Harry Chapin — Bluesman

The kid heard the word up in Brooklyn It was his second year of medical school He went and stashed some jeans into his guitar case His father said, "You're a fool" But the boy jumped on board a Greyhound bus It took him two days to get to Mobile And though it took two weeks to track the old man down He never doubted that the rumor was real But there the old man stood by the store front With his white cane hanging from his belt And he was bending the steel of his guitar strings So it seemed like the metal had to melt He was the last of the street corner singers Paying his final years of dues The voice in his throat was like a bullfrog croak Yes it's he who invented the blues "To play the blues, boy, you got to live 'em Got your dues, boy, you know you got to give 'em Got to start sweet like a slow blues rhythm Like a heartbeat you'll always be with 'em When you're married to the blues, boy Your guitar is your wife It's like that fine old woman Who you're faithful to for life." Well the kid walked up as the blind man finished And was bent to put his guitar away The old man heard him and said, "Who are you?" "I'm the kid you're gonna teach to play." The old man laughed but the kid kept talking 'bout How he'd help him get around That's when the old man said "I don't need no fool to get me where in the hell I'm bound" The kid nods his head with a great big grin and says "When do we begin?" That's when the old man said "If You're staying with me This is how it's got to be..." "To play the blues, boy, you got to live 'em Got your dues, boy, you know you got to give 'em Got to start sweet like a slow blues rhythm Like a heartbeat you'll always be with 'em When you're married to the blues, boy Your guitar is your wife It's like that fine old woman Who you're faithful to for life." "You know I ain't no guru I'm just a blind black preacher man My guitar is my gospel, boy And I preach with my picking hand And I preach with my picking hand I ain't gonna be your wet nurse Or black father to an albino son." "That's O.K.," the kid up and say "I just wanna pick like a son of a gun!" "Whoa, boy, that ain't no damn typewriter you're playing, now You've got to caress it like a woman, slow and easy" "Like this, old man?" "No! A fool plays the blues like Machine Gun Kelly Five hundred notes to the bar And if you're going to stick with me You've got to learn what the blues really are You learn to pick with me and you can stick with me But it's time to blow this town We gots a gig to preach in a gaming house We're Alabama bound" So the kid took the hand of the old blues man To lead him all around the south Now it's the old man's turn to make the white boy learn "You don't play guitar with your mouth" To play the blues, boy, you got to live 'em Got your dues, boy, you know you got to give 'em Got to start sweet like a slow blues rhythm Like a heartbeat you'll always be with 'em When you're married to the blues, boy Your guitar is your wife It's like that fine old woman Who you're faithful to for life All right, son, let's hear some guitar I want you to play it funky like your uncle's carbuncle That's right, son, play it sassy like your sweet mama's pajamas That sounds pretty good for a New York boy! Oh, son that sounds so sweet