108 Days: Green Onions and Other Tasty Morsels

Song #1 in my "ode to Duck Dunn" study:

Booker T and the M.G.'s are responsible not only for their backing of popular artists such as  Sam & Dave, Otis Redding, Albert King, and Wilson Pickett, but also for their own fantastic records.  Green Onions is one of the most popular R&B instrumentals ever.  

Duck Dunn actually had nothing to do with the writing of the song-- Lewie Sternberg was the original bassist.  However, Dunn was did play the song for many years along with his M.G.'s band mates.  And that is enough for me to include it in my studies.  Here is a great video of the band squeeing all they can from this 12-bar blues: 

Green Onions was the primary focus of my practice sessions for about a week.  By itself, it is pretty straight forward.  In its original record version the tune is a bit shorter-- short of 3-min, compared to the live version (above) at about 4:15. A different, more energetic vibe is present with the live version and as such it changes location of some accent notes.  It was helpful to first learn the recorded version, then with the foundation established learning the live version was much easier.  Again, it is a straight forward bass riff that repeats itself steadily during the course of the song-- and it is GREAT FUN to play!

My new practice space-- I now have a window!

When learning the tune I used the sunburst G&L SB1, though once I had it down I switched to my 5-string G&L JB.  Doing so was mainly to become more comfortable on the 5-string, and with a little tweaking of knobs on the bass and amp, I achieved a tone respectable enough for Green Onions.  

Because I am a visual learner, writing out tabs and notes for the song was a big help.  It also reminded me that learning to sight read music notation is something I need to include in my practice routine.  Tabs are great in conjunction with a recording, and a lot of practice, but music notation provides a visual account of the rhythm and duration of notes-- something I very much want to learn.  

The list of songs I want to dig into is long, and I keep adding to it; I think something from Otis Redding should be next in the queue-- perhaps "the Dock of the Bay... but then there are the Staple Singers, Sam & Dave...

...stay tuned & in tune!