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Electric Chicago Blues was developed in the late '40s and early '50s, taking what was essentially Delta blues, amplifying it, and putting it into a small-band context. Taking the basic guitar and harmonica lineup and fortifying it with drums, bass, and piano (sometimes saxophones), the form created what we now know as the standard blues band.
Key features that distinguish Chicago blues from the earlier traditions, such as Delta blues, is the prominent use of electrified instruments, especially the electric guitar, and especially the use of electronic effects such as distortion and overdrive.
- Baby Face Leroy Trio – Rollin’ And Tumblin’ With its polyphonic moaning and humming and its deliriously repetitive riffs, this recording has been described by some critics and scholars as a throwback to the ring shouts enacted by black slaves as rituals of connectedness and celebration.
- Muddy Waters – Hoochie Coochie Man. McKinley Morganfield, also known as Muddy Waters, was inspired to learn guitar as a teenager in Mississippi after seeing Clarksdale Delta blues pioneer Son House play bottleneck slide.
- Howlin’ Wolf – Smokestack Lightnin’ Chester Burnett cut an imposing figure in the Chicago blues clubs of the 50s, being 6ft 3in tall, weighing 275lbs and possessing one of the most extraordinary voices in music – a rasping, ferocious, yet haunting and soulful howl that had earned him the name Howlin’ Wolf.
- Little Walter – Juke. Marion Walter Jacobs, known professionally as Little Walter, revolutionised blues harmonica playing as surely as Jimi Hendrix revolutionised electric guitar.
Electric blues is blues music distinguished by the use of electric amplification for musical instruments. The guitar was the first instrument to be popularly amplified and used by early pioneers T-Bone Walker in the late 1930s and John Lee Hooker and Muddy Waters in the 1940s.
Electric Chicago Blues was developed in the late '40s and early '50s, taking what was essentially Delta blues, amplifying it, and putting it into a small-band context. Taking the basic guitar and harmonica lineup and fortifying it with drums, bass, and piano (sometimes saxophones), the form created what we now know as the standard blues band.
Electric Chicago Blues was developed in the late '40s and early '50s, taking what was essentially Delta blues, amplifying it, and putting it into a small-band context. Taking the basic guitar and harmonica lineup and fortifying it with drums, bass, and piano (sometimes saxophones), the form created what we now know as the standard blues band.
One of the defining characteristics of Chicago blues is the prominent use of electrified instruments, particularly the electric guitar. Pioneers like Muddy Waters and Howlin’ Wolf embraced the electric guitar, amplifying its sound and infusing it with passion and intensity.
