{"id":1770,"date":"2016-07-20T07:00:07","date_gmt":"2016-07-20T11:00:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/?p=1770"},"modified":"2024-03-24T10:17:28","modified_gmt":"2024-03-24T14:17:28","slug":"kokain","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/kokain\/","title":{"rendered":"Kokain (Hannes Wader&#8217;s Cocaine Blues)"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/9c7sVhsZZbk\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>Heading north from Spain for my first summer in Europe, one of my first stops was Liechtenstein, where I had an invitation to spend a few days with the family of a young woman named Ruth who I&#8217;d known in language school in <span class=\"st\">M\u00e1laga<\/span>. It&#8217;s the only time I was ever in Liechtenstein, and my main memory of the (tiny) country is of standing on a mountainside looking down on the clouds that covered the valleys.<\/p>\n<p>My other memory is of my introduction to the alternate universe of European blues guitar. I had my guitar with me and played for Ruth&#8217;s family, and I think it was her brother who<img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft wp-image-1773 size-full\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/Werner-L%C3%A4mmerhirt.jpg?resize=200%2C196&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"Werner L\u00e4mmerhirt\" width=\"200\" height=\"196\" \/> immediately asked if I knew <span id=\"eow-title\" class=\"watch-title\" dir=\"ltr\" title=\"Werner L\u00e4mmerhirt - Die Fr\u00fchen Jahre (1991)\">Werner L\u00e4mmerhirt. Of course I didn&#8217;t, so we went up to his room and he played me L\u00e4mmerhirt&#8217;s first album. I could see why he was playing it for me &#8212; it obviously came out of the same tradition, complete with versions of &#8220;<a href=\"http:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/hesitation-blues\/ \u200e\">Hesitation Blues<\/a>&#8221; and Mississippi John Hurt&#8217;s &#8220;<a href=\"http:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/see-see-rider\/\">See See Rider<\/a>&#8221; &#8212; but I was not thrilled. For one thing, L\u00e4mmerhirt&#8217;s accent was lousy and his singing unconvincing, and for another thing, he was a spectacularly clean, fast, and intricate guitarist, and I was envious&#8230; though the way I phrased that, even to myself, was that he had lots of chops but no soul.<br \/>\n<\/span><\/p>\n<p>At that point, I had no sense of the world of European fingerstyle. I had one John Renbourn album and a couple by Pentangle, had heard a bit of Bert Jansch, but had never even heard of Davey Graham or Wizz Jones, or Marcel Dadi&#8230; so I didn&#8217;t understand the history of what I was hearing on that <span id=\"eow-title\" class=\"watch-title\" dir=\"ltr\" title=\"Werner L\u00e4mmerhirt - Die Fr\u00fchen Jahre (1991)\">L\u00e4mmerhirt<\/span> LP.<\/p>\n<p>I was more taken with another German (actually Austrian, but, heaven help me, I didn&#8217;t make <img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright wp-image-1774 size-full\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/oscar-klein.jpg?resize=200%2C200&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"oscar klein\" width=\"200\" height=\"200\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/oscar-klein.jpg?w=200&amp;ssl=1 200w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/oscar-klein.jpg?resize=150%2C150&amp;ssl=1 150w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 200px) 100vw, 200px\" \/>the distinction at that point) blues guitarist, Oscar Klein &#8212; I would have said because he was more soulful, and I still think that&#8217;s true, but also because he was playing like Lightnin&#8217; Hopkins, not exploring or expanding a new, European take on blues, so I was more familiar with what I was hearing. He was a jazz trumpet player and had a great feel on guitar, and he didn&#8217;t try to sing, which also helped.<\/p>\n<p>And then there was Hannes Wader, or at least &#8220;Kokain&#8221; &#8212; I don&#8217;t recall hearing Wader himself sing that or anything else, and I wonder whether it was Ruth&#8217;s brother or one of his friends who played the song for me. Whoever did it, he also wrote out the lyrics and explained what they meant, and I learned the first few verses, mostly because I figured I should have at least one song in German, but also because I felt like it was exactly what I wanted Europeans to be doing if they were going to play blues.<\/p>\n<p>The thing was, my whole existence as a wandering musician in Europe was predicated on the fact that Europeans liked American music, but didn&#8217;t have a lot of Americans around to play it. They were listening to German and French and Dutch and Spanish blues singers, singing in varying simulacrums of American accents, and some could play good guitar but when they opened their mouths it was mostly funny or just lame. As an eighteen-year-old white kid from Cambridge with fair-to-middling pitch problems, I wasn&#8217;t a world-class folk-blues singer myself, but in those days I could walk into pretty much any folk or blues club in Northern Europe and book a gig simply on the strength of being American, without them asking to hear a note. I might not be great, but I could at least pronounce the words right.<\/p>\n<p>So what I particularly liked about &#8220;Kokain&#8221; &#8212; and what made it a unique object, in my experience &#8212; was that Wader not only<img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft wp-image-1775 size-full\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/Hannes-Wader.jpg?resize=275%2C272&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"Hannes Wader\" width=\"275\" height=\"272\" \/> was singing in German, but had written a thoroughly German, thoroughly modern lyric to the Gary Davis\/<a href=\"http:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/cocaine-blues\/\">Dave Van Ronk version<\/a> I knew so well. He had translated one couplet in the chorus, and kept the original tag-line, but the rest of the song was a long, funny, and completely original fantasy about an extended family caught up in the German drug scene of the 1970s:<\/p>\n<p><em>Meine Tante dealt seit einem Jahr <\/em><br \/>\n<em>Seitdem geht sie \u00fcber Leichen, f\u00e4hrt &#8216;nen Jaguar <\/em><br \/>\n<em>Cocaine, all around my brain <\/em><br \/>\n<em>Immer wenn sie kommt, bringt sie ein St\u00fcckchen Shit <\/em><br \/>\n<em>In der Radkappe f\u00fcr die Kinder mit <\/em><br \/>\n<em>Cocaine, all around my brain<\/em><\/p>\n<p>(Roughly &#8212; and I welcome corrections from German-speakers:<br \/>\n<em>My aunt has been dealing for a year,<\/em><br \/>\n<em>Since then she&#8217;s on top of the world\u00a0 [literally &#8220;walks over dead bodies&#8221;], travels in a Jaguar&#8230;<br \/>\n<\/em><em>Whenever she visits she brings a chunk of shit [hashish]<\/em><br \/>\n<em>In the hubcap, for the children&#8230;)<\/em><\/p>\n<p>I never memorized that verse &#8212; I had enough trouble with the first four and am amazed that I still remember them forty years later&#8230; and I apologize to any German listeners for the mistakes and mispronunciations&#8230; but hey, I had to listen to a lot of Germans sing blues in butchered English, and now it&#8217;s your turn.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Heading north from Spain for my first summer in Europe, one of my first stops was Liechtenstein, where I had an invitation to spend a few days with the family of a young woman named Ruth who I&#8217;d known in language school in M\u00e1laga. It&#8217;s the only time I was ever in Liechtenstein, and my &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/kokain\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">Kokain (Hannes Wader&#8217;s Cocaine Blues)<\/span> <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1770","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.5 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Kokain (Hannes Wader&#039;s Cocaine Blues) - Old Friends: A Songobiography<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Hannes Wader&#039;s German-language expansion of &quot;Cocaine Blues,&quot; which I learned in Lichtenstein and somehow still remember.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/kokain\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Kokain (Hannes Wader&#039;s Cocaine Blues) - Old Friends: A Songobiography\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Hannes Wader&#039;s German-language expansion of &quot;Cocaine Blues,&quot; which I learned in Lichtenstein and somehow still remember.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/kokain\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Old Friends: A Songobiography\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2016-07-20T11:00:07+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2024-03-24T14:17:28+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/Hannes-Wader.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"275\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"272\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Elijah Wald\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:image\" content=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/Hannes-Wader.jpg?fit=275%2C272&ssl=1\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@ElijahWald\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@ElijahWald\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Elijah Wald\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"5 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\\\/\\\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.elijahwald.com\\\/songblog\\\/kokain\\\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.elijahwald.com\\\/songblog\\\/kokain\\\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Elijah Wald\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.elijahwald.com\\\/songblog\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/person\\\/20e4f69f2f284ea0ff728a9d1b7720a9\"},\"headline\":\"Kokain (Hannes Wader&#8217;s Cocaine Blues)\",\"datePublished\":\"2016-07-20T11:00:07+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2024-03-24T14:17:28+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.elijahwald.com\\\/songblog\\\/kokain\\\/\"},\"wordCount\":878,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.elijahwald.com\\\/songblog\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/person\\\/20e4f69f2f284ea0ff728a9d1b7720a9\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.elijahwald.com\\\/songblog\\\/kokain\\\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.elijahwald.com\\\/songblog\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/2016\\\/06\\\/oscar-klein.jpg\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.elijahwald.com\\\/songblog\\\/kokain\\\/\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.elijahwald.com\\\/songblog\\\/kokain\\\/\",\"name\":\"Kokain (Hannes Wader's Cocaine Blues) - Old Friends: A Songobiography\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.elijahwald.com\\\/songblog\\\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.elijahwald.com\\\/songblog\\\/kokain\\\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.elijahwald.com\\\/songblog\\\/kokain\\\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.elijahwald.com\\\/songblog\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/2016\\\/06\\\/oscar-klein.jpg\",\"datePublished\":\"2016-07-20T11:00:07+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2024-03-24T14:17:28+00:00\",\"description\":\"Hannes Wader's German-language expansion of \\\"Cocaine Blues,\\\" which I learned in Lichtenstein and somehow still remember.\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.elijahwald.com\\\/songblog\\\/kokain\\\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\\\/\\\/www.elijahwald.com\\\/songblog\\\/kokain\\\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.elijahwald.com\\\/songblog\\\/kokain\\\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/i0.wp.com\\\/www.elijahwald.com\\\/songblog\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/2016\\\/06\\\/oscar-klein.jpg?fit=200%2C200&ssl=1\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\\\/\\\/i0.wp.com\\\/www.elijahwald.com\\\/songblog\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/2016\\\/06\\\/oscar-klein.jpg?fit=200%2C200&ssl=1\",\"width\":200,\"height\":200},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.elijahwald.com\\\/songblog\\\/kokain\\\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.elijahwald.com\\\/songblog\\\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Kokain (Hannes Wader&#8217;s Cocaine Blues)\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.elijahwald.com\\\/songblog\\\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.elijahwald.com\\\/songblog\\\/\",\"name\":\"Old Friends: A Songobiography\",\"description\":\"Revisiting the songs that have made a home in my head\",\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.elijahwald.com\\\/songblog\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/person\\\/20e4f69f2f284ea0ff728a9d1b7720a9\"},\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.elijahwald.com\\\/songblog\\\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":[\"Person\",\"Organization\"],\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.elijahwald.com\\\/songblog\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/person\\\/20e4f69f2f284ea0ff728a9d1b7720a9\",\"name\":\"Elijah Wald\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/i1.wp.com\\\/www.elijahwald.com\\\/songblog\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/2015\\\/12\\\/elijahbut.jpg?fit=70%2C85&ssl=1\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/i1.wp.com\\\/www.elijahwald.com\\\/songblog\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/2015\\\/12\\\/elijahbut.jpg?fit=70%2C85&ssl=1\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\\\/\\\/i1.wp.com\\\/www.elijahwald.com\\\/songblog\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/2015\\\/12\\\/elijahbut.jpg?fit=70%2C85&ssl=1\",\"width\":70,\"height\":85,\"caption\":\"Elijah Wald\"},\"logo\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/i1.wp.com\\\/www.elijahwald.com\\\/songblog\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/2015\\\/12\\\/elijahbut.jpg?fit=70%2C85&ssl=1\"}}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Kokain (Hannes Wader's Cocaine Blues) - Old Friends: A Songobiography","description":"Hannes Wader's German-language expansion of \"Cocaine Blues,\" which I learned in Lichtenstein and somehow still remember.","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/kokain\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Kokain (Hannes Wader's Cocaine Blues) - Old Friends: A Songobiography","og_description":"Hannes Wader's German-language expansion of \"Cocaine Blues,\" which I learned in Lichtenstein and somehow still remember.","og_url":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/kokain\/","og_site_name":"Old Friends: A Songobiography","article_published_time":"2016-07-20T11:00:07+00:00","article_modified_time":"2024-03-24T14:17:28+00:00","og_image":[{"width":275,"height":272,"url":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/Hannes-Wader.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"Elijah Wald","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_image":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/Hannes-Wader.jpg?fit=275%2C272&ssl=1","twitter_creator":"@ElijahWald","twitter_site":"@ElijahWald","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Elijah Wald","Est. reading time":"5 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Article","@id":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/kokain\/#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/kokain\/"},"author":{"name":"Elijah Wald","@id":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/#\/schema\/person\/20e4f69f2f284ea0ff728a9d1b7720a9"},"headline":"Kokain (Hannes Wader&#8217;s Cocaine Blues)","datePublished":"2016-07-20T11:00:07+00:00","dateModified":"2024-03-24T14:17:28+00:00","mainEntityOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/kokain\/"},"wordCount":878,"publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/#\/schema\/person\/20e4f69f2f284ea0ff728a9d1b7720a9"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/kokain\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/oscar-klein.jpg","inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/kokain\/","url":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/kokain\/","name":"Kokain (Hannes Wader's Cocaine Blues) - Old Friends: A Songobiography","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/kokain\/#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/kokain\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/oscar-klein.jpg","datePublished":"2016-07-20T11:00:07+00:00","dateModified":"2024-03-24T14:17:28+00:00","description":"Hannes Wader's German-language expansion of \"Cocaine Blues,\" which I learned in Lichtenstein and somehow still remember.","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/kokain\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/kokain\/"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/kokain\/#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/oscar-klein.jpg?fit=200%2C200&ssl=1","contentUrl":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/oscar-klein.jpg?fit=200%2C200&ssl=1","width":200,"height":200},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/kokain\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Kokain (Hannes Wader&#8217;s Cocaine Blues)"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/","name":"Old Friends: A Songobiography","description":"Revisiting the songs that have made a home in my head","publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/#\/schema\/person\/20e4f69f2f284ea0ff728a9d1b7720a9"},"potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":["Person","Organization"],"@id":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/#\/schema\/person\/20e4f69f2f284ea0ff728a9d1b7720a9","name":"Elijah Wald","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/i1.wp.com\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/12\/elijahbut.jpg?fit=70%2C85&ssl=1","url":"https:\/\/i1.wp.com\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/12\/elijahbut.jpg?fit=70%2C85&ssl=1","contentUrl":"https:\/\/i1.wp.com\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/12\/elijahbut.jpg?fit=70%2C85&ssl=1","width":70,"height":85,"caption":"Elijah Wald"},"logo":{"@id":"https:\/\/i1.wp.com\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/12\/elijahbut.jpg?fit=70%2C85&ssl=1"}}]}},"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":3701,"url":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/ragged-and-dirty\/","url_meta":{"origin":1770,"position":0},"title":"Ragged and Dirty (William Brown\/Sleepy John Estes)","author":"Elijah Wald","date":"May 26, 2018","format":false,"excerpt":"No one knows anything about William Brown, the versatile singer and guitarist who recorded two songs (or maybe three) for Alan Lomax in 1942. All we have is the music, and it is startlingly distinctive, including two masterpieces of acoustic blues -- both inspired by recordings, with guitar parts that\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/04\/Sleepy-John-Estes-and-Yank-Rachell-300x200.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":775,"url":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/thats-no-way\/","url_meta":{"origin":1770,"position":1},"title":"That&#8217;s No Way to Get Along (Robert Wilkins\/Rolling Stones)","author":"Elijah Wald","date":"April 10, 2016","format":false,"excerpt":"A traveling blues from Robert Wilkins, with a modifications due to the limitations of tablature, my memory, the pre-internet world, and the Rolling Stones.","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"country blues guitar book","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/country-blues-guitar-book-225x300.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":3405,"url":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/big-road-blues\/","url_meta":{"origin":1770,"position":2},"title":"Big Road Blues (Tommy Johnson)","author":"Elijah Wald","date":"February 24, 2018","format":false,"excerpt":"Spending the winter of 1987-8 fronting a blues band in Sevilla got my chops up like never before, and also got me back into pre-war blues (or country blues, fingerstyle blues -- the kind of blues that shaped my understanding of the guitar). I'd never stopped playing that music, but\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/12\/Tommy-Johnson.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":3645,"url":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/southern-rag\/","url_meta":{"origin":1770,"position":3},"title":"Blind Blake&#8217;s Southern Rag","author":"Elijah Wald","date":"May 5, 2018","format":false,"excerpt":"Blind Blake was one of the greatest guitarists of the early blues era, distinguished not only by the speed and precision of his playing, but by the fact that he was known for instrumental showpieces. Blues was generally considered a singing style, so even Lonnie Johnson \u2014 the consummate virtuoso\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"Blind Blake\"","block_context":{"text":"Blind Blake","link":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/tag\/blind-blake\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/07\/Blind_Blake.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":5275,"url":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/roll-and-riverside\/","url_meta":{"origin":1770,"position":4},"title":"Roll and Tumble\/Traveling Riverside Blues","author":"Elijah Wald","date":"June 29, 2024","format":"video","excerpt":"I worked out a bunch of Robert Johnson songs and related pieces when I was writing Escaping the Delta, including Hambone Willie Newbern's \"Roll and Tumble,\" which Johnson used as a model for \"If I Had Possession Over Judgement Day\" and \"Traveling Riverside Blues.\" However, the only Johnson songs I\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/06\/Untitled-2.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/06\/Untitled-2.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/06\/Untitled-2.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x"},"classes":[]},{"id":5371,"url":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/james-alley\/","url_meta":{"origin":1770,"position":5},"title":"James Alley Blues (Richard &#8220;Rabbit&#8221; Brown)","author":"Elijah Wald","date":"September 29, 2024","format":false,"excerpt":"I've always loved \"James Alley Blues.\" When I wrote a chapter on the poetry of blues for my short history of blues,\u00a0 I quoted it in full as an example of the kind of piece that, although perhaps assembled from various \"floating\" verses,\u00a0 has \"an internal logic that makes it\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/Jane-or-James-Alley-New-Orleans.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/Jane-or-James-Alley-New-Orleans.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/Jane-or-James-Alley-New-Orleans.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x"},"classes":[]}],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1770","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1770"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1770\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5135,"href":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1770\/revisions\/5135"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1770"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1770"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1770"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}