”COME ON IN”
Welcome to our preview edition of “Walkin’ and Talkin’ the Blues.” This publication is a work-in-progress containing a fraction of what what will be a much larger issue in the near future.
Our goal is to bring you into the world of Paul Butterfield through the words, music and images of his friends, family and legions of admirers. We are at the point in time now where “Fathers and Sons” has already reached into the third generation. The torch has been passed on from Muddy and The Wolf down through Paul and Michael and onto a vast multitude who have been forever altered, inspired and educated by the work of Paul Butterfield, solo and with his many diverse groups.
“Without Paul, many of us wouldn’t be here tonight.”
-Bill Graham Winter land, 1973 Intro to Better Days concert
Butterfield was indeed an avatar for a generation. While others sold more records, reached greater levels of fame and fortune, and went on to reap the fruits of their labors, Paul Butterfield’s legacy will be that of one who cut a gre,J.t path into the unkown that a generation would follow – think of the Red Sea parting for Moses, and you’ll get an idea of the impact of The Paul Butterfield Blues Band – featuring Michael Bloomfield, Elvin Bishop, Sam Lay, Mark Naftalin, and Jerome Arnold – on a generation. This revolution probably caused as much of a stir in its way as the Beatles. With East-West as their Sergeant Pepper, The Butterfield Blues Band solidified its position as great innovators and posted a wake-up call to every gigging musician in Amecica that the ante has been upped.
That Butterfield, on an instrument that retailed for about two dollars when he first started buying them, could go on a stage anywhere, with literally any kind of music being played, and pick up where the most accomplished musician in the band or orchestra had just finished soloing and basically blow any and all under the table, is why he is so admired. Greg Allman aptly introduced him in 1987 at the Crackdown Concert in Madison Square Garden as “The man: Paul Butterfield.” And that he was. Paul, in failing health and hear the end of his clays, still managed to go on that stage and hold his own with that monstrous band, and it was recorded for posterity.
Paul began by playing the flute in school, then a little guitar while hanging around the cultural mecca that was Hyde Park in Chicago (listen to his acoustic work on In My Own Dream). He was a track star and boxer in his youth until a racing accient blew out his knee. The summer after his graduation, he spent his clays on the rocks overlooking Lake Michigan playing the harmonica. There and then he found his voice and his style. He started out a novice but returned from his quest almost as good as he was ever going to be. There’s no real earthly explanation for such talent. He even played the instrument backwards, left handed, as you can see from Thom Pollard’s photo, with the high keys on the bottom. Kind of like Hendrix and Abert King playing the guitar upside-down. You don’t learn that from books. Upon his return to the South Side, he began gigging with Little Smokey Smothers at all black clubs in dangerous neighborhoods. Here, the young Irish lad was appreciated and heralded. The patrons would be asking, ‘When is that white kid coming back?’ When he’d walk into a place, Junior Wells and Little Walter would put down their harps. James Cotton and Muddy Waters would be beaming and smiling at him, as if he was their very own. Sam Lay, right out of Howlin’ Wolf’s band, began to play with Paul at Big John’s when the group had work every night they wanted it. “Black, white – Paul played the blues and that-‘s all that mattered.” Paul’s wife Virginia (Gabe’s mother) put it like this: “He was music.”
His joy and strength – not only as a ·musician, but as a brilliant bandleacler and emotive singer – reached not only fans but his peers in the music industry around the world. His bands, jamming partners and session mates included luminaries from all fields of music (Muddy Waters, Otis Spann, David Sanborn, Chris Parker, Dr. John, Rick Danko, Levon Helm, BB King, Eric Clapton, Hendrix to name a few) and his recorded material, right from the·beginning (“The Lost Elektra Sessions”) to his acoustic duet of “Amazing Grace” with John Sebastian, always satisfied.
Butterfield’s power on that tiny instrument was awesome. He was an accomplished yogi in breath control. He would stand on a stage and without the aid of a mic or PA system, fill a hall with one note. When I put “Walkin’ Blues” on my car stereo, my 17 year-old nephew mistook the harmonica for a trumpet. Indeed, Paul Butterfield’s harmonica was the clarion, a call to arms for a generation that walked to “The Love March.” Butterfield called the tunes and scored the soundtrack indelibly etched in the annals of music history and in the histoy of manknd. There have been a lot of harmonica players since, but never one better. Long may he blow.