By Request: Stevie Ray Vaughan performing Lenny

       June 13, 1983 is the day a brand new blues guitar player was formally introduced to the world.  His name was Stevie Ray Vaughan and that is the official release date of his seminal album Texas Flood.  In the seven years and two months he lived after the debut of the album he became a living legend.  Vaughan died in a helicopter crash on August 27, 1990 and today is the 23rd anniversary of that sad day.
       I have said in earlier posts that the greatest guitar players can be identified by their unique style of play.  It's as if they lay down a distinctive template and then play within it.  That's not to suggest they are limited in ability or imagination, it's that they are the true masters of that particular form.  As soon as you hear them on the radio you can identify Carlos Santana, Jimi Hendrix, & Chuck Berry.  They only need to play a few notes for you to recognize them.  SRV's template was the Texas blues and his inventiveness within that formula was virtually endless.  Don't get me wrong he didn't invent Texas blues he just took it somewhere that it hadn't gone before.
      On New Years eve 1983 SRV concluded a six and half month world tour that saw him and the band Double Trouble play 107 dates.  Concert number 107 was held at a Norfolk, Virginia venue called The Boathouse.  It was a very small and grimy building that held a few hundred people but for some reason it pulled in some of the major acts of it's era.  It had a very small stage that was maybe 30 inches high which meant if you could get to the front of the crowd you could literally touch the artists.

Layton, Vaughan, & Shannon
Double Trouble

      My girlfriend, soon to be wife, and I were at the back of the crowd.   A few minutes after the band appeared she took me by the hand and led me all the way to the stage.  As the crowd filled in around us we found ourselves pressed against the apron.  Soon the excitement level reached a fevered pitch and the crowd surged forward entrapping her.  Bassist Tommy Shannon saw her being crushed and offered her a hand onto the stage to escape.  Then SRV, seeing her distress, stopped the show and both he and Shannon implored the crowd to move back.  Once they did Stevie nodded to my girl then sat down on his amp and played Lenny.  I've always believed they played that song at that moment to try and calm the crowd down a bit to prevent anyone from getting hurt.  Not many people can say they forced a band to re-arrange their set list on the fly, but my girl did.  Before that moment we both thought Lenny was a great song but after that close call it became a much more personal song and we thought about SRV and Double Trouble's music in more personal terms.

Robert Cray, Eric Clapton,
Stevie Ray, & Jimmy Vaughan

      Vaughan wrote the song for his wife Lenora and it became a staple in his stage show for the remainder of his career.  It's kind of a freestyle thing that strolls softly yet pretty forcefully through blues and jazz riffs changing tempo along the way.  Tempo changes in the middle of songs is one of the hallmarks of SRV's music. A great example of this is the song Mary Had A Little Lamb.  At around the 1:18 mark he enters into a fairly straight forward (for him) blues guitar solo.  Soon after the 1:40 mark, while the Double Trouble rhythm section remains on the steady 4/4 twelve bar blues beat, Stevie downshifts and veers away.  Eventually he and the band meet up again in time for the beginning of the third verse.  Stevie Ray's ability to change tempo and change scales without losing his place is a unique gift that I've never really heard from another guitar player.  Usually tempo changes are executed by the whole band and driven by the rhythm section.  SRV could leave the script and rhythm section behind playing whatever he felt while still keeping the song in the pocket, never getting lost and arriving on time at exactly the right place.
      His loss was a tragedy for his loved ones, fellow artists, and fans.  He left us with an album called The Sky Is Crying and the last thing he committed to album was another very personal solo acoustic piece called Life By The Drop.

'God it's good to be here walkin' together my friend...
                           
By request for my good friend Mark EV:

Lenny by the incomparable Stevie Ray Vaughan 
& Double Trouble featuring Tommy Shannon & Chris Layton