Americana students challenged

Staying with the basics is a recipe for success in most endeavors. For today's aspiring singer-songwriter, it is especially important.

Former folk singer and noted Underdog American Music aficionado Walker T. Ryan dropped by the high school's Americana Project class earlier this month to share his thoughts and insights with students. Ryan was in town to perform as a headliner at the "Seeds for Song" benefit concert on May 18.

Ryan encouraged students to go back to the roots of American music. Throwing out names like Muddy Waters and Lightnin' Hopkins, that were less than familiar to many of the students, Ryan said: "They were a huge influence on me," immediately strumming out several bars of a familiar Hopkins tune.

"There were two roads essentially that people got into the blues in the '60s," Ryan said. One side was the acoustic side through artists like Sonny Terry, Leadbelly and Reverend Gary Davis. The other was the electric scene with individuals like Eric Clapton and Muddy Waters.

Explaining the difference between acoustic and electric, Ryan said: "I finally figured out that the defining thing is how long it takes the note to decay." An acoustic note merely goes away. An electric note goes away and comes back and goes away and comes back. Awareness of this difference is important to a singer-songwriter.

Ryan reflected on an old man who called chords holds. "I realized that when I play a chord, there's a piece of paper floating somewhere in my brain." The old man had not learned by following a piece of paper but by someone telling him to put his fingers "here" and do "this."

"You don't need to know what it is," to play it, he said. "That's what I love about the guitar."

Reinforcing the importance of building on the basics, Ryan threw out the name Odetta. She was "one of the huge influences," he said.

"If you haven't ever heard her, check her out. She's got one of the voices of the ages."

Ryan mentioned how difficult it is for today's students to gain a base in music simply as a result of the sheer number of songs that are out there.

"We live in an era of guitar monsters, and the Web doesn't help because you can go and find them all," he said. "When I was doing it, there were about six other guys and we all knew the same 25 songs and we sang them over and over again," Ryan reflected, as he broke into a rousing rendition of "This Land Is Your Land."

Americana Project executive director Brad Tisdel agrees with Ryan that it is important for students to learn the basic keys before exploring all of their nuances.

"People have made millions and had careers on very simple songs and singing and writing," said Tisdel.

Perhaps the most important tip of the day was Ryan's charge "Don't listen to your contemporaries. Go back to the old ones.

"To me, the blues, jazz or interchanges of that are the greatest thing America gave the world. It's astonishing music," Ryan said.