The Acoustic Guitar Forum

Go Back   The Acoustic Guitar Forum > General Acoustic Guitar and Amplification Discussion > PLAY and Write

Reply
 
Thread Tools
  #1  
Old 06-14-2019, 03:58 AM
RJVB RJVB is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Mar 2019
Location: Atheos Mons
Posts: 1,907
Default Midnight Special - blues or?

I found a nice little (and free) transcription of Merle Travis's version of the Midnight Special traditional:

http://www.michel-lelong-music-house...hel-lelong.pdf

It certainly sounds like a blues to me, but it doesn't look like the 12-bar version which is the only kind I'm (let's say formally) acquainted with. Is that just because it has been condensed? The recording of Travis playing this is different enough, and a lot longer too.
__________________
I'm always not thinking many more things than I'm thinking. I therefore ain't more than I am.

Pickle: Gretsch G9240 "Alligator" wood-body resonator wearing nylguts (China, 2018?)
Toon: Eastman Cabaret JB (China, 2022)
Stanley: The Loar LH-650 (China, 2017)
Reply With Quote
  #2  
Old 06-14-2019, 07:09 AM
JonPR JonPR is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Dec 2010
Posts: 6,450
Default

You could call it an 8-bar blues, I guess. It's actually quite a common folk-blues form, which is like a 12-bar blues with the first 4 bars cut. I.e., it starts on the IV.
"Folk-blues" is a nice catch-all term for traditional songs which would have been in the repertoire of blues and folk-country singers alike. Leadbelly, after all (not first to record Midnight Special, but the one who popularised it) was a "songster", who knew a wide range of stuff, beyond blues.

Other folk-blues songs with similar form are Richland Woman Blues:

and the Memphis Jug Band's You May Leave (But This'll Bring You Back).

Midnight Special is probably older than either of those, but it's quite likely both were based on some other source.

There are other blues tunes in (more or less) 12-bar form which also begin with IV. I.e., the changes are IV-I for both the first two lines, not just the second. You Don't Love Me (Willie Cobbs, Bo Diddley) and Meet Me in the Bottom (Howlin' Wolf) are examples.
__________________
"There is a crack in everything. That's how the light gets in." - Leonard Cohen.

Last edited by JonPR; 06-14-2019 at 07:15 AM.
Reply With Quote
  #3  
Old 06-14-2019, 07:46 AM
keith.rogers's Avatar
keith.rogers keith.rogers is offline
Charter Member
 
Join Date: May 2019
Location: Texas
Posts: 1,695
Default

Long history of the song here:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Midnight_Special_(song)

A guy did that song at a local open mic last night and related a short version of the history because one of the versions is reported to have been based on happenings at a prison not too far from the open mic, in a town where I worked for a few years, Sugar Land (TX).
__________________
"I know in the morning that it's gonna be good, when I stick out my elbows and they don't bump wood." - Bill Kirchen
Reply With Quote
  #4  
Old 06-14-2019, 01:24 PM
RJVB RJVB is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Mar 2019
Location: Atheos Mons
Posts: 1,907
Default

I'll have another look with a set of brand-new eyes, thanks I'm guess that the regular 8-bar blues isn't just a 12-bar blues without the first 4 measures, normally?

I had already scanned through the wikipedia article but that didn't help me much for the problem at hand. I like the song, and have a nice interpretation of it by Eric Bibb and Jean-Jacques Milteau on a disc called something like Leadbelly's Gold (heard them live last summer with that programme).
__________________
I'm always not thinking many more things than I'm thinking. I therefore ain't more than I am.

Pickle: Gretsch G9240 "Alligator" wood-body resonator wearing nylguts (China, 2018?)
Toon: Eastman Cabaret JB (China, 2022)
Stanley: The Loar LH-650 (China, 2017)
Reply With Quote
  #5  
Old 06-15-2019, 11:36 AM
JonPR JonPR is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Dec 2010
Posts: 6,450
Default

Quote:
Originally Posted by RJVB View Post
I'll have another look with a set of brand-new eyes, thanks I'm guess that the regular 8-bar blues isn't just a 12-bar blues without the first 4 measures, normally?
True. That's just one way of looking at this particular 8-bar sequence.

Other kinds of 8-bar blues begin on I and have other sequences. (Key to the Highway, Trouble in Mind, etc.)
__________________
"There is a crack in everything. That's how the light gets in." - Leonard Cohen.
Reply With Quote
Reply

  The Acoustic Guitar Forum > General Acoustic Guitar and Amplification Discussion > PLAY and Write

Thread Tools





All times are GMT -6. The time now is 07:31 PM.


Powered by vBulletin® Version 3.8.11
Copyright ©2000 - 2024, vBulletin Solutions Inc.
Copyright ©2000 - 2022, The Acoustic Guitar Forum
vB Ad Management by =RedTyger=