The first thing I noticed when I greeted James “Blood” Ulmer at the UMass Hotel was how much healthier he looked than when he was last on campus. Since 2006, when he brought his long-running Odyssey band (Charles Burnham, violin, Warren Benbow, drums) to the Magic Triangle Series, Blood had lost about 30 lbs, was moving much better. He reported feeling much better, too. “Forty years of smoke has taken its toll”, he told me, but a vegetarian diet and a calmer lifestyle has put more bounce in his step and seemed to put him in a happy frame of mind.
Priscilla and I hosted a small dinner party in Blood’s honor the evening before his concert. The guests: storytellers, musicians, professors, students, were (with a few exceptions) not necessarily fans of his music or even fans of the music. But stimulating little conversations put Blood at ease, and he told me the “creation story” of his distinctive guitar sound.
Blood was a devotee of guitarist Wes Montgomery. One night (mid-1960s) while playing a club in Indianapolis with organist Hank Marr, in walked the great Montgomery. Montgomery stayed for all three sets, but despite ample opportunity, left without saying a word to him. Crestfallen, then angry, Blood went back to his hotel and decided, then and there, that he was no longer a follower. That night he de-tuned his guitar and started to create something of his own.
The day of the concert is pretty relaxed: lunch (salad and kale) at the student-run restaurant, Earthfoods, an afternoon interview on WMUA-91.1FM with Katie Wright on “Thursday’s Rhythm & Blues Revue”, and a nap.
The concert itself is an authentic blues experience. Deep, slurred, hard-to-decipher lyrics sung over an amazing display of guitar technique. Simultaneously playing drones, bass lines, swinging rhythms and well-articulated, single note melodies, Blood kept the full house at Bezanson Recital Hall in rapt attention. Wearing a loose fitting, non-Western jumpsuit and snakeskin boots, Blood cut an impressive figure. With his idiosyncratic tuning and approach, he reminded me of one of the early, rule-bending blues pioneers.
Glenn Siegel
Director Solo & Duos Jazz Series