We have assigned ourselves the task of defining certainly
certain trends and certain situations, and any such have become, I guess, more so than musicians, bluesicians.
Because we have tended to try to define certain means and modes related to the blues.
As the bluesicians have gone all over the world carrying blues message and the world has...
He snapped his fingers and tapped his feet right along with the blues folks, but the blues has always been totally American.
As American as apple pie.
As American as blues.
As American as apple pie.
The question is why?
Why should the blues be so at home here?
Well, America provided
The atmosphere.
America provided the atmosphere for the blooms and the blooms were born.
The blues was born on the American wilderness.
The blues was born on the beaches where the slaves should have died.
Born on the slave man's auction block, the blues were born and carried on the mountain winds.
lose love, slave.
Oh.
Bye.
The Blues grew up in small town deprivations.
The Blues grew up in big city isolations.
The blues grew up in the nightmares of the white man.
The blues grew up in the blues singing of Bessie and Billy and Ma.
The blues grew up in Satchmo's horn, on Duke's piano, in Langston's poetry, on Robeson's baritone.
The point is that the blues have grown.
The blues is growing now, full growing, and you can trace the evolution of the blues on a parallel line with the evolution of this country.
From premise rock to acid rock, from states to Watergate,
The blues is grown, but not the home.
The blues is grown, but the country has not.
The blues remembers everything the country forgot.
It's a blues year, and America has got blues.
It's got the blues because of partial deification of partial accomplishments over partial periods of time.
Halfway justice, halfway liberty, halfway equality.
It's a half-assed year.
Cheers.
And we would be silly in all our knowledge, in all our self-righteous knowledge, when we sit back and laugh and mock the things that happened in our lives.
To accept anything less than the truth.
Thank you.
