-
Hi there,
I used to play guitar some time ago but quit playing for about 5 years now.
Back then I listened to all sorts of music, and "attempted" to play all sorts of music. I wasn't focused, no plan for development, although I got lessons for about two years, but I wasn't dedicated enough.
To get the point though, I had a Fender Stratocaster back then, and I didn't get to try out many quality guitars, actually a very very few like 4 or 5 other than mine. So my knowledge of electric guitars is very narrow, and I've only played solid body guitars, no hollow or semi-hollows.
Now, I'm all about jazz, and I'd like to get back to playing the guitar, but this time to play mostly jazz. I can see that hollow-bodies are being described all the time as the quintessential jazz guitars. I've never tried one, but if someone could take the stratocaster as a starting point and compare everything to it, it would really help a lot. I'm also quite intrigued by musicians using Telecasters for jazz, and would like to know your opinion of that.
I know what I liked and didn't like about my strat; I loved the feel of the neck and fretboard, the tone was great for blues, but to me it wasn't that hot for other stuff on the rock side (it was all maple with stock single coils, and I kinda liked the sustained big/heavy sound of mahogany and humbucker pickups more for the heavier stuff).
Now that I have a clear target I would like to get your recommendations for a jazz guitar purchase based on the above, and preferably while constantly comparing to what I already know.
P.S. Where I live, I don't get to try out lots of guitars, and will seize the chance to buy something when abroad for probably a short period, and that is why I need the comparison with a guitar that I've played for several years.
-
08-12-2013 05:25 PM
-
You can play Jazz on any guitar its about the notes first and foremost.
Tele vs Strat tele can get a better Jazz tone and many Jazz players have used them over the years.
Strat's are capable of an okay Jazz tone. What makes a strat a popular rock guitar the whammy bar, floating bridge, extra body cavity, and springs give strat a sound hard to tone down for Jazz. That's my opinion and they will be lots of strat lover with opposing opinions. Read all post and in the end go back to my first statement you can play Jazz on any guitar.
-
I have been having an affair with my Strat for a few weeks now. Please don't tell my archtops about it, I couldn't stand it if they left me. What I would say is to try a Tele for jazz, it is much better suited tonally than a Strat. Or, mix your two preferences and use a semi-hollow (335 type). It can be the best of both worlds. Bigger tone and more of a rock/blues feel to the guitar. I mean as far as the size and weight, etc..Some hollowbody archtops can feel very large like an acoustic guitar or more. I am used to it and like that feel. But, I love the comfortable feel of Fender guitars. And, when I use a Strat or Tele at a rock/blues jam session and throw in a big fat jazz chord, it sounds great. One other thing, don't be afraid to use flatwound strings on a Tele. I held off for years with that and when I finally did (from reading this forum) I loved the tone.
-
I'm old and old school...well actually self taught...
Archtop has been my choice for jazz since 1965...!!
I have had others and played hundreds in my lifetime (so far)...
Had a 62 Strat I sold a few years ago....I should have bought a few more in the years after that one..
Archtop....
time on the instrument...
-
If you're going to exclusively play jazz then get an archtop. I also came from a rock and blues background. Aside from tone, the big difference with an archtop is that the old bag of tricks: sustain, bends, hammer-ons, etc., just don't work anymore. It's a great tool for getting out of your comfort zone and onto new ways of thinking and playing. Of course, I still have the other guitars for when I want to go back to my roots.
If you're mainly after tone and you want to maintain some flexibility, there are plenty of options in solid and semi-hollow guitars that will cut it for you. If it's jazz, jazz, and more jazz, go with the archtop.
-
So.. OP.. are you thinking a more electric jazz sound or something leaning more acoustic? Do you have some guitar players who you feel have a great tone?
-
I had a chance to play at volume the other night and I was trading off between a strat and a tele. Both had flatwounds, boutiquey pickups and were played through my Quilter.
We played a handful of standards to change pace and I felt that the "2" position on my strat, which was the neck and middle pickup (presumably in parallel, right?) was not really tame-able for jazz. I'm sure it'd be fine for a restaurant gig or something -- passable, but it really was too bright and open sounding. It felt like they tele was easier to tame.
Oh well, what the heck do I know...
-
for jazz its the arch top (we don't really call them "hollow bodies").
if you really like 25.5" scale length then I would suggest a Gibson Wes, L5, or Le Grand. new or used, depending on your budget - and try before you buy.
you should know however, that most of the top luthiers are emulating the Johnny Smith specs.
17" lower bout
21" length? (not certain about that)
3" depth
25" scale length
1.75" nut width
The last two parts of the spec make the biggest difference to your hands
-
Chris Crocco plays clean (i.e., no effects) jazz on a strat, and he uses heavy strings and gets a pretty "full" sound. As someone above said, you can play jazz on any guitar.
I've had full hollowbodies and semi's, and both styles sound good to me. Go to a store and play a bunch of guitars.
-
Jazz is played on instruments as diverse as electric guitar, acoustic guitar, nylon-string guitar, piano, saxophone, flute, clarinet, vibes, violin, harmonica, etc.
Strats have some great tones, I don't see why they wouldn't work for jazz. You don't have to follow an inflexible tradition.
Check these great sounds starting at 1:10. Not traditional, but good sounds non the less.
-
When playing electric in a group setting, I never have a problem getting a good warm jazz sound on a strat with the neck pickup...or a tele...or a LP...or a semihollow...it all easily sounds warmer than Grant Green...
-
Arch top jazz boxes have a punchy midrange sound that works great for cutting through other instruments. Not much bass and it just sort of lives in it's own defined sonic space that doesn't step on other instruments' toes. Similar can be said for humbucking pickups. The two coils attenuate the highs and lows so you get a more focused mid-centered frequency response.
Strats work great in a trio setting where you're not competing with keys and sax for the lower midrange frequencies. Unless your name is on the marquee like Bill Frisell, Wayne Krantz (or in rock genre Eric Clapton, SRV) where you're paying the bills and everyone has to play around you. But in a setting with lots horns and keys, Strats with single coils can be too wide ranged. I've played in funk bands and when we play small shows with just guitar, drum, and bass I can use a Strat just fine. When we start adding keys and horns I go to a 335 for the reasons I mentioned.
Also Strats have that open airy Strat sound that's just always there no matter what you do and it's not a particularly stereotypically jazz type of sound. To me, Telecasters are a little more "neutral" sounding and with a humbucker in the neck...viola! Dark, midrangy, and jazzy. Relatively speaking.
Now, if you realistically think you'll just be practising at home and not playing jazz gigs for the foreseeable future you might want to consider getting just a good ol flat top acoustic. They have a lot more bass than an arch top, which isn't ideal for a lot of jazz gigs but if you're not playing jazz gigs the flat top is more versatile in that you can do chord melody stuff and use the fuller bass response, or if you do any voice and guitar duets particularly with a female vocalist the flat top will work nice.
Here's Kenny Burrrell playin some jazz on a flat top
-
With a blocked tremolo and thicker flatwounds, I easily get a very nice and sweet jazz tone from the neck pick up on my stock Strat.
-
I totally agree! I started with a 50's strat blocked tremolo and 13's flatwounds. I don't see a problem with that. and later you will know what and if you need a specific guitar.
Originally Posted by oldane
-
That's a tough one. Originally Posted by Spook410
Well, I would say that I love the Pat Metheny tone. But then again, he plays like a gazillion different guitars.
The electric jazz sound for me would along the line of "The Way Up" by Pat Metheny Group, and I hate the tone of most Frank Gambale albums.
One point you touched on that is very frustrating for me, is that I really really like the acoustic sound of Django and some of the acoustic Pat Metheny work like "A quiet night", and on the other hand I need something that is flexible.
Actually when I think of it, my current choices will probably steer the decision towards an archtop, but I still need the flexibility
-
That's interesting; I had read that the telecaster has spiky highs and lows (treble and bass), while the strat has more of a mid punch. Originally Posted by Silentwiz
-
Spot on. The only difference for me is that when I was using a 355 in a band, and we added keys, I moved to a Strat to cut through. I tended not to play rhythm stuff in that outfit, however. Originally Posted by teok
You can make a Tele sound like a Viola? Now that's impressive. Originally Posted by teok
-
Some comments: Originally Posted by teok
Not all archtops have a punchy mid-focused sound.
I find P90s to be much more mid-focused than PAFs.
Cutting trough in a band has lots of things to consider: the amp's voicing and eq tone tone stack, cab / design and speaker matter as much as the guitar / pickup in my experience. A properly eq'd archtop will yield excellent results in any band setting as long as feedback is manageable. 335s do cut trough better in general at the expense of a not so good tone (in my opinion, of course). I don't find single coils to be worst to cut trough than humbuckers if they have enough output, I actually find humbuckers can lead to a "closed" tone than can get easily lost in the mix.
People talk too much about how guitars sound and not enough about how guitars feel. Go practice / play with a flattop for several hours a day during a few months. Then come tell us how're you're feeling... I love flattops but they are very hard to play and very tiring. Archtops with a small amp are much easier on your body for long practices, again in my experience. And they sound VERY different... I love a flattop for a jazz sound but if I wanted ONE guitar for jazz it would be an archtop.
-
To the OP: Jazz is a pretty broad church, from rag-time via New Orleans, swing, be-bop, fusion, etc. ...too many stylistic differences for one guitar to do any more than approximate what's required for some styles.
As a comparison, think about what's happened to the bass in that time. In early jazz, it was probably a tube or sousaphone, or maybe a bass saxophone. Eventually a string bass took over. Nowadays there are bass guitars, some fretless, electric upright bass (EUB), synthesisers, you name it. Like many people, I prefer a double bass for jazz, but any of them will do the job. And any guitar can be used for jazz. A semi-acoustic/semi-hollow will probably be most versatile, but start with what you know or already have and go from there. Create the sound that you're happy with and don't let anyone tell you "that's not right for jazz". May not be what some people expect to hear, but that doesn't make it wrong.
-
I had a Strat for some years but sold it recently since I play a hollowbodied archtop and Tele-clone most of the time. However, the Strat is a real basic instrument like the Tele and lends itself to all sorts of easy modifications that can get you pretty close to the revered "jazz tone". My Strat was a USA model with what's referred to as the "swimming pool route", a large rectangular hole under the pickguard with loads of room for the bottoms of the three Strat pickups. Now all you need to do to change things up a bunch is to get another pickguard loaded with, say, two PAFish humbuckers, P-90's or mini-humbuckers or combinations thereof wired up with a three-way switch and separate volume and tone controls and swap it with the standard Strat pickguard. All you need to undue is the hookup to the jack. And throw on a set of flatwounds. Blocking the tremolo piece with a piece of wood is also simple to do.
-
What mongrel says... Plus you can try a hard tail Strat. I have a video of mine on my youtube channel, and I think it shows off the jazz tone rather well. Mine has round wound 11's, too.
-
And also.. welcome EMZ. I returned to guitar not that long ago after not playing much for quite awhile. This forum is the best place I've found to learn new things and get back into guitar. Enthusiasm for playing cannot be discounted in the grand scheme of things. I hope you'll be able to hang out a bit.
Back to the topic, while it's true that a tele or a strat can be applied to many things, they do not produce good acoustic sounds. You mentioned Django. There are also many current gypsy jazz players (e.g. Langrene, Rosenberg, et al) relying on acoustic instruments. And while a gypsy jazz guitar may not be suited to a broad spectrum of styles, there are players like Julian Lage applying a more acoustic tone using archtops in their amplified playing. Solid bodies or semi-hollows do not do a very good job in this area.
If you are not planning near future forays into louder volumes and combos, the best acoustic solution may be a 17"-18" solid wood archtop with a good quality floating pickup. Properly set up, these are marvelous acoustic instruments. At low volumes like recording on your PC, you can process the sound into pretty much anything you want. However, when you want a good acoustic tone or when you are playing unplugged, these can't be beat.
Still, you mentioned that you are looking for flexibility. While I caution looking for a swiss army knife when a chef's knife is what you really need, for flexibility, the Gibson ES175 and it's clones are probably as good as it gets. Seems that, depending on your setup, you can extract a real array of sounds from these. I've always like the Heritage 575 and good deals can be found on used examples. Also, Eastman makes a decent copy with their AR371. If you are looking for a place to get started without a huge investment, these would be hard to beat.Last edited by Spook410; 08-13-2013 at 03:21 PM.
-
Good point, you don't need flats to play jazz. Originally Posted by rpguitar
-
Thanks Spook, I can honestly say after only a couple of days on this forum that the rate and richness of the replies are amazing; I already love this place. Originally Posted by Spook410
Now, I've read some of the great replies on this thread, with many saying that a Strat (or any guitar for that matter) is as valid as any other for Jazz. I can get that from the creative and unique way of looking at things; that you don't need people telling you what's right and what's wrong (I just a saw video yesterday of Rory Hoffman, and he DOES NOT need anybody to tell him how jazz or even "regular" guitar is played)
However, two aspects of your reply resonate with me:
A. Flexibility within different jazz styles, because by flexibility i didn't really mean Joe-Pass-and-all-the-way-to-Cannibal-Corpse kinda flexible.
B. the acoustic qualities of arch-tops; sounding like an acoustic unplugged
Also, to be honest, when I searched for videos of people playing telecasters and strats for jazz, they sounded really good, until, I saw the next video with someone else playing an archtop, and at that point they sounded OK.
So, I can afford something around the $1K give or take a couple of hunderd, which archtops would you recommend within that range, I can see the Ibanez AF-AFJ series is kinda popular, maybe you can give me your opinion of those as well.
-
I just chanced upon this article. Interesting read for Strat and Tele players The Stratocaster "Jazz Switch" Mod
Reply With Quote
“Shearing style”
Today, 05:26 PM in Comping, Chords & Chord Progressions