The Blues
15/05/15 05:11
Rock me baby, rock me all night long
Rock me baby, rock me all night long
Rock me baby, like my back ain't got no bones
Rock me baby, honey, rock me slow
Rock me baby, honey, rock me slow
Rock me baby, till I want no more
Rock me all night long
Rock me all night long
Rock me all night long
Rock me all night long
Rock me all night long
Rock me all night long
Rock me all night long
Rock me all night long
Rock me all night long
Rock me all night long
Rock me all night long
Rock me all night long
And then there was silence.
And in the silence we could remember the sweetest guitar licks that were ever played and we could picture the man with his eyes closed and his fingers dancing and the moments when race and economic difference and the wrongs of history and the injustices of this world simply faded away because we knew that the music was the most important thing of the moment.
Lenny Kravitz said, “BB, anyone could play a thousand notes and never say what you said in one.”
BB King started out this life as a farmhand. A few years ago he earned his 15th Grammy award. He was inducted into the Blues Foundation Hall of Fame and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. When he held that Gibson ES-355 in his hands, the guitar he called “Lucille,” folks just wanted to close their eyes and listen.
And now the King has gone on to a place where, for a little while, we cannot follow. He died in his sleep in Las Vegas. On the map that might be a long ways from Mississippi, where he was born, but music has a way of bridging the distances and BB had a way of making every town his home.
He had been sick for a few months, probably due to complications from diabetes. There is no need for a medical explanation. Maybe the best we can do is to listen once more to “The Thrill is Gone:”
The thrill is gone
The thrill is gone away
The thrill is gone baby
The thrill is gone away
You know you done me wrong baby
And you'll be sorry someday
The thrill is gone
It's gone away from me
The thrill is gone baby
The thrill is gone away from me
Although, I'll still live on
But so lonely I'll be
The thrill is gone
It's gone away for good
The thrill is gone baby
It's gone away for good
Someday I know I'll be open armed baby
Just like I know a good man should
You know I'm free, free now baby
I'm free from your spell
Oh I'm free, free, free now
I'm free from your spell
And now that it's all over
All I can do is wish you well
And he is free. Maybe he was always free.
And after the silence, the song lingers on. And among the songs that keep coming to my mind is that epic performance with Buddy Guy of “Stay Around a Little Longer:”
I thank the Lord
I thank the Lord for letting me stay around a little longer
But I feel like I got a lot more to give
I thank the Lord for letting me stay around a little longer
Lord knows I love the life I live
Thank You, Lord, I love the life I live
Until very recently, King was playing over 100 concerts a year. When he was 85, he commented in an interview, “I can’t retire, I need the money.” But anyone who heard King, even those of us whose experience was limited to recordings and videos, knew that King was a man whose motivation was far beyond money. You can’t keep music like that inside.
If Louis Armstrong was the definition of jazz, surely BB King was the definition of the Blues.
And the blues are a unique expression of the simple, basic, human reality of grief. You can’t run away from grief. You can’t escape without having experienced grief. You can’t run away. You can’t hide. You can’t be human without coming face to face with the reality of loss and the pain of loss and the power of grief. Grief, however, isn’t bad. It is a gift of healing. It is how we get from one moment to the next - from one day to the next. Facing death and loss squarely is the only way to discover that death is not the end.
The blues bridges the normal lines that divide us from one another. A few years ago, at our first Holy Week Blues concert at the church, I sat in a crowded room and listened to Jami Lynn sing the blues. I closed my eyes and when I opened them up, I literally rubbed them both to try to clarify my vision. I couldn’t believe that a white girl, who grew up in South Dakota, who had the privilege of a good education and a good family life and a wonderful way to grow up, could really sing the blues. I rubbed my eyes again. I couldn’t believe that anyone so young - with so little life behind her - could really sing the blues.
But Jami can sing the blues.
You shouldn’t be able to put Patsy Cline and BB King on the stereo and mix them up and pull out Bob Fahey and Jami Lynn. But the blues don’t recognize the boundaries. The blues reach beyond our own experience and enable us to share the experiences of others.
BB King brought us the woes of a Mississippi sharecropper and the legacy of slavery. BB King brought us the hope that tomorrow will come and that we will all be able to say, “Thank you, Lord!”
But today:
No fancy words.
No slick guitar riffs.
Just the weight of silence.
Cause, BB, today the whole world’s got the blues.
Rock me baby, rock me all night long
Rock me baby, like my back ain't got no bones
Rock me baby, honey, rock me slow
Rock me baby, honey, rock me slow
Rock me baby, till I want no more
Rock me all night long
Rock me all night long
Rock me all night long
Rock me all night long
Rock me all night long
Rock me all night long
Rock me all night long
Rock me all night long
Rock me all night long
Rock me all night long
Rock me all night long
Rock me all night long
And then there was silence.
And in the silence we could remember the sweetest guitar licks that were ever played and we could picture the man with his eyes closed and his fingers dancing and the moments when race and economic difference and the wrongs of history and the injustices of this world simply faded away because we knew that the music was the most important thing of the moment.
Lenny Kravitz said, “BB, anyone could play a thousand notes and never say what you said in one.”
BB King started out this life as a farmhand. A few years ago he earned his 15th Grammy award. He was inducted into the Blues Foundation Hall of Fame and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. When he held that Gibson ES-355 in his hands, the guitar he called “Lucille,” folks just wanted to close their eyes and listen.
And now the King has gone on to a place where, for a little while, we cannot follow. He died in his sleep in Las Vegas. On the map that might be a long ways from Mississippi, where he was born, but music has a way of bridging the distances and BB had a way of making every town his home.
He had been sick for a few months, probably due to complications from diabetes. There is no need for a medical explanation. Maybe the best we can do is to listen once more to “The Thrill is Gone:”
The thrill is gone
The thrill is gone away
The thrill is gone baby
The thrill is gone away
You know you done me wrong baby
And you'll be sorry someday
The thrill is gone
It's gone away from me
The thrill is gone baby
The thrill is gone away from me
Although, I'll still live on
But so lonely I'll be
The thrill is gone
It's gone away for good
The thrill is gone baby
It's gone away for good
Someday I know I'll be open armed baby
Just like I know a good man should
You know I'm free, free now baby
I'm free from your spell
Oh I'm free, free, free now
I'm free from your spell
And now that it's all over
All I can do is wish you well
And he is free. Maybe he was always free.
And after the silence, the song lingers on. And among the songs that keep coming to my mind is that epic performance with Buddy Guy of “Stay Around a Little Longer:”
I thank the Lord
I thank the Lord for letting me stay around a little longer
But I feel like I got a lot more to give
I thank the Lord for letting me stay around a little longer
Lord knows I love the life I live
Thank You, Lord, I love the life I live
Until very recently, King was playing over 100 concerts a year. When he was 85, he commented in an interview, “I can’t retire, I need the money.” But anyone who heard King, even those of us whose experience was limited to recordings and videos, knew that King was a man whose motivation was far beyond money. You can’t keep music like that inside.
If Louis Armstrong was the definition of jazz, surely BB King was the definition of the Blues.
And the blues are a unique expression of the simple, basic, human reality of grief. You can’t run away from grief. You can’t escape without having experienced grief. You can’t run away. You can’t hide. You can’t be human without coming face to face with the reality of loss and the pain of loss and the power of grief. Grief, however, isn’t bad. It is a gift of healing. It is how we get from one moment to the next - from one day to the next. Facing death and loss squarely is the only way to discover that death is not the end.
The blues bridges the normal lines that divide us from one another. A few years ago, at our first Holy Week Blues concert at the church, I sat in a crowded room and listened to Jami Lynn sing the blues. I closed my eyes and when I opened them up, I literally rubbed them both to try to clarify my vision. I couldn’t believe that a white girl, who grew up in South Dakota, who had the privilege of a good education and a good family life and a wonderful way to grow up, could really sing the blues. I rubbed my eyes again. I couldn’t believe that anyone so young - with so little life behind her - could really sing the blues.
But Jami can sing the blues.
You shouldn’t be able to put Patsy Cline and BB King on the stereo and mix them up and pull out Bob Fahey and Jami Lynn. But the blues don’t recognize the boundaries. The blues reach beyond our own experience and enable us to share the experiences of others.
BB King brought us the woes of a Mississippi sharecropper and the legacy of slavery. BB King brought us the hope that tomorrow will come and that we will all be able to say, “Thank you, Lord!”
But today:
No fancy words.
No slick guitar riffs.
Just the weight of silence.
Cause, BB, today the whole world’s got the blues.