Source of Pleasure

There’s no mistaking the deep-seated love for the blues shared by Taj Mahal and Johnny Winter. But though Winter’s devotion has wavered little over 30 years, blue defines only one color of Mahal’s musical rainbow.

The lanky, tattoo-laden Winter has stretched his fondness for Texas-style blues-rock into a long if uneven career. He first made headlines in 1968 when Rolling Stone called him “a 130-pound cross-eyed albino with long fleecy hair . . . playing some of the gutsiest, fluid blues guitar you have ever heard.” Within a year, the flashy singer-guitarist signed a record deal for a then-whopping $100,000.

Known for his furious electric-guitar solos and impressive slide work, Winter thrilled guitar worshipers and packed arenas in the late ‘60s and early ‘70s. But heroin addiction and several uneventful albums sidetracked him before delta blues legend Muddy Waters came to the rescue. Winter produced and played guitar on four of Waters’ LPs, including three Grammy winners: “Hard Again” (1977), “I’m Ready” (1978) and “Muddy ‘Mississippi’ Waters Live” (1979.)

“Muddy was like a father figure to me. . . . He just had a way of making you feel comfortable and good about the music,” Winter said recently from a tour stop in San Francisco. “He’d always say, ‘Johnny, just keep playing them blues--that’s what’s important.’ ”

For the ever-eclectic Mahal, however, blues alone couldn’t satisfy his musical appetite. The muscular singer-songwriter-guitarist has carved out a fulfilling, praiseworthy career by stoking his creative flames in unexpected ways.

Mahal grew up in Springfield, Mass., encouraged to explore a variety of cultures. His mother was a gospel-singing teacher from the South; his father--a jazz pianist and arranger--hailed from Jamaica. Though Mahal (born Henry St. Clair Fredericks) is perhaps best known as a solo troubadour on the acoustic blues circuit, he’s equally steeped in soul, folk, Caribbean, ragtime, jazz, calypso, reggae and rock. Mahal and the Phantom Blues Band open for the Dave Matthews Band on May 20 at Irvine Meadows.

His hard-to-classify style is “an interesting blend. . . . I guess I’d call it acoustic soul,” Mahal said during a recent phone interview from his Pasadena home. “All these different elements are part of a thread that’s led me back to certain techniques and forms of traditional African music. Much of it, like finger-pickin’, has influenced American guitar playing. I see music as the extension of language, humanity and joy.”

He’s now dabbling in film and television, and his 37 recordings roam from urban, electrified blues and rural, acoustic blues to a variety of “music for little people” projects and a new recording of Hawaiian music. Last year, he performed on the nationwide HORDE tour and contributed a stark, folk-blues version of “Honky Tonk Women” to a Rolling Stones tribute album (“Paint It Blue: Songs of the Rolling Stones”).

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Unlike Mahal, Winter is on the comeback trail. After two Grammy-nominated efforts (1991’s “Let Me In” and 1992’s “Hey, Where’s Your Brother?”), he was hospitalized in ’94 because of anxiety attacks and has toured only occasionally since. Now, after a five-year break from recording, he hopes to reestablish himself with “Live in NYC ‘97” and its supporting tour, with stopovers Sunday and Monday at the Coach House in San Juan Capistrano and Wednesday at the Galaxy Concert Theatre in Santa Ana.

Winter, 50 and living in New York, has also battled the prejudice of being white in a genre traditionally identified with blacks.

“I didn’t know if people would put down my work with Muddy. . . . That attitude of, ‘Here’s just another white guy trying to take advantage of Muddy Waters,’ ” he said. “But we got along great when I produced his records because he liked to record the same way I do: Get in there, get it done and get out without much fuss. He told me he didn’t want anyone else producing him, and to gain that kind of respect--from someone like Muddy--was just incredible.”

Winter recalled the joy of jamming with friends and his musician brother Edgar back in his hometown of Beaumont, Texas. But he also recalled how money can turn one’s world upside-down. After signing his contract with Columbia Records, the heat was on to produce a major seller.

“I didn’t worry about it at first, but I soon realized how important the sales figures were to everyone around me,” said Winter, who’s now fronting a trio featuring bassist Mark Epstein and new drummer Vito Luicci. “And my manager back then, Steve Paul, really put the pressure on me. It was a difficult time, and to get everyone off my back, I wound up playing more rock ‘n’ roll than I really wanted to. It took me a while to get back to the blues.”

Winter said he fell in love with the blues while listening to Waters, Howlin’ Wolf, Blind Lemon Jefferson and others on the family radio. “I love the blues. . . . I just couldn’t stop playing them,” he said. “I don’t know what I’d do. It’s such real music that comes from within. So much of rock music is contrived. I know . . . I’ve worn my rock ‘n’ roll shoes and lived through the whole theater [aspect] of it all.”

Mahal, on the other hand, hasn’t traveled such flamboyant side roads. In 1984, his travels took him to the Hawaiian island of Kauai, where he lived for 12 years before moving to Southern California to be closer to the film and television industry. But you have to reach way back for the inspiration behind his brand-new LP, “Sacred Island,” which features Mahal on vocals, Dobro and harmonica plus the flavoring of his Hula Blues Band (which includes members of the Hawaiian group Napali.)

“My dad had this great old Firestone radio with a shortwave band, and it picked up everything,” Mahal said. “We got this one program called ‘Hawaii Calls’ that was just incredible. Man, the depth and beauty of that music just had a grip on me. I was only 5 or 6 . . . but Hawaiian music really touched me.”

“Sacred Island” offers a bubbly mixture of slack-key and steel guitars, ukulele, drums, pan pipes and horns. The cross-cultural material--which ranges from the reggae-flavored “The Calypsonians” to the island strains of “No Na Mamo” to a funky, urban blues number titled “Mailbox Blues”--is sure to confound image-makers still intent on labeling Mahal.

“Man, when I grew up, people had eclectic tastes,” Mahal said. “You’d get into classical, then maybe stretch out into gospel and jazz. You might check out some R & B and blues. But today, everyone’s got their sights on the mainstream Top 10. Americans see music simply as commerce, and the rest of the world considers it an art form. The twain shall never meet.

“My parents opened up the world to me. But now more than ever, there’s this marketing guy who says, ‘We’re not broadcasting anymore. We’ve researched and reviewed the demographics, and we’re narrow-casting.’ I guess I’m just one of the lucky ones. . . . I’ve been around the world on the strength of my music--without any hit songs.”

Mahal, who turns 56 this month, has been inspired not just by the songs of blues greats such as Lightnin’ Hopkins, Sleepy John Estes, Son House and Sonny Terry, but by their desire to reach an ever-widening audience.

“I remember looking back at the careers of different musicians, and some of the legends . . . they didn’t worry about accolades,” said Mahal, who in 1965 formed his first band, the Rising Sons, featuring Ry Cooder. “They just did their trip the way it came down, in honor of the music.

“Did you know that [country-blues legend] Leadbelly had an apartment in Harlem where Lightnin’ Hopkins and other musicians would just hang out and play for these college kids? Just because the students were interested in the music.”

* Johnny Winter performs Sunday (with Eric Sardinas and Steve Copeland & Raging Sun) and Monday (with Eric Sardinas and Blue Jewels) at the Coach House, 33157 Camino Capistrano, San Juan Capistrano. 8 p.m. $29.50-$31.50. (949) 496-8930. Winter also appears Wednesday (with Joe Wood and Adam Cohen) at the Galaxy Concert Theatre, 3503 S. Harbor Blvd., Santa Ana. 8 p.m. $29.50-$31.50. (714) 957-0600.

* Taj Mahal and the Phantom Blues Band open for the Dave Matthews Band on May 20 at Irvine Meadows Amphitheatre, 8800 Irvine Center Drive. 8 p.m. (949) 855-8096. Sold out.