178 Quotes About Blues

When Johnson started singing, he seemed like a guy who could have sprung from the head of Zeus in full armor.

What were good and evil, really, but stupid categories? Stupid categoriesthat restricted people and punished or rewarded them based on how they responded to their own natures, natures they really didn't have any way to control.

What I found about the blues and music, tracing things back, was that nothing came from itself.

Christianity, as it was first given to the slaves [...] was to be used strictly as a code of conduct which would enable its devotees to participate in an afterlife; it was from its very inception among the black slaves, a slave ethic. [...] One of the very reasons Christianity proved so popular was that it was the religion, according to older Biblical tradition, of an oppressed people. The struggles of the Jews and their long-sought "Promised Land" proved a strong analogy for the black slaves.

In the early days of slavery, Christianity's sole purpose was to propose a metaphysical resolution for the slave's natural yearnings for freedom, and as such, it literally made life easier for him. The secret African chants and songs were about Africa, and expressed the African slave's desire to return to the land of his birth. The Christian Negro's music became an an expression of his desire to "cross Jordan" and "see his Lord.

[O]ne can see, perhaps, how "perfect" Christianity was in that sense. It took the slave's mind off Africa, or material freedom, and proposed that if the black man wished to escape the filthy paternalism and cruelty of slavery, he wait, at least, until he died, when he could be transported peacefully and majestically to the Promised Land.

Blues is easy to play, but hard to feel

I'd solo on my guitar; then sing; then solo; then sing some more. one stopped when the other started. That way I felt a continuity, not a conflict, like a wheel that keeps turning. Both sounds - guitar and voice - were coming out of me, but they issued from different parts of my soul.

I'm a fan first. I believed Duke Ellington when he said there's no bad music, just some of it is presented badly. As a kid, hanging around Church Street, the presentation of music was so powerful, I couldn't help but jump for joy. I had discovered art, or truth, or whatever you want to call it; I had seen a light I'd follow forever.