© Bluestronomical Publishing Inc. 2006

By Jackie Don Loe

~ My Friend ~

If you have not heard Aaron Burton and Cheryl Arena perform yet, catch one of their shows. This is down home blues with Aaron backing up Cheryl's harmonica playing with his blues fingerstyle technique. He plays an Epiphone Emperor II and a 60's era Gibson acoustic that he inherited from his Dad. He said it was the guitar that he learned his first chords on. Aaron has a lot of old blues songs at his fingertips and evokes the spirits of Robert Johnson, Blind Lemon Jefferson and Charley Patton when he plays his guitar. When I last caught up with him he sang and played the classic barroom blues tune "My Friend" by Jimi Hendrix off the 1970 Cry of Love album. It is in 12/8 time (think of a blues waltz) that has 12 beats per measure and is popular in doo wop and some old blues standards.

12 Bar Blues - "My Friend" in A Major - 12/8 time

A / / / / / D7 / / / / /   |  G / / G# / / A / / / / /   |  A / / / / / D7 / / / / /   |  G / / G# / / A / / / / /  |

C#9 / / / / / C#9 / / / / /   |   F#m / / E / / D / / / / /    |  A / / G / / F# / / / / /    |

Ebdim7 / / Gbdim7 / / Adim7 / / Cdim7 / /   |

A / / G#m / / F#/ / E / /   |  D / / G / / A / / / / /   |   A / / / / / A / / / / /   |  E / / / / / E7 / / / / /   ||

On the record, the song starts with a pool hall ambience throughout, and Aaron keeps this feel on his arrangement. We have a I-IV in bar one, (A to D7) then a chromatic walk up from the G chord to the A chord in bar two which repeats in bars three and four. The C#9 in bar five cries out for resolution and grabs the listener's ear, before setting up a whole step harmonic walk down in bar six from the F#min to the D chord. There is another walk down from the A chord down to the F# major chord in bar seven, then a diminished chord walk up with three beats to the chord, sets up bar eight. In bar nine, we continue three beats to the chord. In bar ten the progression resolves to the A chord and stays there for bar eleven. The twelfth bar uses the V chord (E7) to resolve back to the I chord (A) in bar one. Have fun with this one and as Jimi says at the beginning of the tune, "Y'all pass me that bottle, and I'll sing y'all a real song".

     - Jackie Don Loe -

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