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His name may be streaked in crimson red but in his soul, James (Blood) Ulmer has got the blues.
"Blues will allow you to play music by ear -- no music, no nothing. Blues just comes from inside," says Ulmer. "When I realized that, I knew I never wanted to lose that factor right there. I played a long time without knowing music or studying music and I realized the blues must have had to do with that whole thing. Blues has been in everything I do."
Though recognized these days as a master of blues guitar, Ulmer is, in truth, a walking history of American music forms.
He started out playing gospel music as a nine- year-old with The Southern Sons, back when blues music was a foreign entity to his God-fearing parents. Ulmer, of course, has since grown to see similarities between the genres.
"The only difference is the words they use," he laughs. "In church, when you're singing gospel music, it's always about the Lord, never anybody else. With blues, they changed the text, but I don't think they changed the music that much."
Ulmer later played in doo-wop groups and Detroit organ combos before devoting himself to jazz, eventually hooking up with trailblazer Ornette Coleman in the early 1970s.
Ulmer became a student of Coleman's harmolodic theory of music and when he went solo, it was Coleman who produced his masterpieces Free Lancing, Black Rock and Tales of Captain Black.
He didn't allow anyone else to produce his records until decades later, when former Living Color guitarist Vernon Reid encouraged him to release a blues album.
"Vernon had this premonition in his head ... he said, 'There's something about you I want to bring out, you're this old blues person like Muddy Waters or B.B. King," he says laughing. "It's somebody watching you who sees something in you that you don't even see ... And he got from me what he imagined!"
Ulmer's most recent blues collection, 2005's Birthright, is the first to be comprised mainly of his own compositions.
"It was like me taking an examination to find out if I knew how to play songs," he says of his first few forays. "After about 30 of those (tracks) I figured my tests were over. Somebody should know I could sing a song by now and if I can sing a song, I can sing my own."
Birthright is also the first album on which Ulmer plays unaccompanied and while his shows this week at The Windsor will be solo, he says it's his least favorite way to groove.
"I like solo least of all because solo is something I always do when I'm writing," he cackles. "It's not as impressive."
Another thing Ulmer always does by himself? Tests out his compositions on a flute, of all things.
"Man, the flute is like my wife," he says. "If I play something on the guitar, before I put it out on the street, it has to sound right on the flute. And if it don't sound right on the flute, I ain't going to play it on the guitar."