It is a biological fact that as men age, the more girlfriends they acquire. Last week, I had a long conversation with just such a girlfriend where the attraction between the two of us goes back for more than 30 years. If you read Ezra’s Essays closely, you will find that the girlfriend was a woman named Georgia Coney, whom I met as she was checking me out at the King’s grocery store here in Short Hills. Talking to Georgia brought up many fond memories and it also brought memories of two blues songs.
Actually it was only one blues song but it was recorded by two different artists. That led me into an examination of what inspired these two artists. The string does not stop here. It goes on to embrace the history of blues music and then it led to some thoughts about the old timers who wrote and sang the blues such as W.C. Handy, Jelly Roll Morton and Louis Armstrong.
Now to start at the beginning. Georgia Coney is a special person who is, according to my view of things, a mere youngster. To old timers such as myself, anything younger than 70 denotes youngsterhood. But Georgia has always been a special friend. She speaks in the soft tones from Albany, Georgia where she was born. Our relationship was entirely platonic, but if there are unmarried men around Georgia’s age, they are missing a bet by not asking her out for dinner.
For several days, the opening lines of the lyrics of the tune “Georgia” have bedeviled me. Those lines are:
Georgia, Georgia, no peace I find
Just an old sweet song keeps Georgia on my mind.
That’s where this essay had its inception. Or, if I may be excused for my bluntness, the essay had its conception after my discussion with Georgia.
Shortly after that conversation, with the song “Georgia” on my mind, I began to think of two artists who recorded that song as a thoroughly blues number. Those of us who were born on the banks of the Mississippi River have a special resonance for the blues. I view it as a great art form.
Here is an explanation of the blues:
The Blues… it’s 12-bar, bent-note melody is the anthem of a race, bonding itself together with cries of shared self victimization. Bad luck and trouble are always present in the Blues, and always the result of others, pressing upon unfortunate and down trodden poor souls, yearning to be free from life’s’ troubles. Relentless rhythms repeat the chants of sorrow, and the pity of a lost soul many times over. This is the Blues.
While you are pondering the description of exactly what constitutes the blues, it is my duty to tell you that the two artists who recorded “Georgia,” which has had my head humming for several days, are Willie Nelson and Ray Charles.
As it turns out, Ray Charles dropped his last name of Robinson because he did not wish to be confused with the boxer called Sugar Ray Robinson. So it was just Ray Charles. Ray Charles was a masterly musician. He was totally blind from the age of six onwards, yet he learned to play the piano and before his life was done, he had composed a large number of songs and was also an arranger. I believe it is fair to say that Ray Charles was a significant figure in popular music for the last quarter of the 1900s.
Aside from his musical talent, there is one other aspect having to do with Ray Charles’s procreative talent. I always become confused on this subject, but it seems to me that Ray Charles was allegedly married 12 times and produced five children. On the other hand, perhaps he was only married five times but there were 12 children involved. I am a generous fellow and I would give Ray Charles the benefit of the doubt by saying he was married 12 times but those unions produced five children. That has to do with his procreative talents. The fact is that Ray Charles’s recording of the song “Georgia” was done in the blues tempo and was an extraordinary effort. It is included in the enclosed CD.
The second artist who also recorded “Georgia” was a man named Willie Nelson. Willie is still alive and has celebrated his 80th birthday. According to the publicity furnished by the publishers of Willie’s music, Willie Nelson is “a hard drinker and a hard liver.” That makes very little difference because of the excellence of Willie’s recording of “Georgia” as a blues number. (Also on the CD.) Whether Willie Nelson has a wife is not known to me. I do know that for many years Willie Nelson had a bus in which he slept as he was driven from one engagement to another. Annually, Willie Nelson sponsors a rally to support American farmers, which gives him a special place in my memory.
If you take the opportunity to listen to the CD with recordings of “Georgia” by Ray Charles and Willie Nelson, I believe that you will be entirely rewarded.
The string of thoughts did not stop with listening to those two songs. It was my good fortune to grow up on the banks of the Mississippi River in St. Louis. During the 1930s and even after the world war in the 1940s, there were bands and individual performers who played the blues. They played the music of W.C. Handy and Jelly Roll Morton. Those were only two of the composers of blues music. W.C. Handy is best known for his works which include “The Memphis Blues” and “The St. Louis Blues.” You may recall the opening lines from “The St. Louis Blues.” They are:
I hate to see that evenin’ sun go down,
Because that gal of mine has done left this town.
Then the song goes on to identify that gal of his as having a heart “like a rock dropped down in the sea.”
But when I search my memory, it seems to me that no respectable blues music has emerged since perhaps 1955. It could well be that blues music tended to die with the departure of Louis Armstrong. Those of you with long memories will recall that Louis Armstrong was the happiest person performing on the American stage. He was a troubadour for the blues. Certainly, the blues have much to do with unrequited love. But it also has to do with laughter as much as with unrequited love.
To a large measure, blues music is kin to Negro spirituals. They both grew from a sense of deprivation born of starvation and poverty. Of course, the black people who sing the blues and the Negro spirituals are the ones who have suffered the humiliation that this country inflicted upon them for so many years prior to the passage of the Equal Rights Amendment in 1965.
But I fear that at this late date, the music of the blues is not much written anymore and not performed either. I am a devoté of spirituals. And similarly I find the music of the blues entrancing. It is a time that W.C. Handy, Jelly Roll Morton, Ray Charles, and all the others who wrote still wonderful music are gone. But maybe there will be a revival of blues music.
But even as I dictate these lines, the thought of Georgia, one of my old girl friends, goes through my mind. Which is as it should be, because as the song says in the second verse of the lyrics, “Just an old sweet song keeps Georgia on my mind.”
E. E. CARR
February 21, 2011
Essay 535
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Kevin’s commentary: Unfortunately I have no CD for you, but here’s the duo performing Georgia a few years back. Pop also wrote about Willie nelson in this essay entitled “Mitt and Willie” which I would go ahead and deem a winner.
Also I’d like to go on record that Pop uses a version of “checking me out” which is literal and hopefully far removed the colloquial language of today which would imply something else, especially in the context of girlfriends (which is being used in a similarly literal way here as well).