It’s probably all been said already on this thread, but I just wanted to chime in and say that he’s probably one of my number one idols. And yes, he often hits more than one string on two and four, making more like a stride piano left hand than a strict alternation. And yes, he’s loose, and plays a lot with syncopation. His middle finger is also really fast, and a lot of his syncopations come from doing a bunch of fast repeats, etc. And I don’t think he ever played a song the same way twice.
I really envy you, gfirob, to have been around what was going on at that time. I was growing up just a short subway ride from Greenwich Village, but I was just a few years too young. By the time I was making the trip to the Village in the mid ‘60s, that golden age of the acoustic folk invasion had just passed. Some of the guys I used to play and hang with were part of it, and were part of the whole Gary Davis circle. But, by the time I got there, they were just cool stories.
Probably the only time I ever wish I was 10 years older...
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