The Steel Guitar Forum

I've been thinkin'about and listening to all genures of music and I believe now that every kinda music has been infultrated by many aspects from other kinds of music. I believe that only leaves us with one genure of music that has not been rashed with many styles from others and that is "Western Swing".
To me, Western Swing has kept the original style and texture and instrumentation; it has always had. Even today's Western Swing>ala>Asleep at the Wheel> has stayed true to the style and instrumentation and tones of the instruments and grooves(texture) that it has originated from. Western Swing grows with modern technology in the output of sound; but stays true to the format for which it came from. Many times I hear that other genures of music must progress; but the progression is from the blatant infultration from other styles and leaves out the originality from where it started and grew to acceptance. To me; one only knows what they call a certain selection of music, by what they know as it's history and originality of style; but folks do not research the roots and the original reason one played(made) a certain style of music; and therefore they can be infultrated by many influences as well and finally come to accept something in it's unpure form.
If one discovers and researches the roots of Western Swing and it's original intentions; I believe one can only deduct that is has stayed true to it's form and cannot say that about most all the other styles of music.
When I hear todays(insert label here!)music; all I hear is the many styles that have disclaimed the original style(format) and when I hear a Western Swing song; I 100% say>"Now that's Western Swing".
Ricky<FONT SIZE=1 COLOR="#8e236b"><p align=CENTER>[This message was edited by Ricky Davis on 08 October 2000 at 10:26 PM.]</p></FONT>

Ricky, I agree with you 100% on the Western Swing stylings. Western Swing has become, for lack of a better way of putting it, a culture in a fashion similar to "Bluegrass." As long as there is Western Swing, there will always be a Steel Guitar.



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kd...and the beat goes on...

You tell em Ricky

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Janice "Busgal" Brooks
ICQ 44729047

I think that as western swing players get older, they get more and more focused on the original vision: a string band playing traditional jazz. That vision is so rich that it doesn't need outside influences to freshen it up every decade or so.

You Texans really have it good. The market for western swing in most places is very small, but in Texas it seems that everyone loves it. In Texas western swing gets the same respect that bebop gets in the big apple, or that Mozart gets in Vienna (I imagine!). It is pure, it is played right, and the audience loves it.

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<small><img align=right src="http://b0b.com/b0b.gif" width="64" height="64">Bobby Lee - email: quasar@b0b.com - gigs - CDs
Sierra Session S-12 (E9), Speedy West D-10 (E9, D6),
Sierra 8 Laptop (D13), Fender Stringmaster D-8 (D13, A6)

Which period of pure western swing is the one that didn't change ?

Bob

Western Swing stays pretty close to its roots (Bob Wills and Spade Cooley). As does Bluegrass, Ragtime, Dixieland Jazz, Be-Bop, Classical, Hawaiian, Barbershop QT, and a whole host of other genres. But Country? Nah, man...we gotta progress and evolve, and try to please EVERYBODY. Go figure!

My $.02 on this discussion, if I might...

Western swing in and of itself is not a "pure" form in that, depending on whose music is being discussed, it's always been a synthesis of several musical styles, with the basic element being swing-style jazz played on stringed instruments.

If the music in question is Bob Wills, I hear a synthesis of fiddle music and "string jazz" like Eddie Lang and Joe Venuti, mixed with elements of Dixieland jazz and Benny Goodman-style big band (depending on the era).

The music of Spade Cooley and Tex Williams was, in the early 40's, much like Lang/Venuti but had relatively little Texas fiddle influence. Later in the progression of those bands, light classical music was influential, probably because of the training of the players involved, especially Spade and his fiddlers and main arranger Pedro DePaul. In the 1950's, Spade's orchestra was really indistinguishable from Harry James' band, basically big band jazz.

Billy Jack Wills' music, on the other hand, started as Bob Wills style, but with the growing popularity of r&b and early rock 'n roll, evolved to sounding very much like Bill Haley and the Comets (who were a WS band before their own transformation).

Of course, throughout all the steel guitar was basically playing Hawaiian style over a string jazz or big band context.

But what the subject of this thread might be getting to is that WS has avoided the pervasive synthesizing nature of rock and roll; that quality of rock music that seems to take over any music it meets and makes it rock. Witness the fact that we have folk-rock, country rock, classical rock, jazz-rock, fusion, glam-rock, heavy metal, 50's rock, punk rock, etc. And some would say that modern country music is nothing more than a softer version of plain ol' pop-rock.

I think that what makes WS still relatively popular in the Southwest, TX/OK/NM specifically, is that the residents have had the music around them when they were teenagers... the years when we decide what kind of music we "like," generally... and that there is still a tradition of ballroom dancing for courtship purposes. The underlying reason for it all has always been "boy meets girl."

What has damaged WS, even here in TX, is economics. Audiences HAVE shrunk, and you just can't pay 9 musicians with only enough money to pay a 4-piece band. We still manage to do it, though.

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Herb's Steel Guitar Homesite

Excellent post and very good history, Herb.

I agree that Western Swing has kept it's main theme.

Besides the other types mentioned as holding on.
I believe that So called Big Band, jazz, standards, blues, have kept their themes pretty well too.

As far as can be seen, it seems that only Country has changed it's main theme. Too Bad..al

<SMALL>Barbershop QT</SMALL>

Interestingly, Barbershop Quarter has some pretty strict rules to keep it from being "influenced" by other forms of music. There are certain chord progressions, for exmample, that aren't allowed.

At least that's what I recall. My uncle sang baritone with "Rural Route 4" before it disbanded a few years ago. They won the national championship about 20 years ago or so.

Barbershop Quarter surely hasn't changed much -- but then neither has bluegrass. And neither one of these wonderful forms of music has much market appeal. I suspect that "pure traditional country" (whatever that really means) would have a similar audience.

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The Unofficial Photographer of The Wilkinsons

Now you see what I mean about every genure of music is infultrated. And now Western Swing is infultrated.
Bottom line and my point here is now supported by these comments are: when a label is presented to a kinda music being played; it is only interpreted by the knowledge and ear of the one listening to it.
My original post here was really a question I had for why a Label of music is interpreted in so many ways.
Herbs anthology of Western Swing is a beautiful one and because of those influences; I know what Western Swing is in my mind and as I know what all labels of music is in my mind and is how I define a label being presented to me.
When one asks me how I define a label of music; I can only answer: "What ever you think it is, is all that matters; and what I think it is, is all that matters to me".
If folks truely believed this statement; there would be no arguments about all the lables of music and their definition; but the simple question one may have or the argument they may present about a certain label; is because of their lack of knowledge and insecurities in their own individual convictions.
Ricky

To comment on Bob Hoffnar's question. I think there are different styles of WS. In the early years (20s 30s 40s) Dixieland was very prominent in WS. Along about the 50s the Dixieland style became less dominant and with Hank Thompson, along with the Wills boys and Spade Cooley, the emphasis went to fiddles and steels instead of the dominance of the piano, b@njo and the fiddle. Not to say that the same instrumentation doesn't exist today, its just not as much "up front." I don't here much, if any difference in the WS of perhaps the 60s on up to the present. These are just some of my thoughts and observation. Oh yes, When Jimmy Day and Ray Price teamed up in the mid 50s, we were introduced to another style of WS known as "shuffles."

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kd...and the beat goes on...


<FONT SIZE=1 COLOR="#8e236b"><p align=CENTER>[This message was edited by Kenny Dail on 09 October 2000 at 04:50 PM.]</p></FONT>

Barbershop unspoiled by Rock? You haven't heard Spinal Tap's "barbershop raga" version of "Heartbreak Hotel", have you? BTW, let's hope that the current popularity of Western Swing will be GOOD for the music in the long run, and that we won't have to hyphenate something like, ugh, Western Swing-Rock in the future . . .

Robert

Well, when I started reading this I though oh yeah Kenny or Herb or someone will beat me to writing anything of interest.

As pretty much everyone before me put it Western Swing is possibly one of the most eclectic forms of country music.

Hank Thompson went very 'uptown' for a time there in the late 1960s and early 1970s, although not in any way like Cooley's group did in the 1950s. As mentioned before the Billy Jack Wills groups on the 1950s were much more influenced by R&B and closer to early rock 'n' roll.

Indeed some music that is similar to rockabilly and predates it is simply known as Western Bop and has a flavour closer to Western Swing without the horns, Rockabilly is a blend of all of those, but even now there are scores of groups across the worl who are mixing rockabilly and Western Swing as naturally as the forms originally evolved.
Might even catch a couple this week.

And what of performers like Speedy West and Jimmy Bryant, not strictly Western Swing at all, but it's part of their sound.

The Bob Wills Texas Playboys of 1936, 1941, 1947 and 1955 are so different at times.. it's quite startling, especially the instrumental sides.

Jason, seems like we have had this conversation before, doesn't it? The one element that I find most consistant with WS is the rythm section. Other than tempos, I don't hear much variation.

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kd...and the beat goes on...

What the heck does INFULTRATED mean ?
What a great post !
Ricky,B0b,Herb, Thanx .
Steel not finished readin this one !

INFULTRATED> "swarmed by outside forces"
Ricky

Barbershop Quartet singing doesn't allow any 6th's,so Ricky don't go trying to infiltrate over there.No major sevenths,that's for the Hi-Lo's or the Four Freshman.God forbid a ninth.I think they let you get in a dominant 7th once in a while if you're discreet about it.But I'm not for sure about that.
I'm re-reading "Lone Star Swing" by Duncan McLean and really enjoying it.The author is a Scotsman who bought a Bob Wills LP in a used record store one day and became obsessed with WS.He goes to Texas looking for answers and has some excellent adventures.Cool book,and the guy is very enthusiastic about the music.

Kenny, it sure seems that way.
I was looking at the CD racks the other day and they had the reissues of Hank Thompsons first coupe of Capitol albums and his latest two Cds, the guy has style and is still going strong.
Actually I'm pretty jealous of anyone who has a chance to see any of the Texas Playboys related outfits, and Duncan McLean's book is great, overall though my fave bit is when he visits Johnny Cuviello!

Thanx Ricky ! i did'nt know the Word existed.
i got a 1956 Dictionnary...
Un Americain a Pares.

Enjoyed your comments on WS. Herb, We are very fortunate in our band that five out of six can double,the exception being me and I'm lucky to do what I do on steel.We get all the bookings we want although the pay averages out to $65-70 per man per gig. I believe one of if not the most important thing about ws is the clean beat where a guy like me can hang on to my wife and look good.Our hawaiian band was run down by others in that we play pure haw and hapa haole and not Jawaiian. However we stuck to our roots and now we have more shows than we can handle in the centex area alone. Keep your thumb pick hot! cc

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Spade Cooley came to Nashville with his band and booked the War Memorial Building. It was said that there were more band members than audience members. As told to me by Billy Robinson this week at the NTSGA shindig.

Garry,this is typical. East of the Mississippi the country music was for listening and toe tapping and west of it the music was for dancing. So the Cooley gig in an auditorium probably was for sit down audiences. When Herb Remington was w/Wills the same thing happened in mine and Herbys hometown area of South Bend-Mishawaka.

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<SMALL>It was said that there were more band members than audience members.</SMALL>

We always say there were "more musicians than people".

Here in Texas we say, "the tables were dancing with the chairs!"

Several years ago a friend of mine who was a record producer at the time approached Hank Thompson about doing an album and Hank declared that he was indeed western swing. My fried said he was astounded that Hank would consider himself as being in that category but apparantly others agree with Hank. I think of Spade Cooley and Tex Williams as western swing but not Hank Thompson. But what the hey, what is the deffinition for western swing. Perhaps Hank Snow is western swing.