Chet Atkins "Blues For Dr. Joe"

I love this tune. This was when Chet was experimenting with his one man bass. I believe it was a guitar or something similar that he invented that played all the bass notes automatically. I'm not too into technical stuff. I just love Chet's music. Maybe someone who is into the technical side of Chet could correct me or help me out.
Anyway, this Chet tune has a great boogie woogie beat, and it is slow, cool, and sophisticated. In fact, this tune, the way Chet plays it is addicting!

Category:

Music

Tags:

• chet
• atkins
• boogie
• woogie
• guitar
• blues
• classical

[sdsu54]

Chet was an accomplished electrician. He spent alot of his free time tinkering when he wasnt playing his guitar. You can tell that his bass notes arent perfect, theres a few that lack proper timing, but nonetheless, I never will cease to be amazed by the Chet. Bravo!

[daffydoug]

@sdsu54 He also was into ham radio.

[garmasan]

i love blues when its played by a really jazz musician like chet or like django reinhardt was, much better tahn the allways the same i iv v penthatonic tunes that use to play then blus people

[Tech470]

This is the first Chet Atkins song I ever heard, I must have been about 12, and I've been hooked ever since. I'm almost 50 now!

[george383]

@hooplablahblahblah : I like jazz players but they take the blue feeling out of the blues - I mean real blues like Charlie Patton and Robert Johnson, when blues was about getting beat up by the cops just for being out after dark and spend the day wandering the railroad tracks, getting the last drags off a cigarette butt and drinking kerosene cuz they couldn't afford no whiskey. Jazz guitarists gotta live that life before they stick the word "blues" on the end of a song just to make it sell.

[hooplablahblahblah]

@garmasan I must disagree with you. I do love Chet and this song but the rest of your comment is off. This IS played in a i iv v progression using the pentatonic scale. And saying you only like the blues being played by jazz players is like saying you like grape jelly made outta strawberries. They're both great and they do go together but they are too different genres

[jazzpsalti]

@garmasan word! check out martin taylor he's still alive!!!

[CrackerJackLee]

i wonder if chet atkins had a hand in the patent for stomp boxes?

[CrackerJackLee]

amen. we all wail away modally on the blues scale constantly, while they played chordally and with seventh chords.

[keryadams]

Sounds like a harmonizer. There are stomp boxes that have an effect like that... you set it to the key you're in, and it adds a harmonic note to what you play... but while they work well with monophonic lines and simple chords, they get confused the more tones you add. Playing a chord across all six strings will likely cause it to produce a dischord and sound terrible.

[CrackerJackLee]

gotta love the chord play in this one - classic coolness. hey, i remember back in the 70's in a Guitar Player article, Chet Atkins was discussing this "bass box". it seemed that it could tell what chord you were in and it played something accordingly - i guess it was somewhat programmable. he was talking about putting it into production, but there were "bugs", and then i never heard much else afterwards.