"Seaboard Stomp" by Blind Blake
Added 2022-10-01 13:00:14 +0000 UTCHappy Oct. 1 everyone. It has been a very busy month trying to get everything ready for this Blind Blake solo. In "Seaboard Stomp" Blake talks about the Seaboard train (probably referring to the Seaboard Air Line Railroad). Though hard to make out everything he says in the song he recounts listening to other musicians then imitates them on his guitar. There's the piano, coronet, trombone, and saxophone.
My YouTube recording covers most of the piece, though I eliminated measures 49-56 and 85-112 to make memorization more manageable in such a short time span. Everything is covered in the lesson video.
I made a few revisions to the transcription after recording the lesson video, so you may question a few discrepancies, the transcription contains the most up-to-date and accurate reflection of Blake's recording. The biggest change was the position of one note in the trombone solo, i realized the way the line was phrased it was much more likely he was dropping down to first position.
As there is no known video of Blake, all of the editing exists as a suggestion, though I strongly feel it is very close to how Blake would have played this based on evidence we've so far gathered from other recordings of his.
The first few sections are heavily edited to assist in learning this correctly. As material begins to repeat there is less editing but I left in the chord changes (reflected by the use of parentheses in the tablature) as an important reminder of what the left hand should be doing.
You can view my YouTube performance above or here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ACIVtL8E6kY
Here is a stable link to the lesson video:
https://youtu.be/FaK-f7fCYio
The score is attached below. Thank you everyone for the continued support and we'll be back on Nov 1. If you have any additional thoughts or questions please leave them below.
Comments
I gotta admit - when I first saw that the next Blind Blake song was Seaboard Stomp (SBS), my initial reaction was, "Oh, this is very similar to West Coast Blues (WCB)." It might be similar in some ways, but overall, this has been a great song to learn! For me, the quintessential sound of Blind Blake is the double thumb thumping climb down from C to E (to E7) best exemplified in the C - E - (E7) - A - A7) - D7 - G - (G7) chord progression that makes up the bulk of WCB. The problem with WCB though, for me at least, is that there are just too many repeats of this pattern - each with minor variations that make it 1) impossible to memorize since the variations are so slight and 2) sorry to say, a bit boring and repetitive even for the player, let alone any listeners. Well, along comes Seaboard Stomp and it provides "solutions" for the above "problems" of WCB. It includes the beloved C - E - (E7) - A - A7) - D7 - G - (G7) chord progression from WCB, including the great C-E climb down double thumb, but only includes 5 instances of it (using the 2 truncated versions of the songs that Andy recorded (cutting out a few measures here and there for both songs)). This is compared to the 12 repeats from the version of WCB that Andy recorded. What's more, there is more consistency within those 5 instances. This means much less to memorize. (Note: there are a few other similar variations in SBS, like C-G-A-D7-G, omitting the E. I could have said 6, 7, or 8 instances of this progression, depending on how you want to classify some sections.) While both songs share very similar first 4 bar intros, the extended intro of SBS is possibly my favorite part of the song, with the C - C7 move and the moving diminished chords. In addition, while WCB does have the bridge with the C and F bendy part, SBS adds much more variety and interest for both the player and listener with the syncopated single note part (m128 - 134) and the 2 single note climb down parts (m145 - 153) and the final 10 bars. This means more variety. So, in summary, I think this was a great song choice - we get to learn a song with the most recognizable double thumb climb down from Blake, but with less repetition, less to memorize, and more variety. All of this makes the song learnable and playable. (Note: I'm not saying anything about actually getting any of these Blake songs up to his speed, that's a different challenge altogether.)
John Good
2022-11-20 22:17:22 +0000 UTCI’d have to agree!
Andrew Lardner
2022-10-11 17:07:43 +0000 UTCThanks Andy, a great choice. I stumbled across some of Blake’s group recordings a few months ago, (i.e. Hot Potatoes, Southbound Rag) and also an interesting quote which got me thinking: “…Blake’s blues phrasing had the strictness of a dance or band musician. It is likely that ensemble playing (perhaps with a jazz band) had a real impact on his music”. I hadn’t noticed this before and I think Seaboard Stomp is another good illustration of this point. I really like the way he weaves the different parts into the song.
Michael Fenton
2022-10-11 17:02:48 +0000 UTC
