Saturday, September 22, 2012

Geeshie Wiley, "Last Kind Words": blues in a minor key.

We think of blues as sad, and associate sadness with music in a minor key. Truth is, almost all blues is in a major key. I suspect the reason is that, while blues addresses life's hardships, it typically has a "we shall overcome" undercurrent; a sense that the singer is up to the challenge. An exception is "Last Kind Words Blues", recorded in 1930 by Geeshie Wiley, about whose life, according to this Wikipedia entry, little is known.

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