Sonny Black
Encyclopedia
- Bill Boazman redirects here
Sonny Black is a leading acoustic
Acoustic guitar
An acoustic guitar is a guitar that uses only an acoustic sound board. The air in this cavity resonates with the vibrational modes of the string and at low frequencies, which depend on the size of the box, the chamber acts like a Helmholtz resonator, increasing or decreasing the volume of the sound...
guitarist
Guitarist
A guitarist is a musician who plays the guitar. Guitarists may play a variety of instruments such as classical guitars, acoustic guitars, electric guitars, and bass guitars. Some guitarists accompany themselves on the guitar while singing.- Versatility :The guitarist controls an extremely...
based in the UK
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
, who plays blues
Blues
Blues is the name given to both a musical form and a music genre that originated in African-American communities of primarily the "Deep South" of the United States at the end of the 19th century from spirituals, work songs, field hollers, shouts and chants, and rhymed simple narrative ballads...
, rags
Ragtime
Ragtime is an original musical genre which enjoyed its peak popularity between 1897 and 1918. Its main characteristic trait is its syncopated, or "ragged," rhythm. It began as dance music in the red-light districts of American cities such as St. Louis and New Orleans years before being published...
and original compositions usually fingerstyle or slide
Slide
-Fiction:*Slide, a fictional creature in the Sword of Truth book series-Music:*Slides , an album by Richard Harris *Slide , an album by Lisa Germano*Slide , a single by the Goo Goo Dolls...
. "Sonny Black" is a pseudonym adopted when he began the first "Sonny Black's Blues Band". He previously became well known by his real name of Bill Boazman on the folk club circuit and at college gigs during the 1970s as a singer, songwriter and acoustic guitarist. He has been credited with accompanying J. J. Cale, but this is a fallacy arising from a typographic error involving an American musician with a similar name.
First influences
In his early years Boazman lived on Hayling IslandHayling Island
-Leisure activities:Although largely residential, Hayling is also a holiday, windsurfing and sailing centre, the site where windsurfing was invented....
and dabbled in early 1960s pop music
Pop music
Pop music is usually understood to be commercially recorded music, often oriented toward a youth market, usually consisting of relatively short, simple songs utilizing technological innovations to produce new variations on existing themes.- Definitions :David Hatch and Stephen Millward define pop...
until he heard Bert Jansch
Bert Jansch
Herbert "Bert" Jansch was a Scottish folk musician and founding member of the band Pentangle. He was born in Glasgow and came to prominence in London in the 1960s, as an acoustic guitarist, as well as a singer-songwriter...
's first (1965) L.P.
LP album
The LP, or long-playing microgroove record, is a format for phonograph records, an analog sound storage medium. Introduced by Columbia Records in 1948, it was soon adopted as a new standard by the entire record industry...
; he attempted to learn every song on this album. At the age of seventeen Boazman first heard "San Francisco Bay Blues
San Francisco Bay Blues
"San Francisco Bay Blues" is an American folk song and is generally considered to be the most famous composition by Jesse Fuller. Fuller first recorded the song in 1954 for a small label called World Song. The song was brought into wider popularity in the early 1960s by club performances by...
" by Jesse Fuller
Jesse Fuller
Jesse Fuller was an American one-man band musician, best known for his song "San Francisco Bay Blues".-Early life:...
, which led to his enduring love of blues music. By the late 1960s he lived near Reading, Berkshire
Reading, Berkshire
Reading is a large town and unitary authority area in England. It is located in the Thames Valley at the confluence of the River Thames and River Kennet, and on both the Great Western Main Line railway and the M4 motorway, some west of London....
and made regular visits to London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
clubs such as Les Cousins
Les Cousins (music club)
Les Cousins was a folk and blues club in the basement of a restaurant in Greek Street, in the Soho district of London. It had its heyday during the British folk music revival of the mid-1960s and was notable as a venue in which musicians of that period met and learnt from each other...
in Soho
Soho
Soho is an area of the City of Westminster and part of the West End of London. Long established as an entertainment district, for much of the 20th century Soho had a reputation for sex shops as well as night life and film industry. Since the early 1980s, the area has undergone considerable...
, where he learnt from Roy Harper
Roy Harper
Roy Harper is an English folk / rock singer-songwriter and guitarist who has been a professional musician since the mid 1960s...
, Bert Jansch
Bert Jansch
Herbert "Bert" Jansch was a Scottish folk musician and founding member of the band Pentangle. He was born in Glasgow and came to prominence in London in the 1960s, as an acoustic guitarist, as well as a singer-songwriter...
, Ralph McTell
Ralph McTell
Ralph McTell is an English singer-songwriter and acoustic guitar player who has been an influential figure on the UK folk music scene since the 1960s....
, The Incredible String Band, Davey Graham
Davey Graham
David Michael Gordon "Davey" Graham, originally spelled Davy Graham, , was a British guitarist and one of the most influential figures in the 1960s British folk revival...
and many an American
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
guitar
Guitar
The guitar is a plucked string instrument, usually played with fingers or a pick. The guitar consists of a body with a rigid neck to which the strings, generally six in number, are attached. Guitars are traditionally constructed of various woods and strung with animal gut or, more recently, with...
picker. At this point he still did not own a guitar, relying on instruments borrowed from friends and other performers, including John Renbourn
John Renbourn
John Renbourn is an English guitarist and songwriter. He is possibly best known for his collaboration with guitarist Bert Jansch as well as his work with the folk group Pentangle, although he maintained a solo career before, during and after that band's existence .While most commonly labelled a...
who loaned Boazman the Scarth guitar pictured on the sleeve of Renbourn's first album
John Renbourn (album)
-Track listing:All tracks composed by John Renbourn; except where indicated# "Judy"# "Beth's Blues"# "Song"# "Down on the Barge"# "John Henry" # "Plainsong"# "Louisiana Blues" # "Blue Bones"...
. Eventually he purchased a Gibson
Gibson Guitar Corporation
The Gibson Guitar Corporation, formerly of Kalamazoo, Michigan and currently of Nashville, Tennessee, manufactures guitars and other instruments which sell under a variety of brand names...
of his own.
Heron
During the early 1970s he worked with Heron, alongside a line-up of Michael Cooper - Vocals; Gerald (G. T.) Moore - Guitar, Keyboards, Vocals; Roy Apps - Guitar, Keyboards, Vocals; Mike Finesilver - Bass; Steve Jones - Keyboards; Tony Pook - Percussion, Vocals; Mike Cooper - Guitar; and Terry Gittins - Drums. Boazman appeared on the early Heron albums, but (contrary to some sources) was not formally a member of the band. These albums are now highly collectible, fetching about £150 each.Mike Cooper
With Mike Cooper, a leading light of the emerging UK country bluesCountry blues
Country blues is a general term that refers to all the acoustic, mainly guitar-driven forms of the blues. It often incorporated elements of rural gospel, ragtime, hillbilly, and dixieland jazz...
scene in the late 1960s, Boazman began playing acoustic and slide guitar on gigs
Concert
A concert is a live performance before an audience. The performance may be by a single musician, sometimes then called a recital, or by a musical ensemble, such as an orchestra, a choir, or a musical band...
around the UK and Europe
Europe
Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...
. He played on a couple of Cooper's album
Album
An album is a collection of recordings, released as a single package on gramophone record, cassette, compact disc, or via digital distribution. The word derives from the Latin word for list .Vinyl LP records have two sides, each comprising one half of the album...
s on the Dawn
Dawn Records
Dawn Records was a subsidiary of Pye Records. Active from 1970 to 1975, it was set up largely as Pye's 'underground and progressive' label, a rival of the EMI and Phonogram equivalents, Harvest and Vertigo....
label, alongside such luminaries as Danny Thompson
Danny Thompson
Daniel Henry Edward 'Danny' Thompson is an English multi-instrumentalist best known as a double bassist and businessman...
, Stefan Grossman
Stefan Grossman
Stefan Grossman is an American acoustic fingerstyle guitarist and singer, music producer and educator, and co-founder of Kicking Mule records.-Early life and influences:Born in Brooklyn, New York, to Herbert and Ruth Grossman...
, Mike Osborne
Mike Osborne
Michael Evans Osborne was an English jazz alto saxophonist, pianist and clarinetist, perhaps most noteworthy for his contributions as a member to the Chris McGregor band Brotherhood of Breath in the 1960s and 1970s.He was born in Hereford and attended Wycliffe College in Gloucestershire and the...
and Alan Skidmore
Alan Skidmore
Alan Skidmore is a tenor saxophonist of jazz and blues music, son of the saxophonist Jimmy Skidmore.-As a sideman:...
. He also added his vocals and guitar to albums by Ian A. Anderson
Ian A. Anderson
Ian A. Anderson is an English magazine editor, folk musician and broadcaster.-Country blues and The Village Thing:...
.
Solo work
Johnny Coppin
Johnny Coppin is an English singer/songwriter, composer, poetry anthologist and broadcaster. He plays guitar and piano and has written and recorded many albums as a solo artist. He has a weekly one-hour show on BBC Radio Gloucestershire entitled Folk Roots which he has produced and presented every...
and Paul Downes
Paul Downes
Paul Downes is an English folk guitarist, singer and composer. He has appeared on eight albums with bands, three highly acclaimed solo albums and has over 150 session credits...
; and Roll On River
Roll On River
Roll On River is the 1981 album by the German Werner Lämmerhirt and British Wizz Jones, both of them noted solo folk guitarists, singers and songwriters. Jones had first met Lämmerhirt at the Steve Club in Berlin in the early 70's...
recorded by Wizz Jones
Wizz Jones
Raymond Ronald Jones better-known as Wizz Jones is an English acoustic guitarist, singer and songwriter. He has been performing since the late 1950s and recording from 1965 to the present...
and Werner Lämmerhirt
Werner Lämmerhirt
Werner Lämmerhirt is a noted German singer-songwriter and guitarist in the contemporary folk music style. He writes and sings in both German and English languages. His recording career has spanned more than three decades.-Early life:...
. Other notable Boazman compositions of this period include Tall Ship and Breaking Even.
Sonny Black's Blues Band, Sonny Black and the Dukes
Boazman then adopted the persona of "Sonny Black" and formed the first line-up of Sonny Black's Blues Band Dave Bispham on drums, Dick Jones on bass guitarBass guitar
The bass guitar is a stringed instrument played primarily with the fingers or thumb , or by using a pick....
, with Paul Swinton on harmonica
Harmonica
The harmonica, also called harp, French harp, blues harp, and mouth organ, is a free reed wind instrument used primarily in blues and American folk music, jazz, country, and rock and roll. It is played by blowing air into it or drawing air out by placing lips over individual holes or multiple holes...
and additional vocals. The band's first album, "The Filth" (recorded in 1983 to 1987) also included guest musicians Graham Hobbs on organ, Ian Smith on bass and Frank Sidebottom on piano. Over the following years they played their hard Chicago
Chicago blues
The Chicago blues is a form of blues music that developed in Chicago, Illinois, by taking the basic acoustic guitar and harmonica-based Delta blues, making the harmonica louder with a microphone and an instrument amplifier, and adding electrically amplified guitar, amplified bass guitar, drums,...
type of blues and acted as the houseband at Dino's Blues Bar at the West End Centre in Aldershot
Aldershot
Aldershot is a town in the English county of Hampshire, located on heathland about southwest of London. The town is administered by Rushmoor Borough Council...
. Here they played with Eddie C Campbell, Lowell Fulson
Lowell Fulson
Lowell Fulson was a big-voiced blues guitarist and songwriter, in the West Coast blues tradition. Fulson was born in Tulsa, Oklahoma. He also recorded for business reasons as Lowell Fullsom and Lowell Fulsom...
, Guitar Shorty
Guitar Shorty
Guitar Shorty is an American blues guitarist. He is well known for his explosive guitar style and wild stage antics. Billboard magazine said, “his galvanizing guitar work defines modern, top-of-the-line blues-rock. His vocals remain as forceful as ever...
, Carey Bell
Carey Bell
Carey Bell was an American blues musician, who played the harmonica in the Chicago blues style. Bell played harmonica and bass for other blues musicians during the late 1950s, 1960s and early 1970s before embarking on a solo career...
and others. Various line-ups featured, at different times, Sam Kelly (drums), Dan Smith (piano), George Pearson (bass), Alan Glenn (harmonica), Dino Coccia and Damon Sawyer (drums) and Bob Haddrell (organ/piano) - some of whom reformed as The Barcodes. Although performing entirely in a traditional blues idiom, most numbers were written by Sonny Black. Over time and through various line-up changes (including a change of name from Sonny Black's Blue Band to Sonny Black and the Dukes), the driving style of the band mellowed and jazz influences became more apparent.
Return to acoustic roots
In the 2000s Sonny Black was drawn back to playing just finger picking acoustic and national steel guitar, often accompanied by bassistBass (instrument)
Bass describes musical instruments that produce tones in the low-pitched range. They belong to different families of instruments and can cover a wide range of musical roles...
Chris Belshaw. His repertoire is now a varied selection including blues, ragtime
Ragtime
Ragtime is an original musical genre which enjoyed its peak popularity between 1897 and 1918. Its main characteristic trait is its syncopated, or "ragged," rhythm. It began as dance music in the red-light districts of American cities such as St. Louis and New Orleans years before being published...
, jazz
Jazz
Jazz is a musical style that originated at the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States. It was born out of a mix of African and European music traditions. From its early development until the present, jazz has incorporated music from 19th and 20th...
standards. He has performed live sessions for BBC Radio 2
BBC Radio 2
BBC Radio 2 is one of the BBC's national radio stations and the most popular station in the United Kingdom. Much of its daytime playlist-based programming is best described as Adult Contemporary or AOR, although the station is also noted for its specialist broadcasting of other musical genres...
's Paul Jones
Paul Jones (singer)
Paul Jones is an English singer, actor, harmonica player, and radio personality and television presenter.-Career:As P. P...
and Johnnie Walker
Johnnie Walker (DJ)
Johnnie Walker MBE is a popular British veteran radio disc jockey and broadcaster....
shows and, under the name of Bill Boazman, has produced a guitar tutorial DVD, "Jazzin' The Blues". His recent recordings are on his own independent label, Free Spirit Records
Free Spirit Records
Free Spirit Records is an independent record label based in Yateley, Hampshire, United Kingdom. It was established in 2002, primarily as an outlet for the recordings of acoustic blues guitarist and singer, Sonny Black....
.
During 2008 Sonny Black performed at festivals in France and Italy as well as the U.K.
Selected discography
- Heron (Dawn RecordsDawn RecordsDawn Records was a subsidiary of Pye Records. Active from 1970 to 1975, it was set up largely as Pye's 'underground and progressive' label, a rival of the EMI and Phonogram equivalents, Harvest and Vertigo....
) - 1970*‡‡‡ - Twice As Nice & Half The Price (Dawn Records DNLS3025) - 1972*‡‡‡
- From the Lion to the Plough (NYPL Records) - 1978 ****
- The FilthThe Filth (album)The Filth is the first album by the noted British blues band, Sonny Black's Blues Band, fronted by songwriter, guitarist and singer Bill Boazman. It was recorded over the period of 1983 to 1987 and released by Boazman as a private pressing, sold at gigs...
(private pressing) - recorded 1983 to 1987, date of issue not stated**‡ - Smile on the Blues (Roads Records RRCD0001) - 1993 **‡
- Free Spirit (Free Spirit Records FS100) - 1998 **‡‡
- Heart & Soul (Bluetrack Records BRCD004) - 2000 **‡‡
- Blues of a Kind (Free Spirit Records FSCD002) - 2002 **
- The Blue Way (Free Spirit Records FSCD003 tbc) - date tbc **
- The Corner Seat (Free Spirit Records FSCD004) - 2006 **
- The Best of Days (Free Spirit Records FSCD0005) - 2007 **
- DVD - Jazzin' The Blues (Omnibus Media DV10043) - 2003 *
*as Bill Boazman **as Sonny Black
‡with Sonny Black's Blues Band ‡‡with The Dukes ‡‡‡with Heron **** with BMW