Saturday, February 20, 2010
Blues for Hawaiians
I'm on vacation-- and learning how not to blog every day. But yesterday we stopped at the Hanalei Community Center and saw/heard Doug McMaster play Hawaiian Slack Key Guitar with his wife accompanying him on ukelele. If you're in Kauai on a Friday or Sunday afternoon, you should plunk down $20 and check it out. This is a beautiful, homespun version of guitar that shares a lot with fingerpicking by people like Mississippi John Hurt and Elizabeth Cotton and the open tunings of people like Muddy Waters. Believe it or not, there's a bit of commonality with our man Chuck Berry, too, with lots of double string picking on the "lead" parts. Anyway, it's beautiful stuff-- and McMaster is well named, since he's certainly mastered it. Check out their website here.
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