Views and Brews: Native American Music and The Blues with Jimmie Vaughan and Brannen Temple
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Our latest Views and Brews discussion at the Cactus Cafe featured musicians Jimmie Vaughan and Brannen Temple as they illustrated links between Native American Music and The Blues along with Gregg McVicar of Undercurrents and KUT host Jody Denberg.
“The Blues were not just spawned by this intermingling of African and European influences, but there was a very strong Native influence as well,” said Gregg McVicar.
He also explained that musicologists observe that everywhere that people live close to the earth, their music is based on the universal pentatonic scale. Anishinaabe artist Keith Secola is fond of saying that “water will eventually seep into even the thickest rubber boots.” By this he’s going back to the Native principle that we are of the land, that the earth does not belong to us, we belong to the earth and the closer we are to her, her music will eventually seep into us. So in other words, much of what you hear in the blues (and its branches, jazz and rock) is the song of the land here in the U.S. — the Earthsong. And so it comes full-circle.
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MUSIC: Exploring Native American influence on The Blues
We hope you enjoy this video highlight of the evening and click on the player at the top of this post to hear the discussion.
Podcast: Download (61.1MB)
