Jimi Hendrix

Hey! I've been busy for some days due to the "crèdit de síntesi". We had to do a project in groups and it was about the environment, sustainable buildings, climate change...It has been quite interesting but we all have got stressed like every year. It's so difficult to do things ok when you have to deal with the opinions of 4 more people which are never the same as yours, you just want them out of your way and do all the work by yourself. But it is not the objective of the project.

And now I'm busy doing my "individual work". You can't forget about the school although you are on holidays. But well...let's bring up today's subject.

Judit has told me an idea for the blog, she has suggested me to write about Jimi Hendrix. So I will.

You might have heard lots of things about him and I suppose that this won't be new for you. I've got to say first that maybe I'll write things which are not true due to, you know, everybody talks about Jimi Hendrix and of course, there are many legends about him. Ok, he is a legend, and legends are around him (I hope you've understood me).

Johnny Allen Hendrix was born the 27 november 1942, he was later renamed James Marshall Hendrix by his father. But we all know him for Jimi not for James neither Johnny. Jimi changed his name when he did Jimi Hendrix Experience.

He was interested in music due to the influence of the artists of the time like B.B. King or Buddy Holly. Jimi was self-taught, he was unable to read music and this made him concentrate on the music he heard.

He started playing an old one-string ukelele which his father gave him. Then his father gave him a five-dollar second-hand guitar and shortly after that, he joined his first band.

The next summer, his father purchased him his first electric guitar, a Supro Ozark 1560S.

(Supro Ozark 1560S)

Let's go on in time. Jimi Hendrix Experience started and did its first single "Hey Joe". This single was followed by an album, Are You Experienced which has remained one of the most popular albums of all time due to tracks like "Purple Haze", "The Wind Cries Mary" (one of my favourites), "Foxey Lady", "Fire" and "Are You Experienced?".

When the Jimi Hendrix Experience ended and he was back to America, he built his own recording studio, Electric Lady Studios in NYC. He was very happy then that he had a place where he was able to do whatever he wanted. There, he did his most demanding musical release: Electric Ladyland.

When he died he had nearly done a new CD which was going to change the story of music. He died in a circumstances which haven't been completely explained yet. He died when he was 27. The cause of the death was asphyxia caused by his own vomit. He mixed his sleeping pills with alcohol.

James Wright published a book in May 2009 where he says that Hendrix's manager, Mike Jeffery, admitted to him that he had Hendrix killed because he wanted to end his management contract.

Other people says that he committed suicide, there are many things said and I don't know which is the correct one or if even there is one correct, stars deaths are always strange and you never know who is telling the truth. The only thing we know for sure is that he was a great guitar player and that he innovated the way of playing and feeling the guitar. His feedback, wah-wah, fuzz-laden soloing and the incorporation of other effects pedals and units designed for him affected music with a big profundity. The music of Jimi Hendrix has influences from a large list of styles: blues, ballads, rock, R&B, jazz.

He was left-handed and he played a right-handed guitar turned upside-down for left-hand playing and re-strung so that the heavier strings were at the standard position.

Jimi hendrix and his Fender Stratocaster