Steve Cheseborough » reviews

Review of Fetch It! from Il Blues, the Italian blues magazine

chezztone — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 08:06:44 +0000

Quando si va nel profundo Sud degli Stati Uniti a percorrere i luoghi del blues, non ci si può improvvisare “turisti per caso,” perchè il rischio di perdre pezzi di storia è molto alto. Bisogna allora affidarsi ad “un compagno di viaggio”, meticoloso e dettagliatissimo, come l’ottimo libro/guida “Blues Traveling/The Holy Sites of Delta Blues” dello studioso Steve Cheseborough, il quale non si è limitato alla sola attività di autore, indirizzando la sua passione anche come musicista. Dunque da carta e penna, alla chitarra/armonica/percussioni e voce, con i quali, da tre CD compreso questo (I primi due sono stati recensiti nel n. 87 e le due edizioni del libro nei numeri 80 e 89), Steve è come se volesse continuare l’approfondimento della materia riproponendo passi della tradizione afroamericana. Rispetto ai due precedenti CD, dove le versioni di Son House, Charlie Patton, Robert Johnson, Mississippi John Hurt, Tommy Johnson, Bo Carter ecc, mancavano di coinvolgimento emotivo per una esposizione scolastica e un canto dalle tonalità nasali e stridule, in questo suo terzo capitolo, dobbiamo riconoscere la volontà di Steve di aver tentato di dare più espressivitá al canto rendendolo più lento, cosicché anche il suo accento pulito risultasse un po’ più ricco di sfumature. Con la chitarra e l’armonica poi non va al di là del puro accompagnamento, ma no è un difetto, perché in alcuni casi ci mette anche del suo. Gli episodi che risultano menzionabili a nostro avviso sono “Hear Me Talking To You” (di Ma Rainey), “Who Broke The Latch” (di Bo Carter), il sobrio boogie dove si aiuta anche con l’armonica “Shake Your Hips” (di Slim Harpo), la delicata versione di “Vicksburg Blues” (di Little Brother Montgomery”, la ballata, di nuovo con l’armonica e accenno di canto yodel di “Little Ole Wine Drinker Me” (di Jennings/Mills), il traditional “Shortnin’ Bread” con l’uso dello slide e “Last Kind Words” (di Geechie Wiley). Siccome a noi Steve Cheseborough piace, ed è persona sincera e appassionata, vi invitiamo a contattarlo presso il suo sito www.stevecheseborough.com
Silvano Brambilla

When you go to the Deep South of the United States to cover the places of the blues, you can’t be an “accidental tourist,” because there is a great risk of losing pieces of history. You must entrust yourself to a meticulous and extremely detailed “travel companion,” like the optimal guidebook Blues Traveling: the Holy Sites of Delta Blues by the scholar Steve Cheseborough, who has not limited himself to the single activity of author, directing his passion also as a musician.
Therefore from paper and pen, to the harmonica, guitar, percussion and voice, with which, from three CDs including this one (the first two have been reviewed in issue 87 and the two editions of the book in issues 80 and 89), Steve seems to continue the deepening of reclaiming material from the passage of the African-American tradition. Compared with the two preceding CDs, where the versions of Son House, Charlie Patton, Robert Johnson, Mississippi John Hurt, Tommy Johnson, Bo Carter etc. lacked emotional involvement because of an academic presentation and a nasal and shrill vocal tone, in this his third chapter, we recognize Steve’s effort to give more expressiveness to the singing, rendering it slower, so that also his clean accent turned out a little richer in shadings. With the guitar and the harmonica then he does not go beyond pure accompaniment, but that is not a defect, because in some cases he also makes it his own. The tracks that turn out notable in our opinion are “Hear Me Talking To You” (by Ma Rainey), “Who Broke The Latch” (by Bo Carter), the straight-ahead boogie which is helped also by the harmonica “Shake Your Hips” (by Slim Harpo), the delicate version of “Vicksburg Blues” (by Little Brother Montgomery), the ballad, again with the harmonica and a hint of yodel “Little Ole Wine Drinker Me” (by Jennings/Mills), the traditional “Shortnin’ Bread” with the use of slide, and “Last Kind Words” (by Geechie Wiley).
Since we like Steve Cheseborough and he is a sincere and passionate person, we invite to you to contact him through his site, www.stevecheseborough.com
By Silvano Brambilla
Translated from the Italian by Steve Cheseborough

Review of Blues Traveling, third edition

chezztone — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 03:02:50 +0000

This is from the funny-named but highly respected country-blues website weeniecampbell.com, written by the great guitarist and teacher John Miller:

“Blues Traveling–The Holy Sites of Delta Blues”–Steve Cheseborough, University Press of Mississippi

Author Steve Cheseborough must be very happy at the reception his Delta Blues guidebook, “Blues Traveling”, has received, for it is now in its updated and expanded third edition. The book deserves the acclaim it has received, too, for it is hard to imagine how it could be improved upon in the way that it fulfills its primary function: to guide travellers interested in the Delta Blues to the major points of interest from Memphis in the north, to Helena, Arkansas in the west, to Natchez, in the south and to Meridian in the east, in a circular route of the blues country there that can be traversed in whole or in part in either a clockwise or counter-clockwise direction. “Blues Traveling” goes much farther than simply reciting the names of places of interest and telling how to get to them, though. It also provides guidance for negotiating the culture that travelers will encounter in the course of such a trip, what can be expected in the way of food and accomodations, and how to comport yourself while on the trip so that Mississipians will be glad to see you again should you ever decided to re-visit the area.

In some respects, “Blues Traveling” bears more than a passing resemblance to guidebooks to the areas of Classic Antiquity, Egypt, Greece, Turkey and Italy, in that a large number of the most interesting sites commemorate buildings that were once important landmarks, but which are no longer there. So it is that travelers hoping to see where the Colossus of Rhodes or Library at Alexandria were may find an analogous experience seeing where Junior Kimbrough’s juke was, prior to its burning down. The ephemeral nature of the physical relics of Blues musicians’ lives is not surprising, though, for the blues musicians came from an underclass population, and didn’t leave much in the way of estates upon their passing; author Cheseborough makes this point, as well.

A high percentage of the places to be seen noted in the book are graves and museums. Even very small towns often have a musem and “Blues Traveling” is really good about letting you know what you can expect to see at any one of the many museums discussed in the book. The directions supplied in the book merit special praise, and should be particularly helpful in locating some of the graves mentioned in the book, which are often in very rural, out-of-the-way locations. Author Cheseborough offers not only directions to the cemeteries, but also directions on foot once you get there.

“Blues Traveling” does a really fine job, as well, of noting the dates and locations of the various blues festivals in the area throughout the year (many of which are free to attend) and clubs and jukes that host live performances of blues. Steve Chesborough is well qualified to speak to the types of blues one is likely to encounter in Mississippi today, for his tastes in blues embrace present-day electric blues as well as the acoustic masters of the past. Historical context around the various locations and the musicians who frequent them (or frequented them in the past) is delivered in an easy-going informal fashion.

Some of my favorite portions of “Blues Traveling” relate more peripherally to the blues, and more explicitly to the culture in the larger sense, how to get along with people, and what are realistic expectations with regard to food and accomodations. The book is protective of the year-long residents of the area and makes a special point of mentioning when a point of interest is currently private property. To the extent that “Blues Traveling” both encourages tourism in the area by blues aficionados and works to avert cross-cultural mix-ups or tensions between the aficionados and the local populace, it is much to be commended. That’s a fine line to walk.

“Blues Traveling” concludes with a list of recommended reading and another of recommended listening. The listening list could use some updating: the Gus Cannon reliease it cites has been out of print for many years, and there are currently other re-issues of Gus’s recordings that are easier to find. Taken in sum, though, “Blues Traveling” does an admirable job at what it sets out to do, and is a fascinating read both for blues fans planning to make a trip to the Delta and to those who probably will never make the trip. The best travel literature works equally well for travelers and homebodies, and by that standard, “Blues Traveling” succeeds in spades.

John M. Miller

EaT your greens

chezztone — Mon, 25 May 2009 02:16:02 +0000

You can go to EaT: an Oyster Bar (N Williams at Failing Street, Portland) to hear me on Saturday nights. And of course for the oysters, absinthe, shrimp etouffee etc. But here’s another excellent reason to visit that fine restaurant: greens.

I love many things on the menu, but I want to make special note of the greens, which seem to have been ignored in all the press this place has garnered. (Probably that is because Northwest food critics don’t know much about greens.) If you like greens, or want to try them, this is the place. Several places in town just saute them with various meats and seasonings added. Well, greens are not spinach. They have to be slow- and long-cooked in plenty of liquid, or else they are tough. EaT chef Ethan does them right. The only problem is EaT does not serve cornbread, with which one typically soaks up the delicious broth, or “potlikker.” So make sure to ask for a spoon, and don’t let a drop of it go to waste!

Say Amen, Somebody!

chezztone — Sun, 17 May 2009 19:48:20 +0000

I enthusiastically recommend Say Amen, Somebody. It is a movie about gospel music but a major part of it is blues singer Georgia Tom, who rechristened himself Thomas A. Dorsey when he became the Father of Gospel Music.
The reasons you, a blues fan, ought to run right out and get it from your library or video store:
1. If you dig Georgia Tom – and you should – then here he is. Yes, he is past his prime and yes he has switched from blues to gospel. But he sings, walks, talks, interacts with people, conducts…it’s just the best-quality, longest, most-detailed, most-interesting footage of any prewar blues artist. And he still has that vocal style and personality that comes through so strong on his early recordings! There even is a scene of him listening and reacting to one of his old blues records. Priceless. His unsung collaborator/manager, Sallie Martin, also appears here, including a great scene of the two of them together.
2. There is a lot of good music on here, from several terrific gospel acts (Willie Mae Ford Smith, the Barrett Sisters and the O’Neal Twins). If you get the 25th anniversary special edition (the movie first came out in 1982), it includes an audio CD and a nice little hardcover book besides the DVD.
3. It clearly shows that gospel music totally derives from the work of a great bluesman. When someone tries to tell you that blues comes from gospel, have him watch this movie.
4. It’s just a great documentary. As Roger Ebert puts it: “Say Amen, Somebody is one of the most joyful movies I’ve ever seen. It is also one of the best musicals and one of the most interesting documentaries. And it’s a terrific good time. The movie is about gospel music, and it’s filled with gospel music. It’s sung by some of the pioneers of modern gospel, who are now in their seventies and eighties, and it’s sung by some of the rising younger stars, and it’s sung by choirs of kids. It’s sung in churches and around the dining room table; with orchestras and a capella; by an old man named Thomas A. Dorsey in front of thousands of people; and by Dorsey standing all by himself in his own backyard. The music in Say Amen, Somebody is as exciting and uplifting as any music I’ve ever heard on film.”

Review of Fetch It!

chezztone — Sun, 17 May 2009 06:46:01 +0000

From the fun and and authoritative country-blues website weeniecampbell.com comes this review of my new CD:

Fetch It! – Steve Cheseborough

Written by Andrew Mullins

Fetch It! – Steve Cheseborough
Independent

Portland-based musician and author Steve Cheseborough has put together a strong set of country blues for his latest CD, Fetch It!, which was released in January. The author of the guidebook Blues Traveling: the Holy Sites of Delta Blues, Cheseborough is a part-time blues historian, but never comes across sounding like one on this CD. He takes a laid back approach to the music that is very appealing – it’s always a pleasure for the listener when the performer sounds so relaxed and sure of their material. Just sit back and enjoy.

The record opens with “Hear Me Talking to You”, an arrangement of a Ma Rainey song with a beautiful melody that provides the title for the CD in its lyric, “you got to fetch it with you when you come.” The pace sets the tone for much of the rest of the disc. Cheseborough adapts the song – originally played by a jug band – for solo guitar in Vestapol tuning to great success. His arranging talents are in evidence throughout the record, but particularly on Little Brother Montgomery’s “Vicksburg Blues”, a slow blues that transfers surprising effectively from piano to guitar, and the wonderful Georgia Tom Dorsey song “Been Mistreated”, which sounds a little like it’s gone through a Bo Carter machine.

Cheseborough is in fact an expert on Carter, and so it’s only fitting that he tackles several of his tunes for the CD, including the classic “Arrangement for Me Blues”, and the guitar workout “Who’s Been Here” – slightly toned down here from the original acrobatic version, but still rendered with style and Bo-itude. But the most enjoyable take on Carter here is surely the less common “Who Broke the Latch?”, a raggy medicine show or vaudeville-style blues that is hard to resist.

If you’ve seen Cheseborough perform, you may have seen him put away the guitar and convincingly lay down a tune with simple harmonica, percussion and vocal. This time round it’s Polly Wolly Doodle, perfectly executed comedy featuring melodic harp playing, hambone and vocal responses in the bass register. His harp playing in general should not go unmentioned: always understated, he resists wailing harmonica stylings, and has more in common with Noah Lewis or Will Shade.

Other tracks on the record include a funky, John Lee Hooker-ish take on Slim Harpo’s “Shake Your Hips”, Blind Lemon Jefferson’s “One Dime Blues”, Tampa Red’s “Love With a Feeling”, and even a nice cover of a Dean Martin tune, “Little Ole Wine Drinker Me” – complete with yodel. The CD also features percussion on every track – Stacy Adams shoes on an old box lid – though I think a few tracks should probably have stood shoeless on their own. Geeshie Wiley’s “Last Kind Words” in particular is one where I could have done without the percussive tapping.

Cheseborough’s vocals are strong throughout. He picks great singing songs, not just guitar parts, and he’s got his own style (though an occasional tendency to exaggerate vowel sounds may alarm some listeners at first). With a playlist that avoids blues clichés and Cheseborough’s easy-going style, Fetch It! is a thoroughly enjoyable and entertaining CD. Featuring cover art by 15-year-old cartoonist Christopher Livingstone.

Available at CD Baby and www.stevecheseborough.com

The club that looks like my book

chezztone — Thu, 30 Apr 2009 08:32:34 +0000

I headed down to Charleston, S.C., the first week of April, for a family reunion and a gig at Fiery Ron’s Home Team BBQ. This was my third appearance at Fiery Ron’s, and every time I play there it is a thing of wonder for me and owner Randy Abraham (and, hopefully, for the audience too). The thing is, Randy designed the club based on my book, Blues Traveling: the Holy Sites of Delta Blues. Really! Years before he met or heard me, Randy picked up a copy of my book and took it in hand as he toured the Mississippi Delta, shooting photos, buying photos and art, collecting signs and other memorabilia and getting ideas, all of which would go into the decor of his Delta-themed blues-and-barbecue club in Charleston. A few years later I was looking for a gig in Charleston and thought his place sounded promising (I love playing in barbecue joints, and this one already featured blues) so I called and we got it together. It’s really like going home, playing there. Just love the decor. The food is terrific too. And they have a nice beer selection! One of my peeves about Southern barbecue joints in general is that that lavish loving attention on the meat but often give short shrift to the beer, bread, even the side dishes. Not at Fiery Ron’s. So…next time you’re in Charleston, stop by for some ribs and blues, and say hello to Randy and Tony (another owner). Tell ‘em I sent you. Maybe I’ll see you there!

review of Marybeth Hamilton, In Search of the Blues

chezztone — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 19:20:00 +0000

Marybeth Hamilton, In Search of the Blues
review by Steve Cheseborough
Marybeth Hamilton has dug up some good stories, and makes some good insights. But then she takes it too far.
The stories are about white non-musicians obsessed with African-American music (she uses “blues” in the title and many other places in the book, but really the subjects are obsessed with plantation melodies, jazz and various other African-American musics as well as blues). Her point is that these obsessives, with their strange approaches (Dorothy Scarborough relied on elderly white ex-slave owners’ recollections of black song) and personalities (James McKune ended up drunken, homeless and murdered by a man he had picked up to have sex with), have helped define black music through their writing, collecting and other nonmusical activities.
This collection of characters is interesting. They are of course not the only white nonmusicians to have made an impact on blues. Others who spring to mind, who are ignored or mentioned only in passing in this book, include Charles Peabody, the Harvard archaeologist who gave a very early documentation when he noticed his dig’s workers’ songs in 1902; H.C. Speir, furniture-store owner who served as the music’s greatest talent scout by discovering Skip James, Charley Patton and dozens of others; the Paramount record executive (name unknown to me) who took a chance, in an era of sophisticated, orchestra-backed female blues singers, on recording the solo street performer Blind Lemon Jefferson; John Hammond Sr., who produced the Spirituals to Swing concerts in the late 1930s and reissued Robert Johnson’s recordings in the 1960s; Stephen C. LaVere, who oversaw the second reissue of Johnson, on CD in the 1990s, accompanied by a photo, that led to Johnson’s superstardom; Jim O’Neal, founder of Living Blues, the first magazine to focus on living musicians rather than old recordings. Hamilton tends to pick people who wrote books, and that’s OK. She tells us about Howard Odum, who decided in 1907 that black song was as worth documenting as Native American song, and set out to do it; Scarborough, a Virginia-born Columbia professor who switched interest from literature to plantation song; John Lomax, who believed prisons were repositories of pure folk music; Frederick Ramsey, Charles Edward Smith and William Russell, who found heaven in early New Orleans jazz records and then in the living master Jelly Roll Morton; and McKune, high priest of the cult of collecting old 78s.
Where the book goes way out into silly and false territory, though, is when it confuses these people’s activities with the creation of the music. According to Hamilton, Delta blues was born in a Brooklyn YMCA room in the 1940s, as McKune listened to a Charley Patton record. In case we think she’s joking, she physically goes to the site and describes the building and the room, the holy site where the blues was born. She is not kidding.
In the book’s final pages, Hamilton does a mass psychoanalysis of late-20th-Century American white men, and decides that their fascination with the outlaw bluesman is part of their general escape from commitment. There lies the origin of the blues, according to Hamilton.
Barry Lee Pearson and Elijah Wald both wrote books a few years ago that debunked the Robert Johnson myth, said he was not a big deal in his own time or in blues history. Hamilton tries to take it way further, say blues itself is not a big deal, doesn’t really exist except in the twisted minds and writings of her characters. But that isn’t true. There is a music known as the blues, and it would have existed whether or not Odum, Lomax, McKune and the rest of Hamilton’s subjects ever noticed it. All of them did notice it, though, because they were captivated by the sound. In nearly every chapter, Hamilton describes the epiphanic moment when each of these people first heard the blues, usually on record. It was the sound, not the image of a bluesman, that captured these people. That same sound has captivated many, many people — men and women, from all countries and eras, not just commitment-phobic late-20th-Century American men.
But it never captured Hamilton. She never listened to Robert Johnson until the 1990s, and then she “heard very little,” she says in the first chapter. A punk-rock fan, she doesn’t say whether she tried listening to any blues besides Johnson. Instead she set off to try to mass-psychoanalyze the people who do hear something in the blues. Maybe she should try listening again before she writes another book.

Chezz and Taizz reviewed! 2007

chezztone — Tue, 29 Apr 2008 01:09:00 +0000

Chezz and Taizz reviewed!
Originally republished (in Steve Cheseborough blog) 3/21/2007

Old-time vaudeville revived in mirthful, mixed acts
Review: Miz Kitty’s Parlour shows off more than parlor tricks, though
the result can be tedious
Monday, March 19, 2007
LUCIANA LOPEZ
The Oregonian
The building may have changed, but the parlor’s still the same.

The vaudeville and variety show Miz Kitty’s Parlour moved to the
Mission Theater earlier this year, but, as Saturday’s performance
proved, the long-running pageant’s retained its grab-bag mix of acts,
from the musical to the comical to the harder-to-classify, all
presided over by Miz Kitty — aka Lisa Marsicek, of the old-time band
Flat Mountain Girls.

That eclectic approach is the both the show’s strength and its
weakness: Though the variety, surprise and irreverence are welcome,
the blend doesn’t always work. Saturday, for example, the parlor
included a hula hoop dance troupe, the whirlyGirlz. Impressive, sure;
it’s decent odds most in the audience hadn’t even picked up a hula
hoop in years, much less danced choreographed routines while spinning
one about the neck, waist or other body parts. But the Girlz, in
tight, midriff-baring outfits, didn’t quite fit the show’s old-time
vaudevillian aesthetic.

In the strength column, though, list such acts as the Stomp Down
Rollers, comprising guitarist/vocalist Steve Cheseborough and
vocalist-harmonica player Taizz Medalia. The two had an unassuming
easiness that drew the audience in, and their humor pretty much nailed
the vaudeville vibe. The song “Hot Nuts,” for example, was both sweet
and sly, the former for its delivery, the latter for its broad double
entendres.

Somewhere in the middle was the Cavalcade of Beautiful Losers from
Opera Theater Oregon. The Losers performed a mix of pieces, including
a pretty accurate five-minute version of “Faust.” The opera let the
troupe show off voices and insight (they’re right, Marguerite is a bit
of a twit). But their performance was longer than merely the
mini-”Faust,” and the rest of the material felt thrown together,
especially in comparison. For the last song, the woman who played
Marguerite was still in what she called her “Baby Jane” makeup, which
made it a lot harder to buy her singing Diana Krall’s “Temptation,”
though she and the singers on backup were in good voice.

Even Miz Kitty herself could be hit or miss.

Marsicek was often funny and charming, as when handing out “rare,
exotic” door prizes, but sometimes her humor felt a little labored,
especially the leprechaun jokes. Yes, it was St. Patrick’s Day, so
some Irish jokes were to be expected. In the parlor, those jokes took
the form of two men dressed as (quite large) leprechauns coming on
stage whenever Marsicek mentioned St. Patrick’s Day, Irish things, or
leprechauns.

Unfortunately, the joke got, not just old, but obvious. The gag would
have been funnier if it had incorporated more surprise; if, say, the
leprechauns had started appearing for less obvious words.

But we are quibbling here: Even at Miz Kitty’s Parlour’s weakest, it’s
still warm, willing to take risks and a barrel of laughs –
vaudeville, Portland-style.

Luciana Lopez: 503-412-7034; lucianalopez@news.oregonian.com