Curtis Mayfield - RIP/Appreciation
pkny
549 Posts
It totally slipped my mind, but today is the 7th anniversary of the passing of the great Curtis Mayfield. The day is almost over, but it's never too late to big up Curtis.Thanks for the beautiful music, Curtis. RIP.
Comments
Rest in peace and thanks for the legacy you have created, Curtis.
If there's a heaven above, then Curtis went!!!
- spidey
Hendrix explaining Mayfield's style.
- spidey
Out of curiosity, what have you learned from it, technique-wise?
great music from a great man
Without getting all technical his style had a ton of great odd slides, and a rhythm with hammer ons and pull offs approach that is truly the foundation of soul playing. I can still barely use the Open f# tuning effectively, but it's pretty good for doing gospel style 2 finger chords that uses the root note as a drone note.
Probably don't understand what I mean, but Hendrix uses this ALOT. You'd definitely recognize it from his playing.
- spidey
and even after he got psychedelized, the slower songs like "angel" were straight-up curtis
"Ghetto Child" demo
Freddie's Dead instro
awesome radio spot!
It's funny, many think of him as a singer/songwriter first (understandable, no doubt) but kind of overlook his guitar playing. Like in the last "Top 10 guitar players" thread we had here, some posters were questioning his relevance on such a list.
His guitar playing was one of the first things I noticed when I first started listening to his records. Very distinct and emotional IMO.
It seems that many many of the great guitarists use open or straight up unusual tunings. But that is another thread.
Curtis RIP.
The fact that he and JB died within one day of each other is an interesting coincidence...that two of the great judges of talent, and arrangers of the last century would share those dates is interesting.