Sliding Delta
The wail of Johnny Winter sliding up the neck of his guitar is distinctly American and traces back over a hundred years.
At the turn of the century, guitarists loved the way they could make their instruments cry by sweeping a straight razor, a bottleneck, or a piece of pipe along strings, creating tones that hearkened to the blue notes of african scales. They said it sounded like a heart breaking.
Beginning in the 1930s, delta bluesmen like Son House, Charley Patton, and Fred Mcdowell spread the gospel of slide from Mississippi to the Carolinas and beyond.
When guitars went electric, so did slides. The first electric slide masters were Elmore James and Muddy Waters, who in turn inspired a slew of young white players like Mike Bloomfield and Duane Allman.
And now, a new wave of players — Derek Trucks and Sonny Ladreth to name two — have caught the bug and took up the sword - or, rather, the slide - as a way to capture the sound of heart breaking.
