PORT ISABEL — Rambo didn’t have to go to the crossroads to learn to play the blues.
Ambrosio Barrera, 60, from Port Isabel, is known as Rambo to many. He taught himself to play blues on the harmonica, and it became part of his life.
He’s been playing the harmonica from the day he found one when he was 7 years old.
“I never leave home without it, since I was a kid,” Rambo said. “I like to play the harmonica whenever I want.”
To this day, he carries a harmonica in his pocket.
On the nights he performs he carries a belt full of harmonicas so he can play in any key.
One night in 1978 in Key West, Florida, he played the blues with B.B. King.
He said he loves playing in the key of D because he played it with B.B. King’s song, “The Thrill is Gone.”
He called his ability to play the harmonica a gift from God.
He said he has played with many bands and musicians over the years, but he never had his own band until recently.
“I said one day, I’m going to have a band, and I got on my knees at church and asked for God in heaven to give me a band,” Rambo said. “I asked specifically for one guitar man to play with me.”
Rambo said his prayer was answered.
He didn’t just find a guitar player, he found a band.
He found a guitar player who had a brother who played bass guitar and a friend who played the drums.
“I have had this band now for a year and it’s been awesome,” Rambo said. “The name of the band is The Deep Sea Blues Band because we live near the water.”
Rambo and the band will be playing at Schlitterbahn on Sept. 23 during a fishing tournament.
He said when he was a kid he traveled to pick in the fields with his family and he would play the harmonica in the evenings around the campfire.
One night he walked past some musicians playing the blues on a porch nearby where his family picked in the fields.
He began to play along with his harmonica and the men on the porch heard him and called him to come closer.
“Do that tone, come on do that tone again,” they told Rambo, he said. “And they started jamming with the guitars and everything.”
He said that was the night he learned what the blues is all about.
