Houston, TX based jazz musicians?

[TheAficianado]

Howdy,
I live in Houston, Texas, USA and my name is Blake Arnold. I can be reached at my mailbox here or at johnblakearnold AT gmail.com

I am a guitarist with a lot of experience and I am look to form a combo with a jazz pianist, bass, and drummer, and possibly more. To begin it would be reading out of the Real Books.

If you are another guitarist feel free to drop me a line for some duet gigs.

Thanks!

[jmstritt]

I just saw your post, but I am based in Houston as well. Would love to do some duet gigs!

Send me a PM maybe we can get together and play through some tunes and see if anything clicks.

[TheAficianado]

hi,
A great group of jazzers plays at the AvantGarden on Westheimer neartown on Monday Nights. "Another Fabulous Jazz night at AvantGarden Houston! Speakeasy with Cory Wilson's Jazz Marauders,Frost AlOboudi and Patrick Wheeler will be serving up classic pre-prohibition era cocktails. Tonight at 10PM.
Houston's favorite Monday night." These guys play Spectrum-era Billy Cobham to classic Coltrane and everything in between. I really enjoy hitting that club to watch.
For me, I have just changed back to electric guitar after 17 years of classical gut-string. My equipment is basically a Mesa Boogie .50 Caliber+ head into a 15" Weber Blue Dog Ceramic 50 watt speaker. I usually don't play with any effects other than some reverb, but recently began a new company called WhiteOak Amplification, which designs and builds custom, boutique effect pedals, does amp repairs, and builds custom sub-mini and regular sized tube amps. [I've purchased the domain but I have not put up the site yet as I have been busy at my day job, something should be up in a week at whiteoakamplification.com]
Obviously, the guitar duet setting implies a different set list than a larger group. I like the Larry Coryell-Philip Catherine duets, Joe Pass-Roy Clark, and folks like Pat Metheny, Grant Greene, Emily Remler, and obviously Wes.
Honestly, though I love the straight ahead style, much of my experience as a side-man was with country and blues groups, or in personal groups based around grunge and punk. So what I have been practicing on recently has been a lot of Johnny Winter tunes, Freddy King, pretending I can actually play like Eddie Van Halen on Van Halen I (which I am absolutely sure pisses off my downstair's neighbor ), Helmet, and Sepultura. Meanwhile, what I am listening to is Indian classical music such as Shiv Kumar Sharma, John McLaughlin and Shakti, Ravi Shankar and Imrat Khan. The Soundtrack from BladeRunner, Nirvana's NeverMind, Smashing Pumpkins' Siamese Dream, and Z.Z. Top's first album.
So it really depends on what style and tunes you like, and what type of gigs can be booked, and how long the stage time is, practicing, etc.
But I always like to meet new people and play onstage and kiss pretty girls....
Not necessarily in that order

[jmstritt]

Man I am sorry I didn't get the reply until this morning. I live near Spring Branch so I am pretty close by Avant Garden!

[TheAficianado]

No worries or rush, I lived in Branch for many years and went to Spring Branch High School. Let me know how you want to proceed.