Washtub bass
The washtub bass, or gutbucket, is a stringed instrument used in
The washtub bass was used in
Variations on the basic design are found around the world, particularly in the choice of resonator. As a result, there are many different names for the instrument including the "gas-tank bass", "barrel bass", "
The hallmarks of the traditional design are simplicity, very low cost and
History
The washtub bass is sometimes used in a jug band, often accompanied by a washboard as a percussion instrument. Jug bands, first known as "spasm bands", were popular especially among African-Americans around 1900 in New Orleans and reached a height of popularity between 1925 and 1935 in Memphis and Louisville.
At about the same time, European-Americans of Appalachia were using the instrument in "old-timey" folk music. A musical style known as "gut-bucket blues" came out of the jug band scene, and was cited by Sam Phillips of Sun Records as the type of music he was seeking when he first recorded Elvis Presley.
According to
In English
, featured a tea-chest bass, as did many young bands around 1956.A folk music revival in the U.S. in the early 1960s re-ignited interest in the washtub bass and jug band music. Bands included Mother McCree's Uptown Jug Champions, which later became The Grateful Dead, and the Jim Kweskin Jug Band, which featured Fritz Richmond on bass.
Tea chest bass
A tea chest bass is a variation of the washtub bass that uses a
In Europe, particularly Britain and Germany, the instrument is associated with skiffle bands.[citation needed]
In Australia it was traditionally used to provide deep sounds for "
Other variations
Other variations on the basic design are found around the world, particularly in the choice of resonator, for example:
- "gas-tank bass"
- "barrel bass"
- "box bass" (Trinidad)
- "bush bass" (Australia)
- "babatoni" (South Africa)
- "dumdum" (Zimbabwe)
- "dan bau" (Vietnam)
- "sanduku" (Zanzibar)
- "tanbou marengwen, in English, mosquito drum" (Haiti)
- "tingotalango" (Cuba)
- "tulòn" (Italy)
Notable players
- Will Shade, vocalist and multi-instrumentalist member of the Memphis Jug Band who recorded from the 1920s until his death in 1966.
- Kansas Joe McCoy, washtub bass player and multi-instrumentalist, recorded with Arthur Crudup in 1941.
- Fritz Richmond (1939–2005)[3] has performed on numerous recordings from America and Japan. One of his washtub basses is in the collection of the Smithsonian Institution.
- Donald Kachamba and Moya Aliya, one-string box players with the influential Malawi group Kachamba Brothers Band. Can be heard on "Donald Kachamba's Kwela Band",[4] and "Malawi / Concert Kwela".[5]
- Brian Ritchie, of the band The Violent Femmes, plays a 'tubless electric washtub bass'.[6]
- Les Claypool, of Primus, often plays a variation called a whamola, as can be heard on the opening theme of the tenth season of South Park.
- Bill Smith, Len Garry,Quarrymen.
- John Sanford, a.k.a. Redd Foxx, got his start in show business as washtub bass player for the "Bon Bons".[9] In the Sanford and Son episode "Sanford and Gong" (aired December 17, 1976), Sanford and Don "Bubba" Bexley audition for The Gong Show with Bubba on washtub bass.
- Emmett Otter's Jug Band Christmas, puts a hole in his mother's washtub in order to make a washtub bass. He later performs with it in a talent show.
- Mother McCree's Uptown Jug Champions– a forerunner band to Grateful Dead.
- Stu Cook, the bassist of Creedence Clearwater Revival, played washtub bass on the track "Poorboy Shuffle" from the album Willy and the Poor Boys.[10] He faked playing the instrument to a recording of "Down on the Corner" on the ABC-TV variety show Music Scene, December 1, 1969.[11]
- Lionel Kilberg (1930–2008), promoter and player of the 'Brownie Bass' with 'The Shanty Boys' during the folk music revival of the 1950s and 1960s in New York, and producer/lyricist/player of the 1973 album We Walked by the Water[12] featuring Kate Wolf.
- That 1 Guy plays a variation of the washtub bass called the 'Magic Pipe' and a few other self-built instruments.[13]
- Geoff Bell played the washtub bass for folk punk group Days N' Daze.[14]
- TC Lin plays a Taiwanese washtub bass on two Grammy nominated (non-musical category "Best Packaging") albums with The Muddy Basin Ramblers.[15]
References
- ^ Smith, Willie the Lion (1964). Music on My Mind: The Memoirs of an American Pianist, Foreword by Duke Ellington. New York City: Doubleday & Company Inc. p. 11.
- ^ "June Mills" (Video (2 mins) + text). Larrakia Nation. Retrieved 29 April 2022.
- ^ "Fritz Richmond, 66, a Master of the Jug and Washtub Bass, Is Dead", AP/New York Times, November 24, 2005
- ^ No label, recorded live in Austria at Jazz-Pub Wiesen and at Montage-Recording, August 1978
- ^ Le Chant Du Monde – LDX 274 972, France, 1994
- ^ Bass Player Magazine, May 2006
- ^ "Before they were Beatles, they were Quarrymen", Gillian G. Gaar, Goldmine Magazine, November 28, 2012
- ^ "Lonnie Donegan and the Birth of British Rock and Roll", Patrick Humphries, Biteback Publishing, 2012
- ^ Byarlay, Ryan (10 May 2009). "Redd Foxx (1922–1991)". Blackpast.org. Retrieved 4 September 2020.
- ^ Ed Ward. "40th anniversary re-issue liner notes. Willy and the Poor Boys" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 2012-03-14. Retrieved 4 September 2020.
- ^ "Neil Diamond, Mama Cass Elliot, Creedence Clearwater Revival, Sergio Mendes & Brasil '66, Smokey Robinson & The Miracles". IMDb.com. 1 December 1969. Retrieved 4 September 2020.
- ^ Shoostryng Records, re-issued 1995 by Gadfly Records as Breezes
- ^ https://www.westword.com/music/that-1-guy-5095641
- ^ https://rochesterbeacon.com/2021/09/24/darkness-murder-on-stage/
- ^ https://english.cw.com.tw/article/article.action?id=3652