In the News

The Acoustic Side of Tony D

Cover Story, OBScene Magazine
By Liz Sykes

Tony D has come full circle.

Photo by Bob Worrall

He learned to play on an acoustic guitar, and now he's combined his enduring interest in acoustic blues and his more recent fascination with flamenco music and gypsy jazz. The result is an all-acoustic CD and a developing reputation in acoustic blues. Not to worry, though - he hasn't left electric blues behind. This foray into acoustic territory is just another path, another direction to follow, and his increasing acoustic focus in the past few years has strengthened and expanded his electric show as well.

"The first guitar I ever owned was an acoustic guitar and I played that more than I played my electric it was comfortable," Tony recalls. At home, he played the acoustic guitar; with his band, it was electric blues. "But, even if I learned some things from Robert Johnson, I was incorporating that in my electric playing as well, ... because at the end of the day for me it was all blues ... whichever way I heard it or looked at it, it was all blues."

Access to blues in Ottawa in the 70's was perhaps limited, but Tony remembers his first records. "At the beginning I started to listen to anything that was blues. And of course, when I started playing there wasn't a lot of stuff you could get here. If you saw a Lightning Hopkins record you grabbed it - you could get Muddy Waters, B.B. King, some electric blues like Johnny Winter, but they were more his rock albums, and Robert Johnson's 'King of the Delta Blues Singers'. I had those records. And a lot of Muddy Waters, especially the early stuff he did in the late 40's early 50's."

He saw touring blues musicians when they stopped in Ottawa. "When I was 18, one of the first people I ever saw playing was John Hammond. John Hammond's actually quite an influence on me personally, as an acoustic player," he says. "He doesn't have any fear ... there'll be minimal playing and he's not afraid to sort of play without a net .. he will just drop the whole bottom end out of it ... just play single note lines."

And sometimes he opened for them. "One of the earliest gigs - I was 19 - I did two nights with Sonny Terry and Brownie McGhee, opening for them. They truly did hate each other, and they had hated each other probably for about 30 years at this point ... they had to have separate dressing rooms. They would do these things on stage Brownie would play all these songs, and Sonny would purposely play in the wrong key, and then Sonny would do his portion of the show and Brownie would stop playing in the middle of it ... just stop playing ... but the more they got into the evening, finally they would come together and purposely come together because they started loving the music."

These musicians he saw added to his early acoustic influences. "Brownie was a real fingerpicker, right hand stuff. It is all right hand, when you're doing solo or acoustic kind of stuff - it's all about keeping the groove and keeping the rhythm and good tempos and being able to execute what you want to do and keep that feel." And a local guitarist taught Tony some slide technique, "one of the early things that I learned was how to play some slide from Vince Halfhide, when I was about 16 and just got into the blues thing. He showed me open tunings and once I understood the concept of open tunings, I was able to figure out some of the Robert Johnson and all the slide stuff."

Why turn to acoustic blues now? There's something of an acoustic renaissance taking place. More people are playing acoustic blues and there are more venues choosing to have acoustic nights, or acoustic afternoons. But this isn't just jumping on the acoustic bandwagon. Tony has always incorporated acoustic songs or sets in his shows.

"Suzie Vinnick and I played a lot of acoustic shows together," he comments, "and even the band ... did one acoustic weekend at a small bar here in Ottawa - sold the place out, two nights in a row, because it was something very different."

But circumstances led him in a different direction, and "the records started coming out and started doing well, and I went to Europe a lot in the last five years, so I got busy with that. And I had a hell of a live electric band ... Cameron Scott, Zeek Gross, Miche Pouliot and Sean Burke - by far, the best band I've ever had."

Again, circumstances have played a role. When Cam Scott returned to Australia early this year, and Miche Pouliot took over drums for Natalie McMaster, Tony decided it was time for a different direction. He had been learning and playing flamenco music with James Cohen. One thing leads to another and, for Tony, flamenco lead to Django Reinhart and "I got into some gypsy jazz this year, and got into the Django Reinhart stuff. All of a sudden that connection - between blues, jazz, flamenco - is all there."

And he decided to take the step to solo acoustic blues. Although he'd played acoustic before, he'd ever really been on his own, just Tony and his guitar. "Suzie and I used to do a lot of acoustic stuff. But I think it was always the fact that there was somebody else with me, I could play wonderfully; if I was completely alone, I had a problem." He laughs that "A good friend of mine, Charlie Sohmer - he's a big old folkie and a great songwriter - talked to me about that, because I have a fear about doing this kind of stuff, being alone. He said 'let the air around you be your band; use that space; use the quiet part; use the nothing; in between notes stop - air - into the next note.' And he's right, so I'm looking at it that way."

Recently, at the Black Sheep in Wakefield, David Gogo, Ken Hamm and Tony put on an acoustic show. Tony explains, "I did a whole set by myself, and it was a great set and I was so happy. And then David did his set and people really responded, and Ken Hamm did his set and everybody responded to that and we did one together and everybody exploded! But I was really happy I did that show and I did it by myself, purposely. I thought, well, if I'm gonna fall flat on my face today, I fall flat on my face."

Tony's acoustic CD, 'The Size of Your Shoes' is "mostly blues, and mostly material that I wrote." See this issue of OBScene for the review.

The CD was recorded and produced by Victor Nesrallah. "Victor's a great musician, and an excellent singer and an excellent producer and a great engineer, because he's basically been playing acoustic his whole life," Tony explains. "And he's really been monumental in giving me the confidence to do this."

The CD covers a variety of styles, and features some very talented guests. "There's a song that I wrote with Anders Osborne, which John Mooney plays on - we did three versions, three different feels and three different versions of this song, and we liked all three of them. John played on two songs - I've loved working with John Mooney, who's now become one of my musical heroes. Ken Hamm is on the CD - we do a Robert Johnson song together - and Ken is arguably the best acoustic player in this country. He plays only acoustic and he's very adamant, and he's a joy to work with because he's also the sweetest man in the world. I've done three flamenco/gypsy jazz songs with James Cohen, all songs that I wrote, including a brand new one called 'Blue Gypsy', a real 'hats-off' to Django. I have a song called 'little saint' which is a song to my son, Santino. And Santino loves 'Malted Milk'. He thinks that's a great song. He was there to see Ken and I play that when we were recording. He was really good, he stayed in the control room with Victor, and Victor said, 'your son's singing all the Iines that you're singing'."

The CD release is scheduled for the fall, but a special 'pre-release' will be held in conjunction with Tony's main stage appearance at Ottawa's Cisco Systems Bluesfest, on Sunday, July 15. Tony has always incorporated acoustic blues into his main stage appearances, so It's a perfect opportunity to debut some of the new acoustic material and to share a limited number of pre-release copies of the CD with his loyal Ottawa fans. This is exclusive to the Ottawa blues festival and only 200 copies of the CD will be available.

(OBS contributing editor Liz Sykes interviewed Tony D on April 14, 2001.)

 

Tony D's 'Essential' Acoustic Blues

OBS asked Tony to list his 'essential' acoustic blues.

Historically: "Robert Johnson is extremely important, because he shaped not only the way acoustic blues is played, or delta blues, but blues in general. And Son House ... historically those two are wonderful. And I'm going to put Muddy Waters in there too ... Muddy Waters' early stuff. Even when he was playing his electric, even in the late days, that style of playing was that Mississippi delta style. Lightning Hopkins is one of my heroes because of that sort of real aggressive, Texas shuffle stuff - that's what Texas blues is Lightning Hopkins."

Contemporary: "John Mooney, even though he plays an electric, but he does a solo act. He's managed to take the style of Robert Johnson and Son House and made it into his own style as well as doing something fresh and I've never heard anybody stomp so loud in my life! Chris Smither is fantastic, he's a great songwriter. Keb' Mo' does some beautiful stuff on his first album. And John Hammond, of course."

Canadian: "Ken Hamm, who is possibly the best acoustic picker; Rick Fines is right in the middle between folk and he does blues. Roger House, from Newfoundland is possibly one of the greatest acoustic players in Canada - he threatened to put out an acoustic album this year. Morgan Davis is good as well. Vince Halfhide here in Ottawa can play some beautiful, beautiful guitar, especially acoustic guitar. Trevor Finlay's acoustic stuff has been just wonderful. This year, you can see the advancement: he was always good, but this year. I really dig the way he does his acoustic stuff, because he does a little bit of everything - he does his own stuff, he does some really nice sort of delta-style stuff, stuff from way back in the 30's, and he'll sing a song by the Texan with the big hair - Lyle Lovett - and he's got no fear."