Deep in the blues a Guy called 'Slick' slides his way into the music

While many 18-year-old guys wear baseball caps, T-shirts, jeans and tennis shoes, Daniel 'Slick' Ballinger wears hats with a feather in the brim, gold chains and rings, purple suits and alligator or eel-skin shoes.

Daniel ‘Slick’ Ballinger’s playing gets legendary blues musician Otha Turner moving to the beat. "He knows the blues," says the 94-year-old Turner. Ballinger, 18, spent time last summer learning from — and living with — Turner, near Senatobia, Miss.

Instead of trendy bands such as Incubus and The Hives, Ballinger listens to the old-time, earthy, gruff blues played by R.L. Burnside, Muddy Waters and Mississippi Fred McDowell. "I heard that music and it just called me," said Ballinger, who lives in Raleigh, N.C. "It's like Big Lucky Carter said: It's a medicine. I gotta have it. I put on those blues and I feel happy."

Ballinger, who has been studying, singing, playing and performing the blues in juke joints and nightclubs for the past three years, feels he still has a lot to learn. "I'm deep into the blues and it's just to the point where it's fixin' to come through my fingers like it really should be."

He got a jump on his blues education when he spent part of last summer living with 94-year-old legendary blues musician Otha Turner near Senatobia, Miss. "This summer has been the best summer of my entire life."

"I put on those blues and I feel happy," says Slick Ballinger,
here with R. L. Boyce at Boyce’s family reunion near Como, Miss.

Turner is impressed with Ballinger. "He's hard to beat. He knows the blues," Turner said, adding, "He's better than some of these old ones I've heard play.

"Fred McDowell is about as good as I've ever heard and I know he can play. And Lightnin' Hopkins is another one. And them's the only two that got something on Slick, I see."

Sherman Cooper, a blues supporter who often features veteran blues players at events at his farm in Como, Miss., also is impressed with Ballinger. "A lot of the white blues players, they don't give you that real feeling like the old blues musicians," he said. "But Slick for some reason, he gives me that real feeling about the blues."

Music has always been Ballinger's first love. His father used to listen to country music and rock and roll. "I used to love singing along to it," he said. "I didn't have any voice then. I'm not saying that I have a real good voice now, but I know I can sing better than I did then."

Ballinger discovered the old-style blues when he saw the 1989 movie based on the life of Jerry Lee Lewis, Great Balls of Fire!. In the film, "He's a little boy and he sneaks up to the window at the juke joint. I saw him peeping through there and they showed all these people dancing and hollering and this old man playing the piano, Big Legged Woman. All these fine women were in there jumping and shouting and all these men (were) dressed up in nice suits and hats. I said, 'Man, this is pretty cool.' "

Great Balls of Fire! just touched on the blues. About a year later Ballinger saw the 1986 movie Crossroads, a story about a young musician's friendship with a legendary bluesman. He was struck with the harmonica music at the beginning of the film. "When I heard that harmonica, it sent chills. I felt like I knew that music, but I had never heard it like that before."

He was hooked when he saw the old bluesman play the guitar in the movie. "He puts that bottleneck slide on his finger and he slid that slide up on the guitar and started singing, 'I went down the crossroads.' Dog! It felt like I was just hit with a bolt of lightning. I felt like, 'Man, I know this music.' I said, 'Man, that's the blues right there. That's the real blues.' "

Ballinger got a socket out of the garage and put it on his finger to use as a guitar slide and kept rewinding the movie to the scene showing the bluesman playing the slide guitar. He played along with the movie and tried to copy the style.

He then began his search for blues recordings. "I went to Wal-Mart looking for some blues. The only blues I could find was Buddy Guy. I said, 'Let's see what he's all about.' "

Ballinger liked Guy, but his type of blues wasn't the music he was looking for. "It just wasn't as deep as I was gonna go. And I still ain't got as deep as I'm gonna get."

He then listened to Elmo James and Muddy Waters. "I went deep, deep into Muddy Waters."

Ballinger began playing blues in clubs. He saw a photo of bluesman Waymon Meeks on the wall of one of the clubs and asked the owner about him. "He said this man plays blues like Robert Johnson, 'Son' House and Fred McDowell. And I said, 'Lord have mercy. I didn't think anybody was still doing it. Especially young black guys.' "

A few months later Meeks showed up at another club with his guitar and performed. He and Ballinger got to know each other. Meeks showed him how to play slide guitar. He also wrote down names of blues musicians Ballinger should know.

Meeks gave Ballinger some musical tips. "Waymon comes up and says, 'Man, get rid of that pick. You don't need no pick.' He said, 'You gonna play the blues, you gotta play all those strings, man, and you gotta hit 'em with your fingers.' "

Meeks said, "Daniel is one of the most genuine persons I've ever encountered in terms of this body of music. He appreciates it in terms of what the people who came before him contributed to the body of music - not so much the glitz and the glamor, but the emotion and expression of the music and what it represents."

On his 16th birthday, Ballinger's mother took him to Memphis. He heard the blues played on Beale Street, but it wasn't the old-fashioned blues.

It wasn't until his next Memphis trip that Ballinger found some authentic old-style blues players. He heard music coming from an alley on Beale and discovered a group of performers playing for tips. "Oh, man, they were singing," Ballinger said. "They had a guy playing drums, just easy drumming, playing the slow blues. They had a guy on the harmonica and they were all just getting down with it. I said, 'Lord, have mercy, man, the real thing is still there.' "

Ballinger performed with them. "Still to this day I haven't seen anything quite like it."

He returned home and continued to study the blues during his senior year in high school. He met some musicians and formed a blues band, Rev. Slick's BBQ Band, which includes Josh Preslar, 23, on drums, and Turner Brandon, 23, on harmonica.

Brandon recalled the first time he saw Ballinger: "He was sitting there with a chicken fingers basket stomping his foot. He's dressed up like a pimp. And his foot was going like this (up and down). I'm like, 'If there isn't the coolest person in Raleigh right there.' "

Ballinger returned to Memphis last May for the Blues Foundation's Handy Awards. He got a backstage pass and met B. B. King. "B. B. King has so much soul to him," he said. "When I saw him sitting down in that chair I started crying."

Shortly after, Ballinger performed at a picnic in Mississippi. Otha Turner was among the guests. "Mr. Otha got up and danced while I played. I mean danced. Oh, man, I was in heaven. He says, 'Slick, I'm trying to tell you, you're good.'

"He asked me how long I was gonna be in Mississippi. I said, 'I'm gonna be in Mississippi for a little bit. I'm trying to stay as long as I can, but I can't stay that long.' And he says, 'Well, why don't you come stay with me?' "

Ballinger went to Turner's farm the next morning and stayed for a month. He'd get up at 5:30 every morning with Turner telling him, " 'Come on, Slick. I need your help.' We'd go out there and work on the fence. I cut my hand. You see that scar right there? We picked peas."

Turner said, "I say, 'Your eatin' and drinkin' ain't gonna cost you nothing, but when I got something to do out there I expect you to help me out.' "

Various women showed up with food around lunch time. "These old ladies would come get me, cook me catfish sandwiches," Ballinger said. "Thirty minutes later someone else would walk through the door and cook me a fried chicken dinner with pinto beans and cornbread."

At night, Ballinger played music. "Mr. Otha would carry me at night time to different people's houses to play the blues. Just about every night we'd go to somebody different and play the blues. We'd have such a good time. And the women would get up and dance."

R.L. Burnside heard him play. "He's good, man," Burnside said. "Everything he plays is good. He plays the blues, man.

"He's been to my house and played. I didn't play with him, but he played some of my songs. He did good, man."

Ballinger also performed at the Como Steak House in Como, Miss. "People would throw me $100 bills. One man gave me five $100 bills. I came out of there one night with $601 in 2 1/2 hours. That's the way the blues works."

His blues playing skill improved about 70 percent while he was living with Turner, Ballinger said. "My music got so much deeper and rural in style. Instead of playing more of a city style blues, I played blues like they play way off in the backwoods."

Back in Raleigh, Ballinger hones his guitar skills and writes blues songs between schoolwork. He continues to listen to recordings and view live performances by blues performers. "I try to take in everything they give me and try to make my own thing with it. I don't want to sound like anybody else. If I hear somebody playing in the same kind of way I say, 'Man, I'm gonna have to change that and be myself.' "

Whenever he runs across young kids interested in the blues, Ballinger teaches them everything he knows. "I'm building them diddley bows so they can play them."

- Michael Donahue: 529-2797