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"Three-Chord Roy"
Jun. 10th, 2010 08:33 amThe monster CD set of Orbisonia (Roy Orbison: The Soul of Rock and Roll) includes a nine-minute track of an extremely young Roy Orbison goofing around and singing bits of this and that at some social gathering. (There were some girls there, talking in the background.) Rehearsal? Pre- or post-performance event? Doesn't much matter.
It's a lot of fun to listen to him hammer on his guitar. No flights of fingering on bass runs or anything, just strum, strum, strummity-strum. I think he may have known five or six chords altogether, plus some of the associated minors and sevenths. He certainly has a preference for songs in the key of A -- using A, E, and D (with his thumb on the 6th string to make the third). There was one in the key of C where he actually used, I think, six chords, adding complexity to the basic three-chord harmony with a C7, an A7 and a D7.
The Lehman book on his music was a disappointment. It was less about Orbison as musician and more about Lehman's theory of the deep meanings -- most of which I firmly believe is horseshit. I'll accept -- endorse, even -- the notion that Orbison pioneered the redefinition of masculinity in rock music by making vulnerability acceptable. But his talk of passivity and masochism is just silly.
EDITED TO ADD: I'd like to run this recently-released report up Lehman's nose:
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/06/100608135114.htm
It's a lot of fun to listen to him hammer on his guitar. No flights of fingering on bass runs or anything, just strum, strum, strummity-strum. I think he may have known five or six chords altogether, plus some of the associated minors and sevenths. He certainly has a preference for songs in the key of A -- using A, E, and D (with his thumb on the 6th string to make the third). There was one in the key of C where he actually used, I think, six chords, adding complexity to the basic three-chord harmony with a C7, an A7 and a D7.
The Lehman book on his music was a disappointment. It was less about Orbison as musician and more about Lehman's theory of the deep meanings -- most of which I firmly believe is horseshit. I'll accept -- endorse, even -- the notion that Orbison pioneered the redefinition of masculinity in rock music by making vulnerability acceptable. But his talk of passivity and masochism is just silly.
EDITED TO ADD: I'd like to run this recently-released report up Lehman's nose:
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/06/100608135114.htm
