Birthday Salute -- Bonnie Raitt

Born 8th November 1949, Bonnie Raitt is the quintessential female blues guitarist of her generation. Daughter of leading Broadway actor John Raitt, of Oklahoma and Carousel fame, Bonnie picked up the guitar at age 10. Folk music dominated the airwaves and she was soon playing the songs of Pete Seeger, Peter, Paul and Mary and The Kingston Trio on her Stella acoustic.

At age 14, Bonnie experienced a radical shift in her musical tastes when she heard Blues At Newport '63 featuring John Lee Hooker and Mississippi John Hurt, which led her to explore blues and slide guitar.

Attending Harvard/Radcliffe college in Massachussetts in the late-60's, Bonnie started playing the blues in the local coffeehouses. After creating a buzz on the Cambridge coffeehouse circuit, it was a chance meeting with blues promoter and manager Dick Waterman that led Bonnie to the next level of her career.

It was through Waterman also that she had the chance to hang out and learn from iconic bluesmen such as Son House, John Hurt, Otis Rush, Junior Wells, Luther Allison and Buddy Guy.

In this clip, from 1996's Tribute to Stevie Ray Vaughan, Bonnie really lays it down with some mean slide guitar, backed by the Stevie Ray rhythm section of Tommy Shannon and Chris Layton.

Buddy Guy And Carlos Santana at Experience PRS 2009

Carlos Santana and Buddy Guy got together onstage for a surprise jam at the annual Experience PRS event in September.

Carlos was introducing his new 25th Anniversary Santana model as seen in this clip, while Buddy played an all-white, maple-neck PRS 305. The 305, as I mentioned in an earlier article, is a 25 1/2" scale instrument that is the nearest thing in the PRS line to a traditional Strat.

Buddy, a die-hard Stratocaster player, appears a little thrown off when he starts his solo. You can tell that he is playing licks that he would normally play on his Fender -- licks that would simply sing when executed with glassy Strat tones.

The 305 is obviously a lot more meaty sounding with a thick mid-range which he appears to be unaccustomed to. But he soon finds his footing by unleashing a few Santana-esque lines of his own. If you can't beat 'em, join 'em.

But I must say the Santana 25th Anniversary sounds pretty good. Carlos' mildly-overdriven-and-magically-on-the-verge-of-feedback tones are simply unctuous.

Also making its debut at Experience PRS was the Carlos Santana Abraxas SE model. A limited edition model, the Abraxas SE is a take on the Les Paul Junior-style, with a single soapbar pickup and a wrap-around bridge. The instrument is adorned with a graphic from the Abraxas album art and a peace-symbol inlay at the twelfth fret.

Beautiful.

As a side note, Buddy Guy's pic from this very same concert now appears on the PRS website on the model 305 page.

Could this be a sign of a burgeoning new relationship?

(Picture Source: http://www.prsguitars.com/)

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