Ronnie Greer has been a much loved and appreciated figure at the heart of the music scene in Northern Ireland for more than fifty years. Something of a legend, really. He’s a top-notch blues and jazz guitarist, who plays with real feeling and soul and has graced stages along the way with Dr. John, Van Morrison, Sonny Terry and Brownie McGhee, Lowell Fulson and a range of top Chicago blues artists.
For many years he held down a full-time job as a director in a steel company as well as performing with the renowned Jim Daly Blues Band and others. Over recent years he’s been delighting audiences and adding to his stellar reputation by his collaborations with top Irish musicians like Grainne Duffy, John McCullough, Ken Haddock and Anthony Toner. Ronnie is not only a gifted musician, but a wonderful raconteur and all-round nice guy. Get yourself to a Ronnie Greer show and you come away smiling – guaranteed!
He’s released three albums since 2015, A Lifetime With the Blues which features contributions from Grainne Duffy, Ken Haddock, Anthony Toner, Kyron Bourke and others; The Jazz Project; and Blues Constellation, a live album – all of them outstanding and drawing hugely positive reviews in the music press.
I caught up with Ronnie recently to chat about his career, the musicians he’s played with some he didn’t…
Gary
Ronnie, you’ve been playing professionally for let’s just say, several decades! But it wasn’t your full-time profession?
Ronnie
I first started playing with a little beat group, when I was about 15, which didn’t really get anywhere. But I then got a job in a showband that was the resident band every Saturday night in the Castle Ballroom in Newcastle. And we’d also do Friday nights, as a warm-up for big bands like the Royal Showband and The Freshman. I was very fortunate with the guys that I played with in that band, most of them were quite a bit older than me – well, I was only 16! And their influence got me listening to a lot of jazz.
Then in my late teens I encountered Jim Daly, the “father of the blues” here in Northern Ireland. He was a great piano player, a Chicago style piano player. I went to one his gigs one night and he invited me to get up and do a couple numbers. And the rest, as they say is history. I spent 25 years or so playing in Jim’s band, which meant that I got a chance to play with American-based genuine blues players. When they came to Northern Ireland, Jim’s band was the band of choice to back these guys. I worked out recently that I’ve worked with maybe 85 or so black American blues artists – guys from the source.
First of all, I was in Jim’s band, and then when I played with Jackie Flavell in the band we formed, Blues Experience, we backed a lot of these guys. But I had the day job and although I had many, many offers to go fully professional into the music business, I chose to stay, doing both. And by staying at home and getting a chance to back these guys, I played with more genuine black American musicians than if I had decided to take my chance and go out to Chicago and try and get a gig there. I’d just have been one of 300 other guitar players trying to get a gig!
Gary
So when you were only 16, Ronnie, how did you get going professionally?
Ronnie
Well, this would’ve been the mid-sixties, which was the British blues boom. You had The Rolling Stones, The Animals, The Pretty Things, obviously John Mayall, Eric Clapton, and many others. So obviously I was right in there at the right time. And I listened to those guys and was heavily influenced by them.
But then when I joined Jim, I started to learn about the people that they were listening to. And Jim was a great mentor to me and got me started listening to Muddy Waters, Howling Wolf, Otis Spann, Otis Rush, Freddy King, Albert King, all the greats.
And, I seemed to be lucky in that I seem to have a natural kind of feel for the blues, which isn’t always the case. It’s something you can’t teach, if it’s not there. But I seemed to have a feel for it. I have shortcomings in other areas of my guitar playing – I’m not a great technician. I can’t play fast – but I can play with quite a lot of feeling, quite a lot of soul. Which is more important when you’re playing the blues than being able to play hundred notes a second, you know?
Gary
Absolutely. So tell me, you must have been pretty good, to be starting to with Jim’s band when you were only 16. When did you first pick up a guitar and start playing? And how did you get to be as good as you were in your mid-teens?
Ronnie
My parents were at a loss one Christmas for something to buy me when I was 12 years old. My dad noticed that I had developed a tendency to stand on a chair, looking in the mirror pretending to play the guitar with the tennis racquet! So it seemed that it might be a good idea to buy me a proper guitar. And I seemed to have a natural flare for it. Up until then, I’d been quite obsessed with sport and had wanted to be a professional footballer. But once my parents bought the guitar, sport took a second place. The guitar was something that I really took to and it’s become a very life affirming thing for me.
Gary
How did you get started playing, then? Did you listen to records and try and copy them?
Ronnie
Very much so. And I started to collect, I’ve got a massive collection of vinyl albums, mostly jazz of the fifties and sixties, and quite a lot of blues. I’ve now got over 5,000 vinyl albums, collected over 50 years. And in fact, the BBC has twice featured my record collection on radio shows. And Duke Special [Irish songwriter and performer] did a video show where he featured my record collection as well.
Anyway, that’s really where I got my knowledge from., I have no formal music training – I can’t read music. Anything that I know about playing music has come from listening and watching other players. Which maybe was a bit regressive – because it would be nice to have the technical information to hand as well. But I can’t complain because I had a kind of gift that many others didn’t. I know lots of musicians who are great technicians and can read music but they don’t really have a lot of feel, a lot of soul in their playing, you know?
Gary
Now I know you’ve played with a lot of well-known blues and roots performers, the likes of Memphis Slim, Dr. John, Sonny Terry, and many others. Would like to pick out one or two of those that perhaps you most enjoyed playing with Ronnie?
Ronnie
Well, Dr. Dr. John would be one of the highlights. Everybody knows of Dr. John. And Sonny Terry and Brownie McGee – I played several times with them. Memphis Slim, as you say, and then Carey Bell, one of Muddy Waters’ harmonic players, and Mojo Buford, who also played harmonica in Muddy’s band. And perhaps a lesser-known player, a guy I had great rapport with was a guy called Phillip Walker, a Texas guitar player, who played in Big Joe Turner’s band amongst others.
And, the ones that I enjoyed playing with most were the ones who were very, very good and recognized that they were playing with people who were actually quite good themselves. And brought them into the game rather than isolate them. Problem was, a lot of the lesser American players that I’ve worked with over the years, if you played a solo and got any reaction at all from the crowd, that was the end of it for you! They’re never gonna give you another solo!
Gary
Give us an example, Ronnie.
Ronnie
Probably the biggest example would’ve been Lowell Fulson who wrote Reconsider Baby. A lovely man, great guitar player. We did several gigs with him over the years at different places, including the Cork Jazz Festival. But we did a gig with him in the Guinness Spot one night at the Belfast Festival at Queens. Three numbers into the concert, he threw me a solo. Which got a resounding round of applause at the end. And that was that for the rest of the night. I might as well have hung the guitar up and gone home!
But yet the likes of Phillip Walker, who was a brilliant guitar player, he and I bonded greatly. And we actually got into feeding off each other. Guys like that were very encouraging. But, you know, they all loved Jim Daly. Jim Daly was a wonderful Chicago Blues piano player.
He played with Muddy Waters in the Mandala Hall in the mid-sixties, just before I joined his band. Much to my disappointment, I missed that one.
But at the end of the gig, Jim sat in with Muddy, after opening the show. Jim’s biggest Influence was Otis Spann, the doyen of Chicago piano blues. But, at the end of the gig, Muddy said to Jim. He says, “Man, you sound more Otis than Otis!”
Gary
And there’s a postscript to this story, isn’t there?
Ronnie
Yeah. Muddy invited Jim to play the next night at his concert in Dublin. But Jim turned it down because he couldn’t get the day off work from his employer, the Northern Ireland Housing Executive!
Whenever Jim died, the BBC asked me to do a little tribute to him on the morning radio breakfast show, presented at the time by Wendy Austin. And I related that story about Jim not going down to Dublin the next day because he couldn’t get the day off work. And Wendy’s comment was, “That was Ronnie Greer paying tribute to his friend John Daly. And I sincerely hope that the Housing Executive appreciated the sacrifice that Jim Daly made for that day!”
Gary
You didn’t get to play with Muddy Waters. Are there any others you didn’t get the opportunity to play with but would have liked to?
Ronnie
We did a gig in the Errigle Inn in Belfast after one of one of Van Morrsion’s Kings Hall gigs. Van and Jim Daly were very good friends, and he had booked Jim to play. So, the whole band got up and played – Georgie Fame did some stuff as well as Van. Andy Fairweather Lowe was in the band but he didn’t play at our gig. He came and complimented us on how much he enjoyed our music but apologized because he had to leave for an early morning flight. So, sadly, we didn’t get the chance to play with him.
Gary
He’s a great guitarist and seems like a very nice guy.
Ronnie
Wonderful, absolutely brilliant guy. That’s the thing, all the great guys that I met or was associated with, virtually without exception, are all very gracious and were very complimentary about what you were try to do. It’s the ones that aren’t so good that seem to have a chip on their shoulder.
And one other guy I didn’t play with but nevertheless got the opportunity to spend time with was the legendary jazz trumpeter and band leader, Dizzy Gillespie. Quite some time ago Dizzy came to Belfast to play at the Queen’s Festival. I’d been asked to keep him company throughout the day before the concert, and there was a reception for him with the great and the good at Belfast City Hall. So we were standing there together while people milled around and had nibbles. And this lady came up to Dizzie, and said to him, “and what instrument do you play?”
Anyway, I found myself alone in a room with Dizzie right before the concert. I asked him if he would play Lullaby of the Leaves, which I explained was a song I loved. “Oh,” said Dizzy, “the young guys in my band wouldn’t know that. But, tell you what, I’ll play it for you now.” And with a big smile, he got out his trumpet and played the song for me. What a moment!
And then there was one thing that happened fairly recently. I play regularly in Bert’s Jazz bar. Actually, I’m about to do another run of Wednesday nights there starting next month with the trio. But anyway, one night I was on holiday and somebody else was doing the gig for me. And that night, a guy came up at the end of the gig and complimented the guys on the music.
So, he says, I’d love to sing with you guys, maybe I could sing Nature Boy with you? Well, it was 12 o’clock and they made an excuse and told him, sorry, we have to finish because if we play any later, the management will complain. So the guy was fine, and he said “no problem,” very polite and understanding, and off he went.
A few minutes later, the guys found out it was Robert Plant! He was in Belfast doing a gig at the SSE Arena with his band. They tried to find him, but he’d gone!
Gary
But still, there are those 80 or so American blues artists you’ve played with…
Ronnie
Yes over the years, I’ve had some great nights with many American blues musicians, maybe some of them not too well known. For instance, we did several trips with Carey Bell, the great Chicago style harmonica player. And on one of them, he brought his son, Laurie, with him. [Laurie is a Blues Music Award winner and a Grammy nominee].
Laurie Bell is the best blues guitar player I’ve ever played with. He’s a fantastic player. And a lovely guy. We played off each other, and after we did three or four gigs I said to him, you’re the best blues guitar player I have ever played with. And he said, man, you were smoking too!
Another great player I enjoyed working with was Guitar Shorty [David Kearney, known for his explosive performances, of whom Billboard magazine said, “Righteous shuffles…blistering, sinuous guitar solos”], who was very, very supportive. We did a gig with him at the Monaghan Blues Festival. Peter Green had just re-emerged onto the scene with his Splinter Group. Peter was top of the bill and we were on before him. Peter was a big fan of Guitar Shorty, so he just pulled up a chair and sat at the side of the stage watching.
Now Shorty was a very, very exciting, visceral player and his big trick was to do a somersault whilst playing a solo. He never missed a note! Don’t ask me how he did it! I mean, it was jaw-dropping. And Peter was sitting at the side of the stage watching this, and when he did it, Peter got up open-mouthed and called the rest of his band over to see it!
Gary
Obviously, the music you love is the blues and jazz. What is it that draws you to this music, Ronnie?
Ronnie
Well, the soulfulness of it and just the visceral quality. Something Mojo Buford, Muddy’s harmonica player said quite frequently – if you don’t like the blues, you got a hole in your soul.
So, I mean, that’s what it’s all about. Now jazz is a more sort of specialized thing. But the blues is such an infectious kind of music. How could you not like it?
It’s a simple form of music. It’s a simple thing that anybody can basically have a go at. But as Chris Barber [legendary English jazz band leader] put it, the big problem with the blues is that anybody can have a go at playing it, but playing it right is another story.
Gary
Ronnie, I’ve talked to quite a number of artists who would now be in their seventies. People like Rory Block, Eric Bibb, Maria Muldaur, and I usually ask them about the process of getting older and their enthusiasm or otherwise for the music and for playing live. And it’s always very interesting to hear their undiminished enthusiasm. What is it that keeps Ronnie Greer going?
Ronnie
Well, it’s in your soul, your DNA. But. As you get older, it’s not the performance, it’s the other stuff that goes around it – you know, getting the gear in and out and so on. But once you start to play, everything else feels insignificant. Humphrey Litttleton [legendary English jazz musician] once said, “I’m getting old now. All my guys in the band are a lot older, and we’ve all got health issues – but once we start to play, Dr. Gig takes care of it.”
For readers in Ireland, you can catch Ronnie playing over the next couple of months:
- Regular slots: American Bar, second Saturday afternoon of every month, with John McCullough and Ken Haddock
- international Blues in the Bay, Warrenpoint, Thursday 20th May
- Courtyard Theatre, Ballyearl, 3rd June
- Guinness Blues Café, Deer’s Head, Belfast City Blues Festival, 24th June
- Open House Festival, Walled Garden, Bangor, 20th August.