Music : His Best :(Little Walter)The Chess 50th Anniversary Collection
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Binding: Audio CD
Brand: LITTLE WALTER
EAN: 0076732938423
Label: Fontana Mca
Manufacturer: Fontana Mca
Number Of Discs: 1
Publisher: Fontana Mca
Release Date: June 17, 1997
Sales Rank: 3882
Studio: Fontana Mca
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Media Type: CD
Artist: LITTLE WALTER
Title: HIS BEST
Street Release Date: 06/17/1997
Domestic
Genre: BLUES
Amazon.com:
Marion "Little Walter" Jacobs is perhaps the most influential harmonica player on contemporary blues, and his collection is a great place to start. He was trained by Muddy Waters, but brought a more swinging feel to blues. Muddy and his band accompany Little Walter on many hits, as do Robert "Jr." Lockwood, the Aces, and other Chicago greats. In the 1950s, Little Walter's popularity eclipsed even Waters', his style a little more relaxed and pop-oriented. Walter's versions of many songs are the standards: "Blues with a Feeling," "You're So Fine," "Juke." Great stuff. --Robert Gordon
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Picture yourself in a crowded juke joint or blues bar on the southside of Chicago in the late '40's. Muddy Waters is about to play. He's already gone electric; I mean, he had to, to be heard over all the talking and yelling and what not. His harp player has about blown out a lung trying to be heard over all that din. Walter Jacobs has been doing a bit of experimenting himself, in an attempt to amplify the sound of that little instrument. Tonight he actually grabs the microphone off the stand, bumping it up close enough in his clasped hands to touch the harp. He cranks up the volume and starts to blow. The sound coming out of the amp is unlike anything anyone's ever heard. It's got a deep, heavy, honking, sexy wail, nothing at all like the unamplified harmonica sound of "country" blues. Men and women alike dance ecstatically, screaming and crying in excitement, over this new and intoxicating sound, this amazingly sensuous and insinuating beat. Necessity is the mother of invention; the guy was simply tired of people yelling that they couldn't hear him. So, being the innovator he was, he came up with a simple adjustment in technique.
This small act completely revolutionized the blues. Walter Jacobs, probably more than any other individual, has influenced every person who has ever played electric blues. When it comes to harp players, he is the undisputed king, the god, the creator, the originator. You can listen to anyone who's ever played amplified harp since it begun, ... Read More
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Marion Walter Jacobs (b. May 1, 1930 in Alexandria, Louisiana), and influenced by the likes of Sonny Boy Williamson (No. 1) and Louis Jordan and his jump saxophone arrangements, quite simply revolutionized the blues harmonica technique when he showed up at Chicago's famed Maxwell Street market in 1947.
Among the hundreds of artists plying their trade in that environment he stood out to the point where he attracted the interest of the small Chicago labels Ora Nelle and Regal where he cut several sides. His big break came in 1951 when the Chess brothers, Leonard and Phil, hired him to back Muddy Waters and Jimmy Rogers, and it was as much his amplified harmonica that made hits out of Mannish Boy, I'm Ready, and Standing Around Crying [by Waters), and That's All Right and The World Is In A Tangle (Rogers).
By 1952 he was assigned to the Checker subsidiary, and by that September he literally burst into prominence when the instrumental Juke streaked to # 1 R&B and remained there for eight solid weeks [the flip was Can't Hold On Much Longer and is erroneously listed in this compilation as "Can't Hold Out ..."). This single was billed to Little Walter and His Night Cats.
The follow-up Sad Hours (instrumental) didn't quite repeat that success, settling for # 2 early in 1953, while the vocal flipside, Mean Old World, reached # 6 as by Little Walter and His Night Caps. Fittingly, Muddy Waters played guitar on each of these first three hits.
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Wonderful harmonica music! The liner notes mention that Marion "Little Walter" Jacobs was experimenting with different methods of getting the most out of his harmonica playing. He finally discovered an answer through the "use of a hand-held microphone which was plugged into its own amplifier. . . By `going electric,' Walter single-handedly transformed the harmonica. . . ."
Some nice cuts on this CD. One was a tune that he played when he was with Muddy Waters' band in Chicago in the very early 1950s, "Juke." This is an instrumental tune and well played, beginning with some very strong harmonica work by Little Walter. The band overall produces a nice blues sound. Fun to listen to!
By the time "Blues with a Felling" was recorded, Little Walter had left Waters' band and had a new one of his own, featuring the Myers Brothers and Fred Below. Once more, the harmonica work is great. Little Walter sings nicely, although his voice is not in the genre of Sonny Boy Williamson (II), Muddy Waters, or Howlin' Wolf. One nice line:
"I'm gonna find my baby
If it takes all night and day"
"My Babe" is a nice little rocking song. As before, good harmonica and good overall band playing. The recurring vocal riff: "My babe don't stand no cheating."
Another quick note. "Confessin' the Blues" was covered by the Rolling Stones.
In short, a nice album. His singing may not have been as rough and distinctive and powerful ... Read More
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There are no bad songs on this overview of the career of maybe the greatest blues harp player of all time. Chess' compilations, be they boxsets or single disc comps, are all, in my experience, very well remastered. Buy it if you want to hear straight up great blues in the Chess tradition.
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Little Walter had an amazing harmonica sound and style that was all his own and could never be duplicated. Man, is this some hot stuff. His first record, "Juke", an instrumental is just, to quote another title of his, "off the wall." Yeah, there is a number that's called that which is on this CD. Absoultely what the blues is all about. Songs like "Sad Hours" and "Off the Wall" are practically Little Walter and the band sittin' around and jammin'. Check out the guitar lick at the beginning and the through the whole of "Sad Hours"; classic blues lick. Some other cool stuff is "Tell Me Mama", "Blues With A Feeling", "You're So Fine", "Mellow Down Easy", "My Babe", "Hate To See You Go", and especially "Boom, Boom Out Goes The Light." That one's a regular jam session, too. This is how music was made and appreciated to these guys. They just played as and what they felt. If you're learning about the blues, don't forget one of the supreme harmonica players of the genre: Little Walter.
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