Bad Godesberg as a Blues Capital? Well okay, maybe it’s not up there with Chicago – but we do have Bill Baum with his shop and his Bluesbenders of course. We Have Folk Club custodian John Harrison, and we also have an ex-Bad Godesbergian Blueser in Richard Bargel. The latter made his second appearance here in recent times last wekend, playing an intimate house concert in Friesdorferstrasse at the request of Eliane LaGrange. As a Bad Godesberg Blueser myself, I couldn’t miss out of course…
It’s clear from tallking to Richard Bargel before tonight’s concert that leaving Bonn wasn’t a huge leap for him. There really wasn’t anything that the Beethoven City could offer a budding musician that Cologne up the road couldn’t offer x10. By 1969 he was creating a performers commune (Tabernakel) with Klaus von Wrochem (aka Klaus der Geiger) and a year later making the rounds of folkclubs and music pubs in England meeting and playing alongside the likes of Wizz Jones and D.P. (later Elvis) Costello in iconic London venues like Dingwalls and Putney’s Half Moon.
If the Cologne collective idea resembled Dylan’s Greenwich Village then Bargel’s next venture – 1976’s ‘Rolling Blues Revue’ also seems inspired by Dylan. It certainly sealed his place as a Bluesman. It was a top class revue too including the likes of Memphis Slim, Champion Jack Dupree and Eddie Boyd. Did I mention Bargel’s work with harmonica king Charlie Musselwhite? Or that Bargel has a photobook out covering Covid-lockdown Cologne? Or that his face is also likely to crop up on tv as an actor? How does the man have time for going to his own home? Never mind a house concert at someone elses!
But here we are. Maybe 60 people sitting in an assortment of stools, chairs and sofas in Bad Godesberg and there, opposite us all, is Richard with his musical ‘brother from another mother’ Fabio Nettekoven, both sitting snuggly between an array of guitars and small amps, with just a couple of house lights for atmosphere.
Fabio Nettekoven deserves a mention here for sure. Bargel himself concedes jealousy over a man who can (says Bargel) pick up pretty much any stringed instrument and play it consumately within a day. This evening the choice is down to a Gibson ES-335, a National steel and (thanks to a broken mandolin) a banjo. Needless to say, all are impecably played this evening.
I notice that Nettekoven seems to be watching Richard Bargel as much as the rest of us. I suspect the latter follows his own instincts through some of the songs, and it’s good that the former seems of a super-calm temperament to take it all in his stride. Not that the set is a hot-bed of new music. Despite this being a duo concert as ‘Family Business’ (a project started ten years ago between the two and still going strong); at the show’s centre is the recent ‘Dead Slow Stampede’ release which is a very good thing because it’s a very good album.
There are nicely pared-down versions from the disc of numbers like ‘Break the Chain’, ‘I will die for You’ and ‘I Go Blue’. There are also some blues standards to enjoy – ‘Empire State Express’ and ‘Stagolee’. Nettekoven gets a break from being the accompaniment when we get to ‘John the Revelator’ – it’s time for us all to accompany via hand-clapping: “Who’s that writing?” why its “John the Revelator!” Tell me who’s that writing? “John the Revelator” what’s he writing? “The book of the seven seals!”
Concerts like this one are a two-edged sword so to speak. It’s great to hear this music in a small environment. It’s how the blues took off as the likes of Robert Johnson and Son House made their names – playing to small, enthusiastic audiences in small rooms. Bad Godesberg is no cotton plantation of course, but the intimacy of the music and the musicians comes across the way it originally did. The other sword edge though is that modern musicians aren’t living on plantations – they have rent to pay. A small audience – however enthusiastic – isn’t going to pay the bills. It will pay the petrol money though, and feed the spirits of musicians and audience alike.
My thanks to Eliane LaGrange for bringing house concerts to Bonn for the last ten years, and if you haven’t put your name down for a future show there I recommend that you do. Your musical soul will thank you! Richard Bargel and Fabio Nettekoven – I thank you both too for a memorable musical evening.
