![]() ![]() Green Rocky Road (Len Chandler, Bob Kaufman, etc. Got the Blues, Can’t Be Satisfied (John Hurt) Going Down the Road Feeling Bad (Samantha Bumgarner/proto-blues) Gimme A Ride To Heaven, Boy (Terry Allen) Get Thee Behind Me, Satan (Almanac Singers) Georgia Rag (with advice from Dave Van Ronk) Receive news of new song posts no other emails (I promise)Ī Man’s a Man (Bertolt Brecht/Dave Van Ronk)Īin’t She Sweet/ Five Foot Two (Guy Van Duser)īattle of Maxton Field (Malvina Reynolds)īest of All Possible Worlds (Kris Kristofferson)īig Rock Candy Mountain (Mac McClintock/ censorship)īlues In the Bottle (The Holy Modal Rounders)īout a Spoonful (Davis/Lipscomb/Van Ronk)īrand New Tennessee Waltz (Jesse Winchester)Ĭannonball Blues (Woody, Carters, Leslie Riddle)Ĭaptain Don’t ‘Low that Here (Larry Johnson)Ĭasey Jones (Furry Lewis/banjo to guitar)Ĭhicken Is Nice (Dave Van Ronk/Howard Hayes)Ĭomin’ In on a Wing and a Prayer (Joseph Spence)Ĭontrabando y traicion (Los Tigres del Norte)Ĭrow Jane (Carl Martin, country blues LPs)ĭanville Girl (Cisco Houston/hopping freights)ĭon’t Think Twice, It’s All Right (Dylan/Paul Clayton)įishing (Blues) (Chris Smith/Sweetie May) So I just kept this as something to play for my own enjoyment or when I got requests, with the result that I’ve never really solidified an arrangement and keep having fun with it, playing Doc’s basic part as best I can and experimenting with how I might vary it if I took the time to work up my own version of his version. Of course, I could have gone back and learned the piece properly, but by the time I had the chops to do that I was trying to learn pieces that everybody else didn’t already play - and boy, did everybody play “Deep River Blues.” I learned it from the tablature in the Doc Watson songbook, which, as usual, was a mixed blessing - without the tablature I wouldn’t have been able to learn it when I did, but because I learned it from tablature I never got the quirks and variations that make Doc’s version so great. But my favorite guitar arrangement was and is “Deep River Blues,” his reworking of the Delmore Brothers’ “ I’ve Got the Big River Blues” - a preference shared by virtually every fingerpicker I’ve met. This video is a treasure It begins with a spoken introduction from Ralph Rinzler of the Smithsonian (0:00), followed by Doc explaining how he originally worked out this arrangement (1:37). Other Recommendations Doc Watson Playing Deep River Blues. I learned and remember a half-dozen songs from that album, including “ Sitting on Top of the World,” “ I Was Born About 10,000 Years Ago,” “ Omie Wise,” and “Black Mountain Rag,” which I struggled with for years but could never play even halfway competently - my battles with that piece were what confirmed I would never be a serious flatpicker. The tabs I show in this video are included in the two-page PDF guide I made for this lesson. But that first album still defines him for me, and is on my short list of all-time favorite records. I also had a fairly passionate love affair with the Watson family LP he made for Folkways with his wife and other relatives, and his live recordings with Clint Howard and Fred Price - in short, I’m a solid fan. I like a lot of his other work, liked seeing him live, loved interviewing him the one time I got to do it, and Peter Keane and I used his version of “Blue Railroad Train” as the theme song to our live radio show. If you’re in the beginner to intermediate stage, don’t be discouraged if you find a bit too challenging right now – use it as inspiration for what to look forward to as your skills develop (I’ll also be demonstrating some simpler ways of playing it as part of the Breakthrough Banjo Tune of the Week this week).For me, Doc Watson will always be his first album. Note that the tab for this song is Brainjo Level 4, meaning it’s on the advanced side of things. And lots of opportunities for syncopation.Īnd I enjoy trying to adapt songs I’ve first learned for fingerstyle guitar to clawhammer banjo (including some prior MJH classics like Corrina, Stocktime, and Let the Mermaids Flirt With Me, all of which are available in the Breakthrough Banjo Vault). It turns out there are a lot of similarities between country blues fingerpicking and clawhammer.īoth provide a rich and complete musical texture, with rhythm and melody all wrapped into a single package. It was even better than flatpicking (it would be several years before I cracked the code of country blues fingerpicking). ![]() I had no idea how he did it, but I loved it. It sounded like a full band was playing, yet I knew it was just Doc and his guitar. ![]() Perfection.īut “Deep River Blues” clearly wasn’t flatpicking! And it was incredible. ![]() Every fiddle tune he played on guitar became the definitive version in my mind. Up to that point, I was already a fan of Doc’s flatpicking. I remember the first time I heard Doc Watson play “Deep River Blues” on guitar. ![]()
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