Image: c. Chris Barber. Dartford, England
You probably didn’t notice it, but a guitar legend died recently. No, not Eric Clapton or Jimmy Page or even Slash – but someone who probably influenced all of these fine musicians. He certainly influenced one of my early Folk Heroes, so I’ll pass you on to that man, Ralph Mctell, who had this to say on his Homepage about the gifted Bert Jansch:
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“A candle can be just as important as a match, but at the end of the day it is the mirrors which reflect the given light or spark, that truly continuously enlighten.”
Thanks for that John.
“Anji” was in fact written by Davey Graham who was three years senior to Bert Jansch. Davey either invented or popularised DADGAD tuning on the guitar, just as Bert Jansch popularised the acoustic instrumental tune “Angie” as a benchmark for the acoustic guitarists of a whole generation.
Davey Graham died also of cancer, three years ago.
Both will be sorely missed from a great age where great musical fusions occurred merely in the minds of a few great acoustic musicians and not on computers.
Bert Jansch apart from being one of the electric folk group pioneers with the group Pentangle, was also a great old “Blueser” who audaciously sneaked a rendition of Furry Lewis’s “Turn your money green” onto a British folk album, a deed for which I shall be eternally grateful for having opened a door for me a long, long time ago.
Anji
Have you seen how many ‘guitar lesson’ videos there are for this track on the Web?
Proof of Jansch’s relevance as a ‘teacher’ even today of future guitar heroes.
Just for you John (and all aspiring young guitar players) – here is the man himself showing us the way: