Listening

Guide 3-2_10e.

Three O'Clock Blues as recorded by B. B. King (1951)

Features:
King sings and then plays guitar lines that function as a response to his vocal lines.
(He plays the instrumental fills on the last seven beats of each section of the twelve-
bar form.) The guitar lines imitate and expand on the vocal melody to which they
respond and often use string bends to reach blue notes.

A chordal accompaniment is supplied by a horn section playing sustained (long
held) notes. The drums are very soft (under-recorded?), with little or no accenting
of the backbeat. A bit of urban sophistication in the arrangement is the occasional
use of half-step slides into some of the main chords of the progression. Most of the
time King slides down to the proper chord, but he reverses that and slides up to the
tonic chord at the final cadence (ending).

Tempo:
The speed of the beat is slow (about 76 beats per minute), with four beats in each
bar.

Form:
After a four-bar introduction played by the cornet and piano, the music and the text
follow the classic twelve-bar blues form. Both the music and the text follow the
classic twelve-bar blues form.

The recording starts with a four-bar guitar introduction, followed by four full
choruses of the twelve-bar form, the third of which is instrumental with the guitar
improvising on the harmonic progression.

Lyrics:
Finding, in the wee hours of the morning, that his lover has left him, the singer is
suicidal, though going to the local pool hall may offer some solace.