Ibanez Piccolo Guitar

[Dutchbopper]

"Straight No Chaser" on the Piccolo guitar.

DB

[kris]

The guitar is small - Piccolo but you play a lot of jazz on it.
Nice!

[Dutchbopper]

The guitar is small - Piccolo but you play a lot of jazz on it. Nice!

I got this as a present for a camper trip. Made for campfire music. Very tiny and cramped neck, hard to play jazz on - jazz voicings hardly possible, only single line playing - but very cool. Only 169 bucks.

DB

[JFranck]

Nice job!
reminds me of Lyle Ritz

[John A.]

"Straight No Chaser" on the Piccolo guitar.

DB

If I'm understanding correctly, this is tuned up a 4th, so it's like a "guitelele"? I have one of those, by Yamaha. It's fun.

[Dutchbopper]

Nice job!
reminds me of Lyle Ritz

Very cool. I did not know him. Sounds great!

DB

[Dutchbopper]

If I'm understanding correctly, this is tuned up a 4th, so it's like a "guitelele"? I have one of those, by Yamaha. It's fun.

Yes. So that's a similar instrument? Just as tiny?

DB

[lawson-stone]

I think you could get bebop tone from a wash-tub bass.

[Dutchbopper]

I think you could get bebop tone from a wash-tub bass.

LOL. Check my updated Bird vid in the songs section. There are at least 3 bop heads that you can learn from those. "Cool Blues", "Blues for Alice" and "Billie's Bounce."

DB

[John A.]

Yes. So that's a similar instrument? Just as tiny?

DB

I think the guitelele might be smaller.

(The bass in this is bass Uke, btw.)

[pingu]

1156239[/URL]]Nice job!
reminds me of Lyle Ritz

sorry to sidetrack the thread
do you know how that instrument is tuned ?

I LOVE those close voicings he plays in the head
what are they ?
they remind me of some steel guitar chords
i’ve heard
also some Art Tatum piano voicings are like that

could i mimic them on the guitar

please help !

[nevershouldhavesoldit]

If I'm understanding correctly, this is tuned up a 4th, so it's like a "guitelele"?

Jazz on a little guitar has a history. I assume at least some of you remember George Barnes, who had what he called a "guitar in F" made for him by Guild that was about 17" long, 13" wide at the lower bout, had a 22 3/4" scale, and was tuned AECGDA. He played it as part of a duo with Carl Kress (who used a standard Guild archtop). There aren't many recordings of them as a duo, but I'm pretty sure this is one with Barnes on the little guitar:

And he played one in his 10 guitar orchestra, which included Bucky Pizzarelli, Carl Kress, Billy Bauer, Don Arnone, Barry Galbraith, Art Ryerson, Everett Barksdale, Al Casamenti and Allen Hanlon. Here's a cut from one of the two albums he made with that group:

[Joeontheguitar]

Guitaleles come in different sizes and with different tunings. There are tenor sized guitaleles that have body dimensions of a tenor uke, but there are also guitaleles with baritone size dimensions.

I have a Romero Creations D HO 6 nylon. It has a bariton sized body and quite a big neck for such a small instrument. The sound is beautiful. It's not very loud, but it is warm, clear, with good string separation and nice sustain. Jazz voicings are perfectly doable on this instrument. I use it in and around the house. Plan is to take it on a camper trip as well.

Most tenor guitaleles have A-A tuning, as if you'd have a capo on the 5th fret. I have E-E tuning on mine and even use Hawaiian slack key tuning every now and then. Sounds very mellow. I can use 1/2 classical guitar strings, but there are a string set specifically made for this instrument and they sound better to my ears.

[JFranck]

I'm not a uke expert but read somewhere that Lyle Ritz used DGBE or re-entrant dGBE tuning.
Hal Leonard published a DVD dedicated to him :
Lyle's Style - Ukulele Master Lyle Ritz Shares a Lifetime of Performance Techniques - DVD | Hal Leonard Online
Hope this helps...