Grateful Dead Music Forum

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fm2hHaTs ... ature=plcp[/youtube]

So did you try to post a video or something? I only see a blank area above your smiley face. I would enjoy hearing/seeing someone's early attempt at the song as I have been meaning to sit down with it one day myself. Where did you get your material for learning it?

Just go for it using an open A - you will hear how the melody just falls into place, and the chords just shift back and forth from A D and E with that sweet F#m in there - I don't have my guitar nearby, but it's real straightforward / also a great piano song if you can play chords on the piano, gives another good perspective on how it's all linked together / wish the video link above worked, would love to see it played on piano by someone else -

if you don't mind I can try to help, i do not always do this right. I always have trouble finding the thread on How to use the youtubecode thingy, >>>>>forum/viewtopic.php?f=360&t=9700
FWIW. It is the stuff after the = paste into the code. I always forget
So if ya don't mind here is the video, sounds great, good job and thanks for sharing.

Very nice, very nice.

That song changed my life on 3/14/90 at the cap center in Maryland. Wild how I can look back to the exact moment - thank you Jerry and Robert Hunter!!!!

Neither of the two videos in this thread work anymore.

But what I mostly came to say is Black Muddy River is more complex than I thought it was before I began learning it today.

I didn't included any cover songs on either of my 2 albums - each is all original - as will be my third which I anticipate releasing this November (I'll share it here when I do).

I've also already written my 4th album, which I plan to begin recording in the summer of 2024. So far, all 9 of its songs are also all originals. But this one is likely to be my last, its working name is Legacy, I'm still in good health but not as young as I once was (who is?), and want to end the album with a song about transitioning to the next phase of existence. I thought about how I might want to write it before a bulb went off in my head: "The song you want, Jon, has already been written. Perhaps it's time for your first (and last) recorded cover song."

Anyway, the way many of the arrangements for Black Muddy River are written out, it's a real lot of fast though simple chord changes in a row for the verses. Playing them as chords didn't sound right to me. A bit more research revealed how Jerry approached playing the changes. So beautiful.

I finally did find another Black Muddy River instructional video that seems to get the song right. The dude who recorded it comes off at times, to me at least, a bit "challenging" (my euphemism :p ) at times. But at the same time, his enthusiasm is contagious and I'm grateful he's shared his work on the song.

https://youtu.be/M5d5BxGAV3Q?si=ActLxs5JmKAD1iC4

FWIW, after some experimentation, I've:

• transcribed the song to E to best suit my vocal range

• learned Jerry's parts

• decided to, rather than copy many if not most of Jerry's parts, with deep respect, strive for a fresh, personal alternative arrangement (as Jerry himself so often did when covering others' songs)

That's it for now. In around a year, we'll hear if I succeeded.