Etta James R.I.P.

[Tom Sanderson]

http://www.cnn.com/2012/01/20/showbi...bit/index.html

No mandolin content, but still a big loss to the music world

[Mike Bunting]

Agreed in a big way. "I'd Rather Go Blind" "At Last" What singing! What music!

[Jesse Harmon]

How about "Your Love is like a wet match" --- Saw her at the Fox in Detroit, fantastic singer.

[catmandu2]

The great Etta

[citeog]

What a shame. And she was relatively young too. Today on the web I found a tribute to Etta by Cyndi Lauper. Her version of "At Last" is almost as good as the original. RIP Etta.

Paul

[Mike Bunting]

What a shame. And she was relatively young too. Today on the web I found a tribute to Etta by Cyndi Lauper. Her version of "At Last" is almost as good as the original. RIP Etta.

Paul

That is impressive.

[journeybear]

Somehow Etta James slipped past me, despite being a big fan of R&B, and "At Last" having been a monster hit. Then about seven years ago I was playing in a mostly country trio. We got a wedding gig from a couple who had gotten engaged the year before on vacation here, and loved the then-duo, before I came along. They requested "At Last" for the processional. Believe it or not, I had never heard the song before. (Yes, I have since learned how popular it is for these occasions, but it really had escaped my notice - and ironically, suddenly I started hearing it all the time.) Thanks to persistent websearching, I was able to find not only chords and lyrics, but sheet music and a recorded version (this was before youtube - those who don't remember those dark days have no idea how difficult such a task could be), and learned it - the classic version by Etta James with that very cool string arrangement, and our female singer worked real hard to get her vocals just right, too. Thanks to the sheet music, I was able to get the violin part note for note. Come the special day, for some reason I don't recall - maybe the distance being travelled was too short - the vocal version got nixed, and I just played the melody with guitar accompaniment. All that work ... Oh well. Hey, as long as they were happy!

Well, that's my only Etta James memory. RIP, Ms James, you will be remembered for a long time.

[Jason Kessler]

The first time I heard Etta, I said, "oh, so THAT'S where Janis got it.".

[Brent Hutto]

When I saw the news of Etta James' death today, I dug through my "easy piano" books and found an arrangement of At Last. Here's a quick not-ready-for-prime-time take of it...

http://soundcloud.com/brent-hutto/at...memory-of-etta

[Mike Bunting]

When I was eighteen, growing up in southern Ontario, we used to cross the border to Buffalo N.Y. because the drinking age was lower there. In the right part of town, we'd go see Etta at a joint called the Candy Cane lounge. It made me a fan of soulful music for life. In those days, we'd also see Ike & Tina Turner, the Wicked Pickett and lesser known locals like the Chantelles. We learned how to feel from that music, our parents never got it.

[journeybear]

The first time I heard Etta, I said, "oh, so THAT'S where Janis got it.".

Really? Wow. I think Janis dug deeper, and further into the past, and did more with what she found there and within herself. I think her main influences were Bessie Smith and Big Mama Thornton, maybe a bit of Billie Holiday. Etta James came along much later than them, and her style was more polished, even pop at times. You are entitled to your opinion, of course, but I disagree.

[Jason Kessler]

I was speaking of Janis' vocal texture rather than her influences, but since you brought it up: Janis recorded one Big Mama Thornton song, and no Bessie Smith or Billie songs (unless you wish to count "Summertime"), but she did record three Etta James numbers. I would guess that that might tell us where her some of her inspiration came from, more so than, though not exclusive of, the others you mentioned.

[catmandu2]

Billie is of course one of my all-time favorite figures in music -- the first time I heard her, I thought: "that's Louis's horn"

[journeybear]

I couldn't be sure what you meant exactly by "it" in "so THAT'S where Janis got it" - it's a little vague ("it"'s a little vague? ) - so I assumed you meant her influences. Etta was born just five years before Janis, so it seems reasonable to consider her more of a contemporary. Which is not to say one can't consider contemporaries as influences. Some say Janis counted among her influences Aretha Franklin, Otis Redding, and Tina Turner, all a bit older than her but all working at the same time - yes, same as Etta. I'm on record as being not very familiar with Etta's music, so it would be reasonable to dismiss whatever I have to say about her. But what I have heard from her has led me to consider her vocal style a lot smoother than Janis'. I'm not hearing a lot of similarity. You do, I don't, so we just disagree.

Influences are a tricky thing, and when not specifically named by the person in question, are often the result of speculation and interpretation, and thus subject to inaccuracy and inconsistency. In Janis' case, I've seen Bessie and Big Mama mentioned plenty over the years. This is one such: Of all of Janis’ influences, Bessie Smith was probably her greatest. After all, Janis credited Bessie for leading her to singing in the first place. In high school, Janis’ friend, writer Grant Lyons, loaned her his Bessie Smith and Leadbelly records. Something struck a chord, and Janis learned to sing the blues by listening to Bessie for hours on end and imitating her vocal style. “She showed me the air and taught me how to fill it," said Janis. "She's the reason I started singing, really." In fact, Janis Joplin identified so strongly with Bessie Smith that she sometimes told friends that she felt she was Bessie Smith reincarnated. And the way Janis did Big Mama's "Ball And Chain," it became her signature song, even getting Big Mama's blessing. Personally, I am more moved by Janis' a capella turn at the end of the version on "Cheap Thrills" than just about any vocal performance I can think of. She really gets all of it. Then again, to use myself as an example, since I know my influences: my playing style owes a lot to Jerry Garcia and Jimi Hendrix, but my band does only two Dead songs and no Hendrix (and one of those Dead songs is more Grisman than Garcia, anyway ), so the number of songs covered of an influence's repertoire may not be an accurate indicator of the level of that influence.

But this is really neither here nor there, and has little to do with anything meaningful here, and I'm sorry for this sidetrack. A singer beloved by many has died, and this kind of discussion pales in significance. I just wanted to clarify my previous post.

[journeybear]

Tavis Smiley is devoting his show today or tomorrow to a tribute to Etta James. It's PBS so check your local listings.