Language of the Blues - Edmonton Blues Society

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Songs:
I drink so much of Jake, till it done give me the limber leg
- Tommy Johnson
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JA M
To jam is to improvise music with other musicians. Linguist David Dalby traced jam to
the Wolof word jaam for slave. As early as the 1700s, when slaves gathered together for
their own entertainment, they called the get-together a jama. 244
Fierce jam sessions and cutting contests inspire blues, rock, and jazz musicians to stretch
beyond their limitations. As composer/multi-instrumentalist Elliott Sharp put it,
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The musician with the most jamming stamina ever may have been jazz saxophonist John
Coltrane, who would jam all night and keep going while he signed autographs, while he
.
The first blues musician to tap into Coltrane's concept of super-extended improvisational
soloing was Michael Bloomfield, the Chicago guitarist who played with the original Paul
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twelve minutes and was the first lengthy improvisation recorded by a non-jazz ensemble.
Live, the group would sometimes extend the piece up to forty-five minutes.
-Indian Ragafeel-acid experience awakening and the bluesthe
real thing, no
effect on the San Francisco psychedelic scene and the British electric blues scene that
spawned such talented white blues guitarists as John Mayall and Eric Clapton.
acceptable improvisatory practice, but every performance on a given mode or form is a
according to ethnomusicologist Steven Taylor. 247
Koranic recitation require improvisation. Only the Holy Word of the One God delivered
of the Blessed Prophet is unchanging, therefore the music behind the words must always
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