Making scalar runs jazzy

**pamosmusic** · 08-07-2023, 06:12 PM

Originally Posted by djg

how people hear stuff differently. to my ears the slurring into upbeats is the enemy of proper jazz phrasing(disclaimer: i'm a narrow-minded bopper). i think it's this kind of phrasing that prevents me from enjoying a player like sco. it just doesnt sound like jazz to me. to my ears jazz phrasing is playing *into* the beat. galper makes the point that the "one" is the end of the bar and not the beginning. bach agrees. to me the on-beats are mostly landing zones.

also when slurring into an off beat, the note on the beat is louder that the off-beat. i dont like that. regarding trumpet players the default phrasing is slurring into the beat. terry, hub and brownie have been mentioned. i cant imagine there will be many examples of those guys slurring into an off-beat. maybe a bit more with terry who started out pre-bop. wes or martino do very rarely slur into an off-beat. but again the default is moving into the beat and finding fingerings to support that. i really like john mcneil's book "the art of jazz trumpet" on the subject of phrasing. it's a tough workout for guitarists.

WHOA. My bad. Huge typo. Slur into DOWNBEATS.

Downbeats.

slur into downbeats. I said that in my earlier posts but for some reason flipped it in this one. Sco slurs into DOWNbeats.

geez. My bad.

**Christian Miller** · 08-07-2023, 06:40 PM

Wait I’m really confused now lol

You articulate the ands with a pick stroke and slur into the on beat notes. This I understand as ‘slurring into downbeats’

but I recall djg sharing an example of a player doing this and being negative about it

**pamosmusic** · 08-07-2023, 06:48 PM

Originally Posted by Christian Miller

Wait I’m really confused now lol

You articulate the ands with a pick stroke and slur into the on beat notes. This I understand as ‘slurring into downbeats’

but I recall djg sharing an example of a player doing this and being negative about it

Yes I pick an “and” and hammer, pull, or slide into a beat. That’s also what I recall Scofield saying he did.

That was just the worst typo of all time and has been edited.

**pamosmusic** · 08-07-2023, 06:53 PM

But for what it’s worth, doodle tonguing would seem to imply a good bit of articulated beats and slurred “ands.”

Really is kind of a crazy world out there.

**Christian Miller** · 08-08-2023, 07:14 AM

Originally Posted by djg

must've been a misunderstanding. i already wondered in the other thread. slurring/hammering into the beat is the good stuff.

Just when I had you pegged as a contrarian :-)

**pamosmusic** · 08-08-2023, 09:20 AM

Articulation is so fascinating to me. I started a thread about it way back a few months ago.

Guitarists in general just don’t think about it much. Part of it is probably technical—we just can’t shape stuff the way a trumpet can. But still. Interesting.

**gcb** · 08-08-2023, 09:58 AM

Octave displacement/pivot (no affiliation)

**rpjazzguitar** · 08-08-2023, 01:33 PM

Originally Posted by pamosmusic

Articulation is so fascinating to me. I started a thread about it way back a few months ago.

Guitarists in general just don’t think about it much. Part of it is probably technical—we just can’t shape stuff the way a trumpet can. But still. Interesting.

There's a style of jazz guitar which has the notes speak, to my ear, more like a piano than a horn. An archtop straight into an amp, heavy strings and each note is played cleanly. Sounds great.

But, in blues and rock styles, other articulations are common, e.g. bending, pre-bending, finger vibrato, whammy bar vibrato or pitch change, hammering, pull-offs, sliding, pinch harmonics, open strings ringing, extra sustain, and various pedal effects, to name those that leap to mind.

To my ear, saxophone, in the right hands, is more expressive, but there's a lot guitarists can do.

**pamosmusic** · 08-08-2023, 03:25 PM

Yeah there’s a lot guitarists can do, but the time comes to call it jazz, we tend to forget about it all.

Not to mention, we don’t put much thought into it.

Ask a guitar player when they slur and they usually say: when I want to play faster.

Ask a saxophonist when the slur and they say: depends on the line.

Articulation is inseparable from rhythm and shape.

**rpjazzguitar** · 08-08-2023, 03:32 PM

I think about articulation all the time. But, if I had Tal Farlow's chops, maybe I wouldn't.

I left an important one out: palm muting. In fact, muted notes in general, including the muted string in the middle of a Wes octave.

**sgcim** · 08-08-2023, 08:40 PM

Originally Posted by djg

nice intro:

so many runs

Compare KB's version of the SOYS to Benson's. IMHO, one guy sounds like he's just playing licks, and the other guy sounds like he's making musically meaningful statements. As the Moody Blues Graham Edge would say, "You decide which is real, and which is just illusion".

**cmajor9** · 08-09-2023, 03:25 AM

Originally Posted by sgcim

Compare KB's version of the SOYS to Benson's. IMHO, one guy sounds like he's just playing licks, and the other guy sounds like he's making musically meaningful statements. As the Moody Blues Graham Edge would say, "You decide which is real, and which is just illusion".

Two different approaches for sure, but I wouldn’t characterize one as “just playing licks” and the other as ‘making meaningful statements”.