“It’s just a harmonica,” some people might
say. “It doesn’t belong in the venerated ranks of the
strings and winds, nor does it have any business leading a band.
It’s barely even an instrument.”
These people have never heard Charlie Musselwhite.
Musselwhite brings his signature scorching harp to Royce Hall on
Thursday night with other giants of modern blues Robert Cray and
Booker T. Jones.
For Musselwhite, the performance is a chance to get away from
club gigs, play to a younger crowd, and maintain what he sees as an
already-strong interest in the blues among today’s youth.
“(College students) seem to really get into it, because
even if they aren’t already big blues fans, most know it on
some level,” he said. “When I was a youth I liked it
then too, and there’s a lot of people playing really good
blues that are young enough to be my kids.”
Musselwhite grew up going to parties hosted by Elvis Presley in
his hometown of Memphis, Tenn. He began learning his craft there,
and then, like so many blues musicians before him, moved to Chicago
looking for work. It was there he developed his style and built his
reputation as one of the top harmonica players in the country. He
describes his music as “front porch-style blues, down-home
blues.”
This description will ring especially true on Thursday, as
Musselwhite performs with only his guitar player accompanying him.
This format, he said, opens the songs up for more
improvisation.
“It’ll be more stripped down and laid-back,”
he said. “In this case we know the structure of the songs and
just improvise in the middle.”
However this in no way means the show is going to be a
downer.
“People can get up and dance in the aisles,” he
suggested in all seriousness. “You’ll leave this show
feeling good.”
Whether those present take this advice or not, it is important
for Musselwhite to convey the joy that he takes from, and
subsequently brings to, the blues.
“A lot of people who don’t know what the blues is,
they hear the word and they think, “˜Oh I don’t want to
hear that, that’s just sad music,'” Musselwhite
said. “But they don’t know that it’s actually
happy music. It’s feel-good music.”
It is just this power of the blues that has kept Musselwhite
going during his life and kept him passionate about his music.
“Blues can take you through your whole life ““
through good times and bad times ““ with the right
attitude,” he said.