"Lenny" is the tenth and final track on the first Stevie Ray Vaughan album '' Texas Flood''. The song is in 4/4 time and notated in the key of E flat major (but instruments are tuned down a half-step, therefore, the chordal structure is in E). It is played very slowly and freely, with Vaughan alternating between jazz-inflected chords and solo runs. The main chord featured in the song is a movable Major 6th chord in which Vaughan applies moderate

vibrato Vibrato ( Italian, from past participle of " vibrare", to vibrate) is a musical effect consisting of a regular, pulsating change of pitch. It is used to add expression to vocal and instrumental music. Vibrato is typically characterised in terms ...

by use of tremolo bar. The solos incorporate both the E major scale, E minor

Pentatonic scale A pentatonic scale is a musical scale with five notes per octave, in contrast to the heptatonic scale, which has seven notes per octave (such as the major scale and minor scale). Pentatonic scales were developed independently by many an ...

, and E Minor

Blues scale 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 African- ...

. The style is influenced by Jimi Hendrix ballads like "

The Wind Cries Mary "The Wind Cries Mary" is a rock ballad written by Jimi Hendrix. Hendrix wrote the song as a reconciliatory love song for his girlfriend in London, Kathy Mary Etchingham. More recent biographical material indicated that some of the lyrics appeared ...

." The song itself was written and named for his wife at the time, Lenora. Vaughan also named one of his guitars " Lenny," which he used to play this side and also " Riviera Paradise." The track was often played at live shows.

References

Stevie Ray Vaughan songs 1980s instrumentals 1983 songs Songs written by Stevie Ray Vaughan {{blues-song-stub