CHASING THE BLUES: MINERALS AND MUSIC ALONG WITH ELWOOD AND JAKE

Elwood: What sort of music do you usually have here?

Claire: Oh we got both kinds, We got country, and western.

In this time of the Covid-19 pandemic and self isolation my mind wanders, as readers can tell from several of my postings, and my comments about the Blues Brothers! But at least it seems to work, and I and my family remain well.  I read a new book about every three days, play with the minerals, devour the newspaper, write letters to the editor (few are published), write/read several hours a day, watch a little PBS, exercise, and listen to the oldies music channel. Jake: That Night Train's a mean wine.  Not a strenuous day but not too exciting either; however, we have food and shelter and wellness and for this I am happy.  Actually I am learning much, not only about minerals, but about the world in general and wait for scientists to conquer the coronovirus.  Today, for some strange reason, my mind wandered over to the color blue and this posting is what came up!

Blue

Oh, so lonesome for you

Why can’t you be blue over me

Blue

Bill Mack but a big hit by LeAnn Rimes

Well it's one for the money, well it's two for the show

Well it's three to get ready, now go, cat go

But don't you step on my blue suede shoes

Well you can do anything but lay off of my blue suede shoes

Carl Perkins or Elvis Pressley

Devil with the blue dress, blue dress, blue dress,

Devil with the blue dress on

Mitch Ryder

Blues stay away from me

Uh-uh-uh, blues why don't you let me be

I don't know why you keep a-hauntin' me. and I guess that's why

Delmore Brothers

Got the blues, got the blues

Got the blues, got the St. Louis blues

Louis Prima

OK, what is your favorite color?  For me it is blue.  As John Lennon once sang, “The sun is up, the sky is blue” or Judy Garland’s “Somewhere over the rainbow. Skies are blue.” Thinking about blue: 1) there are more songs with blue is the lyrics than any other color; 2) blue is the only color to have a genre of music named after it, The Blues; 3) if one of our 50 states primarily votes for the Democrat presidential candidate, it is a “blue state” 4) and so it goes.

A poster, source unknown, advertising the Delmore Brothers.

What about your favorite Blues genre or blue in the lyrics song?  Well, as an ole rock and roller Carl Perkins and Mitch Ryder are tough to beat.  But my all-time favorite is the Delmore Brothers, “Blues stay away from me.”  The music is very haunting (probably because of the tenor four string guitar and the harmonica {Wayne Raney} and brings back memories of my youth when Saturday night dances were scattered across the rural areas of Kansas. Those dances usually presented a “big band” sound, or “hillbilly” music; rock and roll generally was confined to school dances.   Yea, I know very few readers have heard a recording by the Delmore Brothers!  But consider they were stars of the Grand Ole Opry in the 1930s and wrote more than 1000 songs. Perhaps Bob Dylan summed it up best: “The Delmore Brothers, God I really loved them! I think they’ve influenced every harmony I’ve tried to sing.”  So, there you know some of my strange secrets!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YUk9UDoVyKk

Maybe you have a favorite "blue" movie?  Who could forget The Blues Brothers--It's 106 miles to Chicago, we've got a full tank of gas, half a pack of cigarettes, it's dark and we're wearing sunglasses.   So, what about your favorite blue mineral?  I presume a large segment of the population would immediately state azurite, the copper carbonate. Others might spout turquoise or zoisite (tanzanite), opal, aquamarine, or numerous others.  I have espoused my views on blue minerals with numerous Blog postings and today have a couple of new, blue, copper arsenates: guanacoite and arhbarite.  You aren’t familiar with them? Neither was I until I found them in a dusty drawer of a small rock and mineral store and started reading.

Arhbarite, a hydrated copper magnesium arsenate [Cu₂Mg(AsO₄)(OH)₃], 
gets its “strange” name from the Type Locality in Morocco, the Arhbar (orAghbar) Mine.  It usually has a dark blue color, a vitreous to sub-vitreous luster, a blue streak, and often forms as botryoidal cluster of radially grown crystals.  However, at times the crystals are so tiny that the mineral appears massive. Arhbarite forms in the oxidized zone of polymetallic ore deposits due to percolating hydrothermal fluids and is usually associated with other copper arsenates such as conichalcite and guanacoite.  Arhbarite is a rare mineral only found in two localities, the Type and in Guanaco in Chile.

In fact, the “strange” name for the second mineral, guanacoite, comes from its Type Locality in the El Guanaco Mine (Atacama Desert, Chile).  The mine produces gold (primary commodity), silver, and copper (chalcocite, bornite, enargite, and covellite) from Eocene rhyolite.  It is both a subsurface and surface mine. In addition, the Mine is a source for numerous and colorful blue and green copper minerals, including copper arsenates.

Dark blue massive arhbarite vug (top) with light blue guanacoite  prismatic and bladed crystals (bottom).  Length (vertical in photo) of both minerals ~3 mm.

 

Closeup of above photomicrograph.

Dark blue arhbarite surrounded by prismatic crystals of guanacoite.  Maximum width of blue mass ~1 mm..

Guanacoite is similar to arhbarite in that it is a hydrated copper magnesium arsenate except it has additional water [Cu₂Mg₃(AsO₄)₂(OH)₄-4H₂O]. It has a pale blue to blue color, a white to light blue streak but most important for identification, it usually occurs as prismatic, acicular to bladed, translucent crystals.  Guanacoite is often found as tiny blades lining, or associated with, vugs of arhbarite.  Again, it is a rare mineral only known from the Type Locality, Morocco, and Spain.

RIP John Lewis: Freedom is not a state; it is an act. It is not some enchanted garden perched high on a distant plateau where we can finally sit down and rest. Freedom is the continuous action we all must take, and each generation must do its part to create an even more fair, more just society.