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7-string guitar, perfect for working with another guitarist, or any other instrumentalist or vocalist. One can maintain a nice, round, warm bass line while comping over it. I learned my approach by trying to sound like the Jim Hall-Ron Carter duo rather than Bucky Pizzarelli or Van Eps, whose approaches are wonderful but more orchestral. I even take "bass" solos while the other guitar-holder comps for me.
Beats working for a living.
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12-20-2019 08:44 AM
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Yea... love John Pisano and Pass together... as duo or in ensemble.
Anyway... so if your just having fun... or performing at festival There are generally different results, or at least you are trying for different results. When performing, unless your a star and have hit after hit to perform... you usually need to have your performance be in the entertaining style, the audience is who your performing for. And if your there, you should already have your skills together.
We're not there, right, so we're talking about developing skills that help you perform tunes, in different styles and create interesting and entertaining performances of Tunes.
So there are basic and advanced comping or accompaniment, parts of an arrangement. Take any tune, in any style... they all fit within forms, the sections of time that repeat. The better you get, and the better the players your performing with.... the more you can spontaneously or in the moment... adjust or develop the performance... Live.
Live performance is always enjoyable to watch, it's exciting and audiences become involved in the performance... OK, we're probably not there yet either. I'm just trying help show you where playing tunes can go... When your develop skills, in duos performance skills, your able to create many versions of the same music and have organization of how you perform with those versions using performance skills.
Example... most can add Tags or interludes of simple vamps... right. like at end of solo, vamp on a II- V7 , like on Wave etc...
The II V is a prearranged 2 chord vamp with preorganized feel and development . So there are many other similar devices.
So... really when you playing in a Duo, in a jazz style.... your creating an arrangement of the tune, Live.
Like I posted above... there are tons of boring standard technical skills and arranging techniques that, (like simple II V tag), are part of what comping or accompany can become when performing in Duos. But it's not like you just start using them... they require practicing, just like working on basic lead line comping etc...
It's complicated and there are many technical skills that need to become internalized. Would become a large detailed Thread in itself.
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Originally Posted by Reg
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Hey Matt... don't know exactly. Probable together... but the performance would obviously follow skills etc...
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Originally Posted by Danny W.
As far as two guitars together -- for me, it's all about time feel.
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Originally Posted by WILSON 1
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Originally Posted by Soccerpoodle
I have seen Ramon Banda at Steamers many times with Eschete as well as others. Fine musician.
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Not sure where it is either. I played with Ramon at a gig in Claremont, California. He was just getting ready to record with Joey DeFrancesco. Humble guy who treated me very well even though he was used to playing with much better players.
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From the YouTube page:
L.A. jazz guitarist Frank Potenza and jazz guitar legend Mundell Lowe, along with Rob Thorsen on bass and drummer Ramon Banda in a tribute to the late, great Joe Pass. Jan 13, 2013 performance honoring the Birthday of Joe Pass at the First Christian Church Oceanside, California.
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Was going to post something from the Chuck Wayne/Joe Puma Interactions album but just watched this wonderful duet (which is less apropos to the comping question) so here goes:
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Jack Wilkins and Peter Bernstein:
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Originally Posted by cosmic gumbo
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Originally Posted by mr. beaumont
Doug
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Originally Posted by Doug B
Last edited by Patlotch; 01-28-2020 at 03:08 AM.
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So have we come up with a list of skills, techniques etc... that can be learned and practiced, internalized etc...
-Make the soloist sound best... if we break that down?
yea backing the soloist, vocalist or the melody etc... is part of comping.
Personally the obvious things are yea... don't step on the soloist or who ever is out front. But what generally works better... is to have understanding of what the arrangement of the tune your play is or could become. What organizations of Space...Form etc... work together and how they relate to other organizations of performance.
Variations of everything and the organization of how they work together. Are all part of performance. If you just played and follow a few basic concepts... your going to get boring if your playing more than a few tunes. Great players can entertain with great playing.... but great performances work better within organized forms. Even just head arrangement or verbal arrangement right before performance.
-Maybe start a list of physical performance techniques and break them down into physical guitar techniques.
-Then a list of musically organized performance and arrangement techniques, within styles etc...
-then maybe take three tunes and practice organizing different performances that reflect those lists of performance and style skills.
You'll come up with many comping approaches and possibilities of using them together when performing. Just a thought.... I'll gladly be part of.
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Originally Posted by Patlotch
I was only mentioning the JR recording as an example of how he might comp. I never implied or intended to mean that there was interaction, dialog, etc,etc.
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I haven’t read all the comments here, but a lot of otherwise very consummate players often seem to struggle a bit what playing with other guitar players. Not all I’m glad to say.
The main thing I think is to make an evaluation of who you are playing with. If your duo partner has secure time then you don’t need to spell it out so much. if they are playing a lot of interesting accents you don’t need to play interesting rhythms yourself, unless they leave a gap. Perhaps they might be suggesting some groove or clave to lock into.
on the other hand if your partner is a little inexperienced or unsure you can support them a lot more, and use simpler voicings and clear repeated rhythmic patterns to help them feel the groove.
in terms of voicings I have to say a pet hate is when someone drops extensions in my soloing register. It’s particularly egregious on dominant chords because you might well be playing a semitone clash between a 9 and a b9 or something.
but you can be very creative in how you move between and target chords.
listen. Play simple when the other plays busier and vice versa. If in doubt lay out. Also dynamics can help here too, aim to be under the level of the soloist.
lage Lund has said guitarists tend to play their voicings too high and I’m inclined to agree. However chords with the bottom three strings can be a bit too heavy to use all the time.
2 note shells are a good shout, single bass notes (but not necessarily walking lines) and the odd proper chord for emphasis.
Bb7 - 6 x 6 x x x
Eb7 - 6 x 5 x x x
Eb7 - x 4 5 x x x
and so on....
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I can attest for personal experience that Peter Bernstein is an absolute master at duo comping with an amazing ability to ascertain the best way to play for the other player.
Here he is with forum member Jordan Klemons, who has helpfully transcribed his comping on Jordan’s solo:
there’s a lot to appreciate here, not just the voicings but the creative nature of Peters rhythms which nonetheless never lose the swing or sense of groundedness in the tempo. Jordan’s a very strong player obviously which gives Peter more leeway to be creative .
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Originally Posted by christianm77
Last edited by Patlotch; 01-28-2020 at 02:46 PM.
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A good exercise is to record yourself comping for a few choruses, then try to play along with it. You soon find out how bad your time is and how annoying your comping style is for someone else!
I tried this and found a few things to improve:
- play a chord on beat 1 of the bar, at least quite often. I had a habit of always playing the chord on the ‘and’ of beat 1. Probably sounds cool and hip if you’re playing with a great rhythm section, but in a duo situation it just sounds confusing, when soloing it kept throwing me off knowing where ‘one’ was.
- work on getting the time better, this is where at least hitting ‘one’ accurately really helps the soloist.
- keep the rhythms fairly simple, e.g. Charleston type things a lot of the time. Again I was trying to be hip and play too many fancy rhythms. For more variety play some chords short, some long, rather than lots of clever rhythmic patterns.
- keep the chords fairly simple, obvious really. Keeping to the bottom 4 strings seems to help (e.g. use strings 6,4,3 or 5,4,3).
I think if you listen carefully to those Raney duets, they are doing stuff like this a lot more than you would think, I got some ideas from them.
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I was fortunate to have a guitarist and bandmate work with me for over 20 yrs..we would rip apart songs and experiment with chord subs and voicings and work over the melodies of tunes..
and as other have said if you know the tune..you may have more freedom to experiment a bit..if your playing with another guitarist and he does not know your style .. you should talk about that a bit
If your playing a tune you dont know very well..use caution and basic chord structures and rhythm to keep the tune together..and use only chord voicings, runs inversions etc you KNOW are going to work..
holding chords is not just backround sounds..its giving other musicians the freedom to feel safe to experiment in their solos..knowing where "home" is at all times
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