.

For blues musicians, I think more of folks like Walter Brown or Jay McShann.

From my perspective, Kansas City blues is really a very small part of the blues scene. But, Kansas City sytle jazz-blues is a pretty big part of jazz history and remains influential today.

Many of the things done to extend the 12-bar blues style in KC remain as recognized standard "blues forms" in jazz circles, but aren't even really thought of as the way a blues player would do things in blues circles.

It would be quicker to list Bubba Gumps shrimp recipes than the genres of the blues. Even if you did make a comprehensive list, most artist wouldn't fits nicely in one category alone. Buddy Guy for example has gone from soulful ballads to funky rockers to acoustic footstompers.
Imo there are only two 1. Blues I like and B. Blues I don't (there are very few in the second group).
There is a good book called "Deep Blues" by Robert Palmer (not the singer) that chronicles the rise of "delta blues" and how it migrated and Mutated up and down the Mississippi.

Blues = Music Genre dedicated to exploring the most possible ways to play the same 12-bar chord progression. Heavy use of 7th chords.

That's my 20 words or less answer. whaddya think?

While Charlie Parker certainly played blues inspiried jazz, and even did more than a few songs that can be strictly classified as 12-bar or 16-bar blues forms, it's pretty hard to call him a blues artist.

But, there certainly is a Kansas City blues style that is heavily influenced by the KC jazz scene of the time. It's a hard line to draw, but basically the line being found is the intersection between swing, bebop, and blues.

Folks like Basie, Parker, and "Hot Lips" Page, where really was playing jazz (and in the case of Paker, bebop before anyone knew it was bebop) it is probably more properly classified them as jazz musician. They really shone in the improvisational realm that is the hallmark of jazz.

For blues musicians, I think more of folks like Walter Brown or Jay McShann.

From my perspective, Kansas City blues is really a very small part of the blues scene. But, Kansas City sytle jazz-blues is a pretty big part of jazz history and remains influential today.

Many of the things done to extend the 12-bar blues style in KC remain as recognized standard "blues forms" in jazz circles, but aren't even really thought of as the way a blues player would do things in blues circles.

After doing my homework, its quite clear that your information is 110% correct. I had very limited knowledge of the Kansas City Blues style other than the fact that it was heavily influenced by jazz. Charlie Parker was the only musician that I knew about that could really be noted as a Kansas City Blues man. Thats why I placed him in that spot. Walter Brown and Jay McShann where actually vocalists I believe. Charlie was pretty much the only guitarists of that style that I knew anything about. Youre deffinately right about KC style being more jazz than blues oriented. Thanks King'.

well, there's also the mississippi john hurt fingerpicked blues style, which doesn't fit nicely into these other categories, either.

It would be quicker to list Bubba Gumps shrimp recipes than the genres of the blues.

ROFL That is one of those classic lines that I'll remember for a while. I am a very generalize type of guy. Which is horrible for the work I do, but non the less I dont like the details. LOL I appreciate all the input. I knew that it wouldnt fit nicely in a box but the answers provided does give me a terrific road map.

Robert Johnson and BB King are my two favorites and as such I'll probably be focusing alot on their work for some time now. But this list gives me the names of the other off shoots of blues so I can look into them at some point.

Geoo

Blues = Music Genre dedicated to exploring the most possible ways to play the same 12-bar chord progression. Heavy use of 7th chords.

That's my 20 words or less answer. whaddya think?Doesn't cover it too well. There's a lot of classic blues that isn't 12-bar, or I, IV, V progression for that matter.