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harmonica in reggae dub and soul and stuff like that.
Obviously Stevie Wonder, but apart from Stevie
Wonder there was a lot of diatonic stuff as well, you
know, harmonica. And then through a friend of mine,
who did me a tape or something, I think that's when
I heard Sonny Boy Williamson I, and I thought, oh
my word, that’s a player.
BiTS: Yes.
EL: And that really turned me on, that Sonny Boy.
That's when I started going into Dobells [Jazz Record
Shop in Charing Cross Road] and buying some tapes,
and at the time, I would also borrow stuff from the
library, tape it and stuff before I started buying
records. It was mainly tapes, I think, at the time. But
then, yeah, I'd started discovering the old blues.
BiTS: Errol, how did you learn what actually
inhibited many, many players of blues in the early
days – how did you learn things like cross harp and
that kind of thing?
EL: I had a little guitar, so I was kind of doing some
chords on the guitar and you just kind of naturally
John Lee Wiiliamson (Sonny Boy #1) o hear it. Do you know what I mean?
BiTS: Okay.
EL: You can actually hear it. When I first started
playing, I was probably playing more straight harp, but then you find out where the notations
are on the harmonica and E chords. You find out right, I'll hit the E chords second note on a
harmonica and then you find your way around like that. My guitar helped me, but also, I think
when I first got that ‘wa-wa’, that bending note, I went, wahey! That took me about six months
[laughing].
BiTS: Yes, I bet.
EL: Yeah, so them little bits were encouragement. I can remember throwing harmonicas on
the railway tracks, or something [laughs], just threw it away.
BiTS: That’s wonderful.
EL: Frustrating.
BiTS: That reminds me of all those old jazz musicians in New York going out onto the roof to
play.
EL: Okay.
BiTS: You were nineteen when you first started to play. When did you first start playing with
a band?
EL: I first started playing with a band, that probably would be in my 20s because after a couple
of years playing, someone said to me, oh, have you ever tried going busking? I thought, nah! I
