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"Call It Stormy Monday (But Tuesday Is Just as Bad)" (commonly referred to as "Stormy Monday") is a song written and recorded by American blues electric guitar pioneer T-Bone Walker. It is a slow twelve-bar blues performed in the West Coast blues-style that features Walker's smooth, plaintive vocal and distinctive guitar work. As well as becoming a record chart hit in 1948, it inspired B.B. King and others to take up the electric guitar. "Stormy Monday" became Walker's best-known and most-recorded song. In 1961, Bobby "Blue" Bland further popularized the song with an appearance in the pop record charts. Bland introduced a new arrangement with chord substitutions, which was later used in many subsequent renditions. His version also incorrectly used the title "Stormy Monday Blues", which was copied and resulted in royalties being paid to songwriters other than Walker. The Allman Brothers Band recorded an extended version for their first live album in 1971, with additional changes to the arrangement. Through the album's popularity and the group's concert performances, they brought "Stormy Monday" to the attention of rock audiences. Similarly, Latimore's 1973 recording made it popular with a later R&B audience. "Stormy Monday" is one of the most popular blues standards, with numerous renditions. As well as being necessary for blues musicians, it is also found in the repertoires of many jazz, soul, pop, and rock performers. The song is included in the Grammy, Rock and Roll, and Blues Foundation halls of fame as well as the U.S. Library of Congress' National Recording Registry. Background T-Bone Walker was one of the earliest musicians to use the electric guitar. After moving to Los Angeles around 1936, he began performing regularly in the clubs along Central Avenue, then the center of the city's jazz and blues music scene. He started as a singer and dancer with jazz and early jump-blues bands, such as Les Hite and his orchestra, but by 1940 was playing electric guitar and singing in his own small combos. His particular style of jazz-influenced blues guitar and showmanship, which included playing the guitar behind his neck and while doing the splits, brought him to the attention of Capitol Records. In July 1942, Walker recorded "Mean Old World" and "I Got a Break, Baby" as one of the first artists for the Los Angeles-based record company. Music writer Bill Dahl described the songs as "the first sign of the T-Bone Walker that blues guitar aficionados know and love, his fluid, elegant riffs and mellow, burnished vocals setting a standard that all future blues guitarists would measure themselves by". Shortly thereafter, his recording career was interrupted by the 1942–44 musicians' strike and the diversion of shellac (a key material used in the manufacture of the then-standard ten-inch 78 rpm phonograph record) for the U.S. war effort during World War II. By 1946, Walker signed with producer Ralph Bass and Black & White Records. Although there is conflicting information regarding the recording date, "Call It Stormy Monday (But Tuesday Is Just as Bad)" was released as a single in November 1947. Meanwhile, "Stormy Monday Blues", a jazz single by Earl Hines and His Orchestra with Billy Eckstine on vocals had become a number one hit on Billboard magazine's Harlem Hit Parade chart in 1942 and also reached number 23 in the magazine's pop chart. Credited to Eckstine, Hines, and Bob Crowder, the composition features a big band arrangement with different lyrics and does not include the words "stormy" or "Monday". The fact that both Walker's and the Eckstine/Hines song include "Stormy Monday" in the title has led to confusion regarding the songs' true titles and authorship. Recording and composition There are conflicting accounts about the recording date for "Call It Stormy Monday (But Tuesday Is Just as Bad)". In an interview, Walker claimed that he recorded the song in 1940 "just before the war" (the U.S. entered World War II December 7, 1941), but that it was not released because of war-time material restrictions. Journalist Dave Dexter, who worked for Capitol Records in the early 1940s, believed that Walker recorded it for Capitol before the Eckstine/Hines song (March 1942), but that it was not released because of the unavailability of shellac and the recording ban. However, Walker's first single as a band leader, "Mean Old World", which was recorded in July 1942, was released in 1945 by Capitol. One sessionography places the recording of "Stormy Monday" on September 13, 1947, during his third session for Black & White Records. Blues writer Jim O'Neal noted that blues discographies do not show a recording date before 1947. The recording took place in Hollywood, California, and was produced by Black & White's Ralph Bass. "Stormy Monday" was performed in a "club combo" or West Coast-blues style with a small back-up band. The style, as heard in "Driftin' Blues" (one of the biggest hits of the 1940s), evokes a more intimate musical setting than the prevailing jump-blues dance-hall style. Accompanying Walker is pianist Lloyd Glenn, bassist Arthur Edwards, drummer Oscar Lee Bradley, and horn players John "Teddy" Bruckner (trumpet) and Hubert "Bumps" Myers (tenor saxophone). A key feature of the song's instrumentation is Walker's prominent guitar parts, including the extensive use of ninth chords, which gives the song its distinctive sound. Author Aaron Stang explained: "The real sound of this riff is based on starting each 9th chord a whole step (2 frets) above and sliding down. If we were to analyze this movement, the first chord is technically a 13th chord resolving down to a 9th chord". Guitarist Duke Robillard added The guitar chord line, it's a little guitar ninth chord figure. That was a unique thing and it became T-Bone's signature. And that chord line seems to have grabbed everybody because everybody plays it with that line in it. And it's almost like a law, that you have to, when you play 'Stormy Monday.' Walker also plays twelve bars of single-string guitar solo, which writer Lenny Carlson has described as "remain[ing] largely in the middle register, but it contains some gems, particularly in the use of space, phrasing, and melodic development". The horn accompaniment has been compared to that of Count Basie's 1930s Kansas City jazz bands. Walker uses a standard I-IV-V twelve-bar blues structure for the song and it has been notated in 12/8 time in the key of G with a tempo of 66 beats per minute. The lyrics chronicle the feelings of lost love through the days of week, starting on Monday: "They call it stormy Monday, but Tuesday's just as bad". The mood improves by Friday, when "the eagle flies", a metaphor for payday, which allows for carousing on Saturday. The lyrics end with Sunday, "when the blues and spirituals converged [in] a continuation of a trend used by earlier Mississippi Delta blues singers" and conclude with.... Discover the Aaron Stang popular books. Find the top 100 most popular Aaron Stang books.