forstonc - Posted - 10/12/2008:  21:11:46

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Just wondering if anyone here can tell me what notes make up that high lonesome sound of bluegrass? Is it playing the flatted 7th, or is it playing the minor 3rd over a major chord, or ???? I just can't figure it out.

Thanks for any responses

abinigia - Posted - 10/13/2008:  06:37:54

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I believe the term "high lonesome sound" refers more to Bill Monroe's singing style. On many songs in the "B" part he sang a high tenor over a high melody. But I also think you're right that part of that sound is the blue notes you describe, both vocally and instrumentally. In other words, it's a sound, not any one thing.

Brian Wood
users.wildblue.net/briankwood/

TankerTom - Posted - 10/13/2008:  07:07:45

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i think alote of things make up the sound alote of sliding into a note alote of dstops but the main thing i think separates B.G. from old time is alote of songs played in the key of B and B flat not the funest keys to play fiddle in if it wasent for capos banjoest and gutirest would not like it as well.

fiddlepogo - Posted - 10/14/2008:  13:29:38

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I also have tended to take the term
"high lonesome sound" as referring to a singing style-
Bluegrass singers traditionally tend to sing at the top of their
range and get a tight vocal quality, very similar in that respect to Old Time mountain singers like Roscoe Holcombe.

But the scale thing is part of it- Bill Monroe learned stuff from a blues mandolin player, and that bluesiness in the scales definitely
does accentuate this sad "lonesome" feel. That's a well known
attribute of the blues scale.
The ambiguity of the 3rd and the 7th being flatted is part of it,
(but up to that point it's just like switching from Mixolydian to Dorian mode)
but there is another note- a half-tone above the 5th, that is very
characteristic of blues as well, and you don't find that in those
two normal mountain modes I mentioned.
That's a Bb note in an Em pentatonic scale,
and an Eb in an Am pentatonic.
On electric guitar, I bend up to that note all the time for a lonesome,
mournful bluesy sound. You don't do bends on a mandolin, but I bet that note is incorporated in some way.
And you could slide to it on fiddle, of course.
Could that be your mystery element?

Michael- Old Time 90% of the time!

"It''s hard to take yourself seriously when you''re singing about chickens!"

ezfolk.com/audio/bands/1088
for mp3s, blog, and "Michael''s Old Time Fiddle & Banjo Hour" (hifi & lofi audio streams)

coelhoe - Posted - 10/19/2008:  20:05:34

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Michael: A raised 5th is just weird, don't you mean a half-tone below the 5th? The blues scale is 1 3b 4 5b 5 7b 8.

It is the flatted 5th that is the extra "blue" note. Your examples are both flatted 5ths.

Dennis

"Not being able to play very well is a good substitute for not having good taste." -Eddie Adcock

fiddlepogo - Posted - 10/19/2008:  22:33:51

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quote:

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Originally posted by coelhoe

Michael: A raised 5th is just weird, don't you mean a half-tone below the 5th? The blues scale is 1 3b 4 5b 5 7b 8.

It is the flatted 5th that is the extra "blue" note. Your examples are both flatted 5ths.

Dennis

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Quite right! Brain fart!
When I play blues, I'm less likely to carefully analyze what I'm
playing, don't know why.

Actually though, I tried the raised fifth,
and it's not as weird as all that, when
I bend up to it it works somehow-
well, I goofed, but I got a new blues lick out of it!

Michael- Old Time 90% of the time!

"It''s hard to take yourself seriously when you''re singing about chickens!"

ezfolk.com/audio/bands/1088
for mp3s, blog, and "Michael''s Old Time Fiddle & Banjo Hour" (hifi & lofi audio streams)

forstonc - Posted - 10/23/2008:  20:35:26

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Thank you all for responding.
I will try adding in the flatted 5th on some things and see where that takes me.

coelhoe - Posted - 10/25/2008:  09:13:00

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Actually the phrase "The High Lonesome Sound" dates from a film made in 1962 by John Cohen, a charter member of the New Lost City Ramblers.

Cohen's film is about the music of one Roscoe Holcomb, an intensely idiosyncratic singer , banjo and guitar player from Kentucky. The title reference is to Holcomb's singing style, which pitches his voice at the very top of his range. Some scholars feel that this style is adopted from shape-note church singing where the melody line is usually in the highest male voice. Others (Alan Lomax, for one) have more esoteric explanations, though acknowledging similar male vocal styles in Celtic areas. Still others point out that in the days before amplification, a higher pitched voice could more easily be heard.

Dennis

"Not being able to play very well is a good substitute for not having good taste." -Eddie Adcock

OTJunky - Posted - 10/25/2008:  10:18:24

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Alan Lomax wrote a treatise called "Folk Song Styles Around the World". You can find it here.

books.google.com/books?id=iqso...PPA143,M1

In that treatise he observes many occurrences of this "tight throated", "high pitched" male singing around the world and attributes it to some distinct characteristics of the culture in which the singers are embedded.

He also contrasts the singing styles of whites and blacks in the early Southern rural U.S. and attempts to explain what creates the differences.

I'm not sure I agree with many of his conclusions - but it does make for some fascinating reading.

--OTJ
"I can barely fiddle on four strings. Why would I want five?"

phicks - Posted - 10/27/2009:  11:42:42

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To me, the high lonesome sound comes from treating any note as a blue note. I often slide down from the 5th and up into the 3rd, before hitting the root note. In G, that would be D(slide flat a hair) Bb sliding up to B, then G. Monroe often slid into the Major 7th note in his runs. This is not normally a blue note, but when Kenny Baker and Bill use it, it gets blue. A good approach is to try to make the fiddle sound like the singer. If you phrase your licks in a similar manner to a good bluegrass singer, your fiddle will sound like blugrass. A lot of the bluegrass sound is based on dynamics. Good bluegrass has a sort of surge or swell to it. There are long, bluesy notes punctuated with quick runs.
One more thing is using double stops with flatted sevenths and/or ninths for blues effect.

Pedro

abinigia - Posted - 10/27/2009:  18:56:39

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quote:

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Monroe often slid into the Major 7th note in his runs. This is not normally a blue note, but when Kenny Baker and Bill use it, it gets blue.

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Good point about sliding up to the major 7th being blue, and it's especially true when played double stopped with a third. It's a bluegrass cliché but can sound great if used sparingly.

Brian Wood
briankwood.net/