The Guess Who

I was born in 1981 and at that time, my parents were 25 and 26. I grew up listening to my parent’s music which happened to be 70’s rock. Canadian bands like Trooper, April Wine and Bachman-Turner Overdrive were played on continuum in my home. The only Canadian artist that was NOT allowed in our home was Anne Murray. Anne was never invited to any parties as per the matriarch of our family, my Grandma. Apparently, she believed that Anne stole her songs from a 14 year old girl and she was ostracized from our family, never to be invited to a family gathering. You could not even speak her name in my Grandma’s presence as she would not be ashamed to speak her opinion on the matter!

The Guess Who is a successful band from Canada that had its most popular era in the 1970s. I put together a timeline of some of their career highlights so that you can visualize their career progression. What I find most interesting about their career progression is that their major success in Canada and the United States come mainly after the Canadian Radio-Television Commission (CRC) was established. The CRC (the name was later changed in 1976 to Canadian Radio-Television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC))[i] were the enforcers of the Broadcasting Act of Canada which mandated that a certain amount of Canadian created content must be played on media outlets.

I find the music of The Guess Who to be interesting, varied and catchy. I like how each of their songs has individuality changing styles throughout their career. For example, “American Woman” has a blues/rock/funk feel to it, “Shakin’ All Over” sounds like surf music and “These Eyes” has more instrumentation and sounds like a ballad. I must not be the only person who values their contribution to the Canadian music scene because they were inducted into the Canada Music Hall of Fame in 1987 and the Canada Walk of Fame in 2001.[ii]

TIMELINE [iii] [iv]    

Late 1950s: The Silvertones was created with Chad Allen (Allan Kobel) and Jim Kale

1962: Randy Bachman, Bob Ashley and Garry Peterson joins the group

1962: the band name was changed to Chad Allen and the Reflections

1965: the name of the band was changed to Chad Allen and the Expressions

1965: recorded a cover of Johnny Kidd and the Pirates song, “Shakin’ All Over”. The song was sent to radio stations under the name The Guess Who? to try and garner interest from the disc jockeys

1965: “Shakin’ All Over” reaches number one in Canada

1966: Burton Cumings (1947) joins the group and replaces Bob Ashley

1966: Chad Allen left the band

1966: The band released the LP It’s Time

1966-1968: many singles released that reached the top 40s in Canada

1968: the band ends a two year run as the house band for a television show called “Let’s Go”

1968: released A Wild Pair album and was spotlighted as a promo item for Coca-Cola

1968: the question mark is dropped from the band name. They are now officially known as The Guess Who

1968: Canadian Radio-Television Commission (CRC) was established[v]

1968: Jack Richardson (producer) acquires their contract from Quality Records

1969: album released called The Wheatfield Soul (“These Eyes” made top 10 in Canada and the US)

1969: album released called Canned Wheat

1970: album released called American Woman. The song “American Women” from this album became the first song from a Canadian group to reach number one in the US. It stayed at the top spot on Billboard for three weeks. This was the only album by The Guess Who to reach Top 10 on Billboard pop album chart

1970: Randy Bachman leaves the group, Kurt Winter and Greg Leskiw joins the bands.

1970-1971: two albums were releases (Share the Land and So Long, Bannatyne)

1974: album Road Food released. The song “Clap for the Wolfman” enjoyed the longest run for The Guess Who on the Billboard Hot 100 for 19 weeks

1975: album Flavours was released

1975: Burton Cummings leaves the group

1976: album The Way They Were was released

1976: Kale officially registers the band name as The Guess Who

1978-1981: three more albums were released (Guess Who’s Back, All This For a Song, Now and Then)

 

The single that started it all was “Shakin’ All Over”. This song has a strong steel guitar sound and a surf song style. It employs stop-time measures and a repeated refrain “shakin’ all over” as well as a guitar solo. Bass, guitar and drums are the only instruments used on this song.

I have vivid memories of listening to songs by The Guess Who when growing up. I can remember where I was, what I was doing and what the weather was like when I hear them played again. For instance, I remember painting my parents back yard deck when I was 16. I was out in the garage looking though my Dad’s cassettes and I stumbled upon The Guess Who. It was hot outside without a cloud in the sky and I really did not want to stain the deck. I remember falling in love with the song “These Eyes”. The song caught my attention with the quiet instrumental at the beginning on the song, only the bass and the piano playing. The hook of the title “these eyes…” captured my imagination and drew me into the lyrics. The song is a ballad of heartache told from the man’s perspective after having his heartbroken. The instrumentation includes a string and horn section with the drums changing the rhythm. The rhythm increases and decreases throughout the son. It increases to reflect the pain and the anger of the singer and slows to reflect the singers desire to have his lover back.

I hope that you can learn to enjoy this classic Canadian band as much I do! You can leave a comment below to thank me for getting this hook stuck in your head!

Endnotes

[i] “About Us, The CRTC’s Origins”, crtc.gov.ca, accessed August 8, 2018. https://crtc.gc.ca/eng/acrtc/50.htm

[ii] “The Guess Who”, Canadianmusichalloffame.ca, accessed August 8, 2018. http://canadianmusichalloffame.ca/inductee/the-guess-who/

[iii] “The Guess Who,” Brittanica.com, accessed August 8, 2018. https://www.britannica.com/topic/the-Guess-Who

[iv] “The Guess Who”, thecanadianencyclopedia.ca, accessed August 8, 2018. https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/guess-who-the/

[v] “About Us, The CRTC’s Origins”, crtc.gov.ca, accessed August 8, 2018. https://crtc.gc.ca/eng/acrtc/50.htm

References

2016. “About Us, The CRTCs Origins.” Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission. July 3. Accessed August 8, 2018. https://crtc.gc.ca/eng/acrtc/50.htm.

n.d. “Canadian Music Hall of Fame.” The Guess Who. Accessed August 8, 2018. http://canadianmusichalloffame.ca/inductee/the-guess-who/.

2017. “The Guess Who.” Historica Canada. 02 14. Accessed August 8, 2018. https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/guess-who-the/.
2018. “The Guess Who, Canadian Rock Group.” Encyclopedia Brittanica. September 05. Accessed August 8, 2018. https://www.britannica.com/topic/the-Guess-Who.

 

I wanted to ease into blogging by picking an easy topic that I could get my feet wet as they say. I chose to do a biography on Ma Rainey who is often called “The Mother of Blues”[i]. I thought, I am a mother and maybe we have somethings in common that I could blog about and win lots of creative points. Well, I hate to disappoint but I did not come up with many comparisons between our lives! I will include a few points where our lives differ for your reading enjoyment.

 

Ma Rainey was not her real name, her birth name was Gertrude Pridgett and she was born in 1886 in Columbus, Georgia. Gertrude started working at the ripe old age of 14 participating in a show called The Bunch of Blackberries at the Springer Opera House[ii]. She met a man and married him a few years later in 1904. The man that she married was William “Pa” Rainey and this is how she came to be known as Ma Rainey. She was only 18 year old when she started performing as the Ma to his Pa. Ma and Pa toured together for years while performing blues, country style.

*My name is Jennifer and I have always been known as Jennifer or a derivative of that name. I was married at 23 and Ma was married at 20. I also work with my husband in the same building similar to how she toured with her husband. Ma started working at the age of 14 and I started working at 15 years old. Unlike her job as a performer, my first job was at McDonalds.

Although Ma was very young when her career started, she soon came to be thought of as an authentic blues singer. She seemed to be able to portray true feeling and perhaps empathy to the situations and everyday issues that black people faced at that time and still face today. Her delivery of song lyrics with serious subject matter (incarceration, adultery, abuse etc.) was delivered with humor at times which is a style that was often employed in the slave era[iii]. This would have made her a very entertaining performer that would draw crowds as they could understand her lyrics as their own stories.

Ma Rainey was the first black woman to be recorded while singing the blues and she had a lot of challenges to overcome in her career. She was a black woman running her own career in the first two decades of the twentieth century and this was before women had the right to vote! Sources say that Ma was a true professional in how she ran her travelling troupe which was rare of a blues singer at the time. While photos of Ma Rainey are flattering, she is NOT reported to be a great beauty but she captured her audience with her performance and personal style[iv]. I am sure the spectacle to seeing Ma perform while being swathed in flashy fabrics, iced in diamonds and flashing gold when she smiled didn’t hurt her stage cred either!

*The most expensive piece of jewellery that I own is my engagement ring that cost my husband $900 in 2003! My family and I were once hired to be in a photoshoot for Co-Op Agro but it was because we were a regular family and could represent their customers well.

I would say that Ma Rainey was important to blues history for:

1) Her extensive touring and almost 100 recordings helped to distribute blues around the country[v]

2) For not being afraid to sing about taboo subjects at that time. Subjects like lesbianism, spousal abuse, incarceration, and blatant sexuality; all of which would have been frowned upon by the general public (aka. the majority of the White population). She essentially loaned her voice to be a voice for her people.

One of the unique tidbits that I discovered was that Ma Rainey could draw both black and white a customers to her shows. At times, the white crowd would fill up the allocated seating but sat in the seating reserved for the black customers so that they could take in the show[vi]. This peaceful integration was a testimony of her gift for singing the country blues and her remarkable showmanship. No one could stay away!

*I cannot sing and I do not have the kind of stage presence that Ma had. Well, that’s not entirely true. I have been known to draw the eye of fellow commuters as I belt out a song in my car

Ma Rainey has many recorded songs to choose from (92 to be exact[vii]) but I only choose three songs for your listening pleasure and to showcase her vocal talents.

“See See Rider”

This song by Ma Rainey has a typical blues feel as she sings it. Her vocals start off high and ends low. It was actually her first recorded song from 1925. My favorite thing about this song is the opening line that Ma Rainey sings “I’m so happy…” but her voice is so low that it does not sound happy at all!

“Trust No Man”

I appreciate how this song has a conversational deliverance. It feels like I am in the room watching Ma Rainey sing it to me, eye to eye. I can see how her audience enjoyed her performance.

“Black Eyed Blues”

This song has a typical county blues feel. The banjo (or electric guitar played to sound like a banjo) leads the song and this lends itself to a true country blues feel.

I hope that you enjoyed learning about the Ma Rainey as much as I did. As I said in my intro I thought that Ma and I might have a few things in common but it turns out that our lives are wildly different (go figure!) Are you and Ma Rainey more alike than her and I? I would love to read your comments below!

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Endnotes

[i] (“Ma Rainey”, Biography.com 2017)

[ii] (Jones 1974), page 28.

[iii] (Davis 1998), page 105.

[iv] (Jones 1974), page 25.

[v] (“Ma Rainey”, Brittanica.com 2018)

[vi] (“Ma Rainey: The Life and Music of “The Mother of the Blues”, jasobrecht.com 2010)

[vii] (“Ma Rainey”, Brittanica.com 2018)

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Bibliography

2017. “Ma Rainey”, Biography.com. April 27. Accessed July 18, 2018. https://www.biography.com/people/ma-rainey-9542413.
2018. “Ma Rainey”, Brittanica.com. April 19. Accessed July 18, 2018. https://www.britannica.com/biography/Ma-Rainey.

2010. “Ma Rainey: The Life and Music of “The Mother of the Blues”, jasobrecht.com. August 7. Accessed July 18, 2018. http://jasobrecht.com/ma-rainey-the-mother-of-the-blues/.

Davis, Angela, Y. 1998. Blues legacies and Black feminism. New York, NY: Pantheon Books.

Jones, Hettie. 1974. Big star fallin’ mama: five women in Black music. New York, NY: The MacMillan Company of Canada Limited.

 

Hello! My name is Jennifer Rysavy and I would like to welcome you to my blog for Music 111. I enjoy the rhythm and energy of Latin music so I decided that watching a documentary and reporting on it would be an enjoyable blog post for myself to write and for you to read!

The text book required for Music 111 is Popular Music in America: The Beat Goes On and it covers Latin music in America in middle of the twentieth century. However, it does so briefly with coverage over a page and a half of the text. This was a vibrant time in American history where Latin music was a gem in the crown of New York so it should be remembered by more than a few paragraphs.

[i]

In the documentary “Latin Music USA”, 1940’s Latin music is discussed in the episode entitled Bridges. The episode is called Bridges because the type of music discussed was essentially two musical worlds (jazz and Afro Cuban rhythms) being bridged together.

Mario Bauza (interviewed in the documentary) and his brother in law Francisco Raúl Gutiérrez Grillo (aka Machito) are cited as the creators of fusing Cuban rhythms and big band music in the 1940s.[ii] This style of music is called Latin Jazz or Afro Cuban jazz.[iii] This fusion was achieved with the help of their band, Machito and his Afro Cubans. The documentary states that even the name of the band was ground breaking just like their sound. It was ground breaking because no one was referring to Africa with this musical revolution. I found this interesting that Mario Bauzo and Machito were so forward in their culture that they shook up the scene with their direct band name that unashamedly causes a listener to identify their heritage.

While Mario Bauzo and Machito were creating new rhythm fusions, Dizzy Gillespie was falling in love with their sound. By all reports, Dizzy was an amazing jazz trumpeter that also was a leader in the Be Bop style. With his interest in the Afro Cuban rhythms, he became a champion for the sound. He brought along composer and percussionist Chano Pozo for the ride.[iv] They produced the song “Manteca” that showcases the fusion between Afro Cuban rhythms and jazz. I like the blaring horn riffs, the energetic rhythms and the conga drums that can be heard. It is a toe-tapping and exhilarating piece of music that makes me want to shimmy onto the dance floor.

Dizzy Gillespie & Chano Pozo – Manteca

In the mid-twentieth century, the new Latin Cuban rhythms could be found in New York, East Harlem. This was an area of New York that was often called “Spanish Harlem” as many of the Puerto Rican immigrants made this their home base. If Spanish Harlem was the where the Latin-Cuban rhythms could be heard, the Palladium Ballroom was where those rhythms could be showcased.

The Palladium Ballroom was a dance studio where the only rule to enter was that you had to be able to dance. There was a special group of people that you would encounter at the Palladium, the mambonicks. A mambonick is a person who likes to dance, especially the mambo. The Palladium did not differentiate by race or social class, just by dance ability. This was truly unique because it was a time in history where racial integration was frowned upon (to put it lightly). If you were at the Palladium, you would have undoubtedly seen every race and culture showcasing unique dance steps.

Over time as Latin music became more popular it was mainstreamed for the masses. This happened through:

• The television show “I Love Lucy”. This was a new ground breaking tv show that featured a white woman and a Cuban man living in matrimonial harmony.[v]
• The Cha-Cha-Cha dance was created and popularized Latin jazz music instead of the mambo because it was easier to dance. The documentary recorded people saying that this dance was the “idiots dance” because it was so easy to learn, thus the mass appeal.

The popularity of Afro Cuban music was short lived. The growing boom of Latin music was stopped in it tracks due to a major political reason and one unstoppable musical reason. The political reason that Latin music’s popularity was halted was that Cuba was taken over by Fidel Castro. The source of the music was no longer allowed entry into America. The unstoppable musical reason for the reduction in the boom of Latin music was because a band seemed to take over the whole world, The Beatles. When The Beatles took the stage, no artist or band could compete. The Beatles were drawing huge numbers at all of their performances and their massive appeal drew the mainstream ears to their songs and away from other types of music.

The impact of this musical style can be found in many popular songs throughout the decades. A Latin influence can often be heard in the Cha-Cha-Cha rhythm, conga drums (or conga drum style) and the fact that some of these songs are actually covers of Latin music songs.

Some songs that you may have heard and may not have realised had a Latin influence are:

• “Day Tripper” – The Beatles
• “Save the Last Dance for Me” – The Drifters
• “Good Lovin’” – The Rascals
• “Louie, Louie”- The Kingsmen

I would recommend this documentary to anyone wanting more information on the rise of Latin jazz in the 1940s. It was entertaining to watch and gave me a greater appreciation for the creators of this movement. Leave a comment after you watch the documentary because I would love to read your thoughts!

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[i] “Latin Music USA”, PBS.org. Accessed July 18, 2018. https://bento.cdn.pbs.org/hostedbento-prod/filer_public/latinmusicusa/lmusa_logo.png

[ii] “Latin Music USA”, directed by Daniel McCabe (2009; WGBH Educational Foundation and BBC), DVD.

[iii] “Latin Jazz,” Brittanica.com, accessed July17, 2018. https://www.britannica.com/art/Latin-jazz#ref1088975

[iv] Ibid.

[v] “Why Lucille Ball Was More Revolutionary Than You Think,” Huffingtonpost.ca. Accessed July 17, 2018. https://www.huffingtonpost.ca/entry/lucille-ball-revolutionary_n_7138476

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Bibliography

Campbell, Michael. Popular Music in America: The Beat Goes On. 4^th ed. Boston: Schrimer/Cengage Learning, 2013.

“Latin Jazz.” Brittanica.com Accessed July17, 2018. https://www.britannica.com/art/Latin-jazz#ref1088975

Latin Music USA, “Bridges,” directed by Daniel McCabe. 2009; WGBH Educational Foundation and BBC, DVD.

“Why Lucille Ball Was More Revolutionary Than You Think”. Huffingtonpost.ca December 6, 2017. Accessed July 17, 2018. https://www.huffingtonpost.ca/entry/lucille-ball-revolutionary_n_7138476