Category Archives: Life in France

90 Years and Still Shouting the Blues

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Norrie Snakebite Burnett - Still shouting the Blues

Norrie ‘Snakebite’ Burnett turned 90 this year. For those who know him, that’s not just a number — it’s a life fully and joyfully lived. Norrie loves to sing. He loves to get up in front of a band and shout the blues. He doesn’t get to do it as often as he’d like. So back in January, I decided to do something about that.

The idea was simple. Give Norrie a gig. A real one. For him. To celebrate his birthday and to let him do what he loves, in front of people who love him back.

The planning was quiet and mostly invisible, which is how it should be. A venue to find, musicians to book, a poster to design, tickets to sell. La Ruche Café-Epi in Roussines said yes. Then the musicians said yes. Then the tickets sold out. All of them. A 90-year-old blues shouter in a French village schoolroom, and not a seat to be had. That tells you everything you need to know about Norrie and the people who love him.

Norrie takes to the stage.

There were no rehearsals. None. The musicians — Bobby Dirninger on keyboards, Aroutian Karapatian on drums, David Donachie on bass, Gordon Menditta on saxophone — turned up on the day and trusted each other. That’s not luck. That’s what good musicians do. Playing with them was, quite simply, like being on holiday.

Madame Blanc opened the show. She set the tone with grace, style and no small amount of fire, and the room was hers from the first note. Then she brought Norrie to the stage.

Madame Blanc in full force.

What happened next is difficult to put into words, which is perhaps why Steve Parkins was there with a camera. Norrie took the microphone, raised his arms, and sang. The room responded the way rooms do when something real is happening — they leaned in, they smiled, they forgot about everything else. Robin Spence, who spent five years living in New Orleans, said afterwards that he hadn’t seen better. I’ll take that.

Blues Shouter extraordinaire Norrie Burnett

The musicians were exceptional. Every one of them. Bobby Dirninger is Norrie’s favourite keyboard player, and watching the two of them together said everything about why. Aroutian Karapatian held the whole thing together from the drums with a masterful authority that only the finest players possess. David Donachie on bass was exactly what a bass player should be — solid, present, dependable, musical. And Gordon Menditta on saxophone brought colour and warmth to every number he touched.

David on Bass

The audience were magnificent. Their warmth and generosity filled the room as surely as the music did. I watched their faces. The smiles said everything. Those who were there witnessed something genuinely special — the kind of afternoon that doesn’t come around very often, and that stays with you when it does.

Tell it like it is

Thank you to everyone who came. Thank you to Bobby, Aroutian, David and Gordon. Thank you to Andy Berry and the team at La Ruche for opening the doors and trusting us with the PA. Thank you to Steve Parkins for the photographs — they speak for themselves.

Pure joy on the faces of the band.

And thank you to Norrie ‘Snakebite’ Burnett. For the music, for the friendship, and for showing us all how it’s done.

Still shouting. Long may it continue.

A paid recording session…

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I was lucky enough to get paid to play a recording session yesterday at a local studio here in France, for visiting American songwriter and producer Dana Walden.

If anyone would like to know more — how I got the work, how I prepared, what gear I took, how it actually went — please ask and I’ll do my best to answer. Needless to say, it was a fabulous day, and I consider myself very fortunate.

There were two key takeaways I wanted to share:

1. You must be able to play in all keys. I had to play a song in three different keys straight off, to find which suited the singer best. Luckily it was a simple pop song, but the ability to move freely between keys was essential.

2. Ear training pays off. Dana wanted a short guitar intro and asked me to play him some ideas. He liked a couple of things I played. Then he sang a line to me and asked me to play it back. I was so glad I had worked through those ear training exercises.

How it went…

I met Dana the day before. He wanted to meet and talk through the project, and he was really nice, so I didn’t feel nervous. We were only recording one tune that day — just him, the chanteuse, and me.

Knowing the song ahead of time meant I was able to work out some nice chord voicings and pathways, while still leaving plenty of scope to improvise. Dana was clear about what he wanted and told me when he liked something and wanted more of it.

Style-wise, I’d assumed it was going to be jazzy — that’s why the woman who booked me had booked me — but Dana wanted a more pop approach.

On the day, the engineer was set up and ready when I arrived. I sat in the control room and plugged straight into the desk, playing to a drum track with some piano parts the producer had prepared that morning. I played from the notes I’d made the day before, while Dana sang a placeholder vocal and conducted me through the arrangement.

I put down a couple of takes using different ideas. When the singer arrived we had a few more run-throughs, then the producer asked me for a final take — just embellishments and fills. After a couple of hours, my work was done. The rest of the session belonged to the singer.

One small thing I hadn’t anticipated: I’m used to a two-bar count-in, but the studio DAW was set up for just one bar. That caught me out on the first take! Afterwards I found myself thinking about how much studio time that must save over the course of a few months.

Hopefully I’ll get a copy of the finished track when it’s done.

How I got the gig…

I’m not a working professional musician. Being a professional musician in France is complicated — the rules are quite something. On paper, I’m retired.

I got this gig by being in the right place at the right time. I’d done a short gig with Lyda, my Dutch opera singer friend, and the woman who booked me happened to be in the audience. She loved what we did and got in touch — she was looking for a guitarist, she liked what I played, and she showed some of my YouTube videos to the producer. He thought I was worth a try. I was halfway there before the session even began.