Hi all,

Lemon Jefferson's recording of "Rabbit's Foot Blues" was epoch-making in terms of its effect on the language of blues guitar. If we look just at his up-the neck accompaniment to his verse two (and several subsequent verses), we can find two licks that were widely borrowed and used by other players.



The first lick is Lemon's rocking motion between his I chord and IV7 chords. At this point he is playing his A chord out of a D shape on the first three strings at 9-10-9 (third string to first string). When he goes to his IV7 chord in the second bar, he pivots on the common tone A note on the second string and fingers the IV7 chord on the first three strings: 11-10-8. This move really caught musicians' ears, and was subsequently utilized by the following players, among others, who in many instances, transposed the move to other keys:

* Walter Vinson used it in dropped D for "Stop And Listen Blues"

* Bo Carter used it in his G tuning, DGDGBE, for "I Want You To Know", "I Get The Blues", "Arrangement For Me Blues" and a host of other songs.



The second move of Lemon's in his verse two accompaniment to "Rabbit's Foot Blues" that was picked up by a lot of players immediately follows the rock from I to IV7. In this move, the I chord rocks back and forth between a I triad and a I6 chord, utilizing these two shapes, respectively: I chord: 9-10-9 I6 chord: 11-10-9. This move was utilized in the following later recordings:

* Tommy Johnson used it in D for "Canned Heat Blues". Tommy added a move from the flat III to the III on the fourth string that Lemon had not used in "Rabbit's Foot Blues", so he expanded on Lemon's idea.

* Bo Carter used the riff intact for the signature lick to "Bo Carter's Advice", which he played in A, and for the intro and solo to "Shake 'Em On Down", which he played in his G tuning.



One of the interesting things about the way that these other players worked with Lemon's musical materials was that in every instance, the player expressed the idea in accordance with his own sense of time and phrasing, rather than trying to copy Lemon's timing. Perhaps there are two reasons for this--Lemon's timing being so individualistic that it was unduplicable with any comparable degree of fluidity, and a sense that expressing the lick in one's own sense of timing made it one's own.



All best,

Johnm



