Getting Started with Comping Ballads (Behind a singer perhaps?)

[jamiehenderson1993]

Hi,

I've started looking at playing over Ballads - and I'm feeling like my current style of Freddie Green Comping Shell Chords isn't really sounding right

Can anyone provide me with any general advice or tips on what voicings to use and maybe rhythms or videos/books/albums I could check out for Ballad comping (maybe behind a singer - but not necessarily)?

As well as maybe suggest some good Ballad tunes to get started with that would cover a lot of what's needed to play this style?

I'm liking Polkadots as well as Stars Fell on Alabama & Body & Soul.

[joe2758]

Just guitar and singer, or a group?

[mr. beaumont]

Totally depends on what other instruments are playing...if it's just you and a singer, your role is different than if you're in a group...

[pamosmusic]

Totally depends on what other instruments are playing...if it's just you and a singer, your role is different than if you're in a group...

Just a singer, it’s shells, sideslipping, good time, maybe four on the floor.

Clear bass notes, clear and not overbearing harmony, motion to keep things interesting rather than fancy chords

[Tal_175]

[pamosmusic]

Well yeah ... and that's the ideal.

At one point I owned all the Joe and Ella albums on CD.

[AllanAllen]

Listen to the piano behind Frank Sinatra, it's not hitting quarter notes (no Freddie Green), takes breaks to do tasteful runs, lets the song breathe.

If you want a guitar example, there's this stellar album with Barney Kessel

You can get a lot of mileage from shell inversions, just walk a chord up (or down) the neck to the next chord. There's no quick way to do this, learn inversions by rote memorization and shoehorn them into your playing. You have your entire life to learn all the greek names for analysis, it's okay to focus on shapes and music for a few weeks to get some music out of the guitar.

Here's a ii V I. I slide into the first Am and D7 chords,

Am
3x24xx
5x55xx
8x79xx

D7
(10)x(10)(11)xx
8x77xx
xx757x
5x45xx

G
xx5433
xx4433
xx2433

[joe2758]

XX5457 just use this chord for everything

[joe2758]

and this move

x5656x
x4x354

[pamosmusic]

Listen to the piano behind Frank Sinatra, it's not hitting quarter notes (no Freddie Green), takes breaks to do tasteful runs, lets the song breathe.

bro do I look like a piano player?

[joe2758]

bro do I look like a piano player?

you look like a 'boner

[fep]

I learned/transcribed more or less the guitar part to this as part of learning how to accompany a singer with a jazz style. Half the tune is just guitar and vocal. I think this is a great starting point, at least for a ballad.

[nevershouldhavesoldit]

Sammy Davis Jr (no smirks, please - he was a decent singer and a wonderful entertainer) and Mundell Lowe made one of most beautiful, tasteful albums of ballads by a guitar / vocal duo in history. It’s called Mood to Be Wooed, and it’s continued to inspire me since I got the album many years ago. Like BK did with Julie London, ML really sets the bar high on this one.

Talk is cheap, but no verbal description can impart the depth of feeling and sensitivity you’ll hear on this album (which is only $14 on CD from Amazon). You’ll learn something new every time you listen to one of these gems.

I can’t find the full album on YT, but all the tracks are there - you just have to play them one by one. Here’s one to start:

[mr. beaumont]

Sammy Davis Jr (no smirks, please - he was a decent singer and a wonderful entertainer) and Mundell Lowe made one of most beautiful, tasteful albums of ballads by a guitar / vocal duo in history. It’s called Mood to Be Wooed, and it’s continued to inspire me since I got the album many years ago. Like BK did with Julie London, ML really sets the bar high on this one.

Talk is cheap, but no verbal description can impart the depth of feeling and sensitivity you’ll hear on this album (which is only $14 on CD from Amazon). You’ll learn something new every time you listen to one of these gems.

I can’t find the full album on YT, but all the tracks are there - you just have to play them one by one. Here’s one to start:

I had never heard this. It's absolutely wonderful.

[AllanAllen]

bro do I look like a piano player?

I believe jazz to be a piano and saxophone genre. As guests to the party, we should be respectful and try to fit in.

[mr. beaumont]

An important aspect of backing up a singer...creating intros that establish a key reference and a nice strong V for them (assuming the tune starts on I)

[pamosmusic]

I believe jazz to be a piano and saxophone genre. As guests to the party, we should be respectful and try to fit in.

how very dare you.

[AllanAllen]

An important aspect of backing up a singer...creating intros that establish a key reference and a nice strong V for them (assuming the tune starts on I)

Yeah, this needs to be emphasized. Try to pedal the first melody note through a I vi ii V to start off a tune. The singer might not know why they feel so comfortable, but they will.

[nevershouldhavesoldit]

An important aspect of backing up a singer...creating intros that establish a key reference and a nice strong V for them (assuming the tune starts on I)

Sadly, it's not often that straightforward. I've been backing vocalists for over 60 years, and I remain shocked at some of the things we need to do to keep even some of our best on track. My biggest pet peeve is that so many need the intro to end on the exact note with which they begin. More than a few can't even pick it up if the note I give them is an octave above or below theirs. If the pickup is over a formata at the end of an arpeggiated chord, I have to make sure that the "bell note" is both loud enough and distinct enough for them.

Many flub pickups that start partway through a bar. I've had many otherwise great vocalists come in wrong on Our Love is Here to Stay so many times that I hit a dramatic accented chord on the 1 of the pickup bar with the first note (the 5) as prominent as I can make it. I also position myself so the singer can at least see my head and one of my hands, and I nod &/or point on the starting beat. I also gesture for cues, returns after solos etc.

These are just a few of the problems that come up with the intro, and I've been amazed at the wonderful singers who are plagued by them. Discuss all of this beforehand and respect the singer's neeeds and weaknesses. Keep it simple, and make both the note and the beat obvious so they can hit the first note with confidence. One of the most important things that makes a vocalist (or a guitarist) sound great is the ability to hit every note like you know exactly where and when it is. Playing and singing with confidence goes a long way toward a polished, professional sound. You have to help the vocalist achieve this.

It's about the song, not your playing. And we're just discussing the intro here - the pool of pitfalls throughout a tune is vast, and it has a rocky bottom, I'll show you my scars from forgetting that.

[pamosmusic]

I believe jazz to be a piano and saxophone genre. As guests to the party, we should be respectful and try to fit in.

And as an actual answer -- this just isn't really the case. Buddy Bolden would like a word with you.

And if it were the case, why not just give someone the correct advice? Which would be to quit guitar and play piano instead.

We have to have ways of accompanying singers that are not just approximations of what a piano does. When everyone on this thread keeps agreeing that time and roots are the place to be, I think it's sort of hard to argue against time and root movement as the place to start.

[RLetson]

[Insert standard not-a-jazz-player disclaimer here--hope I'm not gettin' above my raisin'.]

For the last 30 years, I've mostly been an accompanist, and what I have to do depends a lot on the context. Are we a duo or a larger group, and if the latter, how constituted? Just me and a bass behind the singer, it's one thing. Me and keys, quite something different. Drums? Way different. A lot of my duo/trio experience is supporting a singer-guitarist, which further conditions what I try to supply. (It might also matter that I'm mostly a fingerstyle player, unless it's a country tune.)

In general, I think I'm operating in both rhythm and chord-melody modes--maybe simultaneously--and often rather minimally. For standards and standard-adjacent songs, I find myself starting with shell voicings (country or folk material calls for a different approach), and, as several posts above suggest, intros and tags are important structural concerns, as are the places where the singer is not singing. An accompanist is a kind of arranger, and I try to arrange myself behind the singer, but not so far that we don't connect.

[AllanAllen]

And as an actual answer -- this just isn't really the case. Buddy Bolden would like a word with you.

And if it were the case, why not just give someone the correct advice? Which would be to quit guitar and play piano instead.

We have to have ways of accompanying singers that are not just approximations of what a piano does. When everyone on this thread keeps agreeing that time and roots are the place to be, I think it's sort of hard to argue against time and root movement as the place to start.

Counterpoint, Al Viola is playing guitar on that Sinatra tune.

[mr. beaumont]

Sadly, it's not often that straightforward. I've been backing vocalists for over 60 years, and I remain shocked at some of the things we need to do to keep even some of our best on track. My biggest pet peeve is that so many need the intro to end on the exact note with which they begin. More than a few can't even pick it up if the note I give them is an octave above or below theirs. If the pickup is over a formata at the end of an arpeggiated chord, I have to make sure that the "bell note" is both loud enough and distinct enough for them.

Many flub pickups that start partway through a bar. I've had many otherwise great vocalists come in wrong on Our Love is Here to Stay so many times that I hit a dramatic accented chord on the 1 of the pickup bar with the first note (the 5) as prominent as I can make it. I also position myself so the singer can at least see my head and one of my hands, and I nod &/or point on the starting beat. I also gesture for cues, returns after solos etc.

These are just a few of the problems that come up with the intro, and I've been amazed at the wonderful singers who are plagued by them. Discuss all of this beforehand and respect the singer's neeeds and weaknesses. Keep it simple, and make both the note and the beat obvious so they can hit the first note with confidence. One of the most important things that makes a vocalist (or a guitarist) sound great is the ability to hit every note like you know exactly where and when it is. Playing and singing with confidence goes a long way toward a polished, professional sound. You have to help the vocalist achieve this.

It's about the song, not your playing. And we're just discussing the intro here - the pool of pitfalls throughout a tune is vast, and it has a rocky bottom, I'll show you my scars from forgetting that.

I definitely didn't mean to make it sound straightforward! Knowing your singer and what you need to do for them to get them in time and on key can be...exhausting...and it's an incredibly important skill set.

[pamosmusic]

Counterpoint, Al Viola is playing guitar on that Sinatra tune.

If you mean that his pulse mostly playing quarter notes, then sure.

[AllanAllen]

This is excellent!