The Bentonia school, a style of

guitar The guitar is a fretted musical instrument that typically has six strings. It is usually held flat against the player's body and played by strumming or plucking the strings with the dominant hand, while simultaneously pressing selected stri ...

-playing sometimes attributed to

blues Blues is a music genre and musical form which originated in the Deep South of the United States around the 1860s. Blues incorporated spirituals, work songs, field hollers, shouts, chants, and rhymed simple narrative ballads from the Afr ...

players from Bentonia,

Mississippi Mississippi () is a state in the Southeastern region of the United States, bordered to the north by Tennessee; to the east by Alabama; to the south by the Gulf of Mexico; to the southwest by Louisiana; and to the northwest by Arkansas. Miss ...

, features a shared repertoire of songs,

guitar tunings Guitar tunings are the assignment of pitches to the open strings of guitars, including acoustic guitars, electric guitars, and classical guitars. Tunings are described by the particular pitches that are made by notes in Western music. By ...

and chord-voicings with a distinctively

minor Minor may refer to: * Minor (law), a person under the age of certain legal activities. ** A person who has not reached the age of majority * Academic minor, a secondary field of study in undergraduate education Music theory *Minor chord ** Barb ...

tonality Tonality is the arrangement of pitches and/or chords of a musical work in a hierarchy of perceived relations, stabilities, attractions and directionality. In this hierarchy, the single pitch or triadic chord with the greatest stability is call ...

not found in other styles of blues music. While not all blues musicians from Bentonia played in this style, one particular blues player,

Skip James Nehemiah Curtis "Skip" James (June 9, 1902October 3, 1969) was an American Delta blues singer, guitarist, pianist and songwriter. AllMusic stated: "This emotional, lyrical performer was a talented blues guitarist and arranger with an impressive ...

(1902–1969), had a distinct, complicated, and highly sophisticated style that veered from typical blues guitar playing. His style became known as Bentonia School. James became the most well-known of the small pool of musicians associated with the Bentonia School. Others include Jack Owens, Jimmy "Duck" Holmes, and the un-recorded Henry Stuckey.The Blues Encyclopedia, eds Edward Komara, Peter Lee, Taylor and Francis Group (2006), p.696 Both James' and Owens' styles featured haunting minor chords and droning strings which, in comparison to the music of many other blues musicians, ring with an ominous and eerie feel. The Bentonia school of guitar playing has strong associations with a guitar-tuning based on an open E minor chord. From the lowest (6th) string to the highest (1st), the tuning uses E-B-E-G-B-E. (A common variant pitches the same intervals a whole step lower, in D minor: D-A-D-F-A-D.) Although other blues musicians in a range of styles used this tuning ( Booker "Bukka" White,

Albert Collins Albert Gene Drewery, known as Albert Collins and the Ice Man (October 1, 1932 – November 24, 1993),Skeely, Richard. "Albert Collins: Biography" Allmusic.com. was an American electric blues guitarist and singer with a distinctive guitar style. ...

Arthur "Big Boy" Crudup Arthur William "Big Boy" Crudup (August 24, 1905 – March 28, 1974) was an American Delta blues singer, songwriter and guitarist. He is best known, outside blues circles, for his songs "That's All Right" (1946), " My Baby Left Me" and "So Gl ...

Henry Townsend Henry Townsend may refer to: *Henry Townsend (Norwich) (1626–1695), early American colonist born in Norwich, Norfolk, England *Henry Townsend (Oyster Bay) (1649–1703), American colonist born in Oyster Bay *Henry Townsend (missionary) (1815–18 ...

and others), the Bentonia musicians used it to great effect, achieving a distinctive tonality unique to the region.

References

External links

bentoniablues.com – Mission Statement: “''Anything Bentonia Blues''.” To foster communication among those who love and appreciate the Bentonia School of Delta Blues.

Video: Jimmy Duck Holmes keeping the Bentonia Blues alive

Discovery Channel “I Am The Blues”. A musical journey through the Louisiana Bayou, the juke joints of Mississippi Delta and Beltonia, Mississippi Hill country. A tour of the Chitlin’ Circuit with Bobby Rush and other blues legends.

Films

*''Deep Blues'' (1991). Directed by

Robert Mugge Robert Mugge (born May 8, 1950) is an American documentary film maker. He has focused primarily on films about music and musicians, but some of his earliest films were not music focused and he is now continuing to branch out as his interests and ...

. Guitar performance techniques Blues {{Music-theory-stub