John Miller: St. Louis Blues Guitar

The city of St. Louis played host, in the 1920s and 1930s, to one of the most distinctive and vital blues scenes ever documented on record. Like Memphis and Atlanta, St. Louis served as a sort of magnet, attracting musicians from the surrounding hinterlands and providing performance opportunities that were not available out in the country. Many of the St. Louis musicians were transplanted Mississippians, like Charley Jordan, while others, like Clifford Gibson and Teddy Darby, originally hailed from Kentucky. The various early influences that the music of these players displayed ended up coalescing into something that might be called the "St. Louis sound".

Included on this DVD are transcriptions and teaching of the songs of Teddy Darby, where the guitar and voice track each other closely, Clifford Gibson, with his distinctive approach to playing in Spanish tuning and the mysterious low cross-note sound, Charley Jordan, with his acrobatic thumbwork and occasionally raggy sound, and the enigmatic Lane Hardin, who only recorded two titles under his own name. The songs selected for inclusion in the lesson have been chosen to introduce you to a variety of different tunings and playing positions, and employ different right hand approaches that will expand your ability to utilize techniques like thumb lead and brush strokes.

A PDF file is included on the DVD which can be printed out into an easily readable, 8.5” by 11” booklet, including not only detailed transcriptions of the songs, but the songs’ lyrics, as well. As well, all of the original recordings from which the transcriptions were made are included on the DVD.