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Rating: Like a bolt from the blue, two Sundays ago, a friend told me that Johnny Winter would perform here in Sardinia at the Rocce Rosse Blues Festival. Arbatax is very far from where I live and the journey would be long and tiring. But then I asked myself, when would I have the chance to see a living legend like him, someone who has duetted with Duane Allman, played at Woodstock, and produced one of the last masterpieces of the master Muddy Waters, that is, Hard Again? Departure in the morning to Nuoro and then towards the evening, we arrive at the concert venue. In front of the gates, the crowd seems really sparse, but I don't get discouraged; unfortunately, the fame of the albino guitarist in Italy and especially in my island has never been stellar. The concert should start at 10 PM, but Our Man makes us wait a bit, though this doesn't surprise me given his not-so-optimal health conditions, as he was struck by arthritis a few years ago.
But then, suddenly, a trio of guitar-bass-drums enters and starts grinding out instrumental rock blues, but the chair in the center of the stage is still empty. The drummer approaches his microphone and says, "ladies and gentlemen, please welcome the king of Texas blues, mister Johnny Winter," and the sixty-four-year-old sits in the chair, picks up his white, famous headless guitar, and plays a Hideaway by Freddie King just to warm up his hands.
The singer and guitarist delights us with more than good performances of great classics (in random order) like a long and expansive Black Jack by Ray Charles, Red House by Jimi Hendrix, Johnny Guitar, It's all over now, the great Miss Ann by Little Richard, and many others. But perhaps the greatest thrill was seeing him play in the two encores (Mojo blues and a great Highway 61 by Bob Dylan) with his legendary Firebird played in slide style, of which he is perhaps one of the best in the history of blues guitar along with people like Duane Allman and a few others.
What immediately stands out, visually, is his extraordinary thinness and the immobility due to the illness, but aurally, everything is different. Johnny has a touch that only a few white blues guitarists still living possess; the speed isn't the same as before, but he still knows how to pull some spectacular tricks out of the hat (which he literally wears, but it doesn't cover the hair still long down his back). His voice, surprisingly, remains in tune and doesn't obviously try to overdo it. A great applause goes to the bassist and drummer who knew how to adapt the song to the solo raids, sometimes perhaps overly prolonged as expected by the leader, making everything seem smooth as oil. Johnny excellently does his job without dazzling, but the emotion of those who idolize him like me goes beyond the objective opinion of the performance, and then hearing him effectively introduce the songs with few words, and hearing his "thank you"s and especially his counting "one, two, three, four" to set the tempo for the songs gave that human touch to it all. For a fan like me, an unforgettable concert, and forgive me if I wasn't very musically critical but more like an enthusiastic kid in front of a personal hero like Winter. For the non-fans and genre lovers who don't know him, a very good performance. Thank you, Johnny Winter.
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