Johnny Smith Playing Style

[Hyppolyte Bergamotte]

The Girl with the Flaxen Hair.pdf

this is the tune writed by the master himself,59 bars,3 tonal centers, and rythm changes :2/4,3/4/4,typical of the French compositors of this period.
If you analyse the Johnny Smith version,it's much more simplified, essentially in order to exhibit his technical virtuosity.

The original tune is more a question of the installation of a atmosphere

Here's the version for guitar on the James D'Aquisto #1219 from 1990:

[DRS]

For reference

[sgcim]

So the transcription is inaccurate?

All I know is that those three Em7 chords can be played simply by playing open B and E, and the D and G on the 12th frets for the first and third voicings, and the second one you just add your pinky to play the play the B on the 12th fret.

Lenny Breau used harmonics to play these close voicings that have major and minor seconds in the lower voices.
I used tricks like that to play the exact voicings Oliver Nelson used on Stolen Moments. Every other guitarist I've ever heard play that song butchers the harmony when they play the melody to that song, because they don't use Nelson's voicings, which is what makes that song so great.

[jmgalich]

So if you have small or even average hands, can you just work at it till the tendons yield?

Keep at it! I have average hands and that's what I did when I began learning these solos quite a few years ago. Your hand will "adjust" and it becomes easier over time. Although I haven't picked up a guitar in a couple of years for various reasons, I still stretch my left hand in the positions of some of these chords for when I eventually do decide to play again.

John Galich

[DRS]

The stretching is just a means to create the music.
I just happen to really like JS' arrangement but some passages are difficult.

sgcim voicing works but you have to play all notes simultaneously with your fingers which is a different sound than JS gets with his pick.

It's all good as I am also inventing my own voicings. But "Maid . . ." is definately a feel song where your playing adds a tremendous amount of emotion.

[Hyppolyte Bergamotte]

Hey DRS
here a full jazz analysis of the tune

I do not know if it is necessary to push things so far,but ,anyway ,it's interesting
cheers

[sgcim]

The stretching is just a means to create the music.
I just happen to really like JS' arrangement but some passages are difficult.

sgcim voicing works but you have to play all notes simultaneously with your fingers which is a different sound than JS gets with his pick.

It's all good as I am also inventing my own voicings. But "Maid . . ." is definately a feel song where your playing adds a tremendous amount of emotion.

You can play those open string voicings with a pick, JS does it all the time on the things he does in open string keys like 'I'm Old Fashioned'. The highest note in a voicing always gets heard as the melody, no matter which note is strummed first.
JS started to use these types of voicing as he got older, and wasn't capable of stretching like he used to.

While CG players generally love JS, they can get a little testy when it comes to playing pieces from the classical literature like MWTFH. I loaned a copy of my Foursome LP to a friend of mine who was studying with a well-known CG player in college, and got him to play it for his teacher.

His teacher said he didn't like it, and that he had done a much better arrangement of MWTFH!

[Cunamara]

The tab on that sheet music is plain wrong IMHO- those first chords are on the wrong string set, I think. They should be moved one string over, using the B string on top of the chords- or voicing with open strings as others have mentioned. Johnny Smith had medium sized hands.

[Cunamara]

So if you have small or even average hands, can you just work at it till the tendons yield?

You want to stay below the yield strength of tendon. Yielding = rupture.

[wolflen]

here is ted greenes version..note he tuned down to Db..no mention of what guitar he played...

[jrethorst]

Here's a straightforward arrangement for classical guitar. For recordings, Christopher Parkening has a nice one.

[Alder Statesman]

I think I have a music book from Christopher Parkening with "Maiden" in it.
I'll have to give it a go.

Those Parkening transcriptions sound excellent, but they are bears to play, IMO. They should give you some good ideas and fingering to mesh with the JS version you are working on, though.

[va3ux]

Here's a straightforward arrangement for classical guitar. For recordings, Christopher Parkening has a nice one.

Parkening's 1976 recording of this tune was always my favorite. Arranged by Jack Marshall

[DRS]

My transcription is in drop D.
I re-learned it in standard and all those big stretches on the low E string are easier. You loose the bottom on a few big chords. Easier for my hobbit hands.