Playing fast is a necessary evil on guitar?

[goldenwave77]

George Barnes made the 1st electric guitar recording on March 1, 1938 at the age of 17... beating Eddie Durham into the studios by 15 days. Acc'd to Yanow, The Great Jazz Guitarists, Barnes did some recordings with some blues artists in 1937-38, as a sideman. (The 1937 ones must have been miked acoustic guitar efforts.) He joined the staff of NBC at the age of 17. Barnes also headed a guitar-led group in the Midwest during 1935-37, when guitar-led quartets were rare, and Yanow states "he was always interested in using the guitar as a lead instrument" and "considered his main influences to be horn players, rather than other guitarists" (not illogical, as noted previously).

I've not listened to these.

But Christian had the good fortune to hook up with Goodman, whose band recorded prolifically. Something like 600 individual cuts during about a 13 yr. pd., though Christian was only with him from 1939-1941, when he died. Christian first bought an electric in 1937, and came to the attention of Mary Lou Williams and Teddy Wilson. CC became a featured soloist and did most of his work with the BG Sextet, not the big band.

Durham took a few electric solos with the Kansas City Five and Six in 1938, a yr. before Christian. He pretty much gave up guitar playing to concentrate on songwriting and arranging. (Topsy; Jumpin' At the Woodside; I Don't Want to Set the World on Fire, among others.)

[mr. beaumont]

You guys are funny, trying to be all contrarian.

Who did all your favorite bop guitar players transcribe?

Charlie Fucking Christian.

Right place right time? Maybe. Most important guitar player in jazz history? You bet your ass.

[goldenwave77]

But who else was around?

Whose records were available...who was in a popular band, and had exposure?


I think he had the early field pretty much to himself. Barnes went into studio work and Durham became an arranger.



Babe Ruth was a great, great baseball player, probably the greatest. But he wasn't Superhuman.

Charlie Christian is important. He's a good player. But we don't need to make him into some mythical guitar super God.

George Washington is an important historical figure, but the fact is he lost most of the battles he fought, though he ended up winning the War.

Miles D. is a great artist, but he didn't invent cool jazz, much as he would like to take the credit for it.

The mythmaking is what I have a problem with.

[mr. beaumont]

Exactly!

[goldenwave77]

Contrast CC with Charlie Parker.

There have got to be 40-50 top flight sax players around in the early 40's. CP stands out from all the rest....maybe Don Byas is a distant, distant contender, but everyone else just dropped what they were doing, and tried to figure out what this guy Parker was about.

With CC, you maybe had to know that an electric guitar existed, and that this kind of stuff was possible, but plenty of players after him say they listened primarily to horn players. Why is that? Because you don't need to hear trumpet or sax lines, 2nd hand, thru a guitar player, you can just listen to CP, like Jimmy Raney did, and try to adapt it.

CC is probably more important to non-jazz players. He is the first guitar hero, in a way. (There's Django but his style is kind of a folk music, which doesn't really translate readily: It's probably more popular today, than it was in his own lifetime, in terms of being imitated.)

So other players come along and start playing in a riffy style, in music that probably suits guitar better than it does jazz, like jump blues and guys like T-Bone Walker come along, and BB King, and Danny Cedrone...and once the Marshall Amp is accidentally invented, well then guitar comes of age, as a rock instrument, where it reigns supreme.

Bottom line. I love jazz, but jazz on a guitar is not what not drew me into listening to it in the 1st place. I'm not going to be a trumpet or sax player, or a piano player, in this lifetime anyway, so I have the guitar. (And I don't think I'm alone in this view--Jack Wilkins was on the verge of quitting playing, because he despaired of ever doing the stuff that piano did, but he persisted, but who knows if he is truly fulfilled, in his heart of hearts.)

[Skip Ellis]

I tend to only be interested in playing what Sinatra called "saloon songs" - slow, pretty ballads that have a nice melody with some embellishment to the melody but still letting it peek through. I've said before (much to all you hard core jazzers chagrin) that I just don't like gazillion-note-a-second improvisation -where's the melody? As much as I like Joe Pass, I can't listen to him for very long and I appreciate Pat Martino's chops but he bores me after about two choruses - the melody gets lost amongst all the notes. There's lots of players out there who can burn it up but few who can play a ballad with feeling. Just my thought for tonight - not very 'jazz-ish', I know but to each his own.

[Jonah]

You guys are funny, trying to be all contrarian.

Otherwise there will be nothing to talk about)

I actually find that partly this is what forum is about for me... conversation makes things more multilevel, more lively in a way...

[Lobomov]

Metheny would probably disagree with you about having complete freedom to play whatever they hear. They both have said that their styles (Metheny's e.g., Metheny's extensive use of slides, slurs, hammer-ons, etc.) grew out of their inability to play fast and clean, and pick every note. These guys hear tons of stuff that they can't play, and developed distinct voices and methods of adapting their ideas to what they can execute. Sco is another who often says stuff like this.

Actually Metheny said in an interview that somehwere in the mid 80s technique stop being a thing and he now just plays what he hears.

[Vladan]

With compression and distortion (more so with a solid body ... Tele ...) you can hold one note for quite a longish time. It is ridiculous not to use technology on hand.
That guy, CC, you speak about, he obviously did not mind using novelty technologies, guitar amp in his time.
Trumpet players use their sordinas, double bass players use their bows.
Let's ban vibraphones and allow only for xylophones and kalimbas ...

Also, there are techniques to vary the volume, or simulate varying the volume of the held note over time, like volume pedals, pot swells, tremolo ...

I think I remember seeing phrases in my youth that would say something like ... on guitar it is played like this ... when the word was about adapting lines and musical devices common and composed on/for other instruments.
Instruments have their limitations.
Now go bend a string on all mighty piano. Now go buy a synth.

Of course, if you are after "historically original" be-bop solos, you should not play guitar.

BTW, playing ballads usually suck.

[goldenwave77]

Actually Metheny said in an interview that somehwere in the mid 80s technique stop being a thing and he now just plays what he hears.

Metheny talking out of both sides of his mouth, as usual. Earlier on he had this to say:

"For a time, I was sorry that I played guitar rather than trumpet, tenor, piano, bass or drums. The guitar did not seem to fit into the jazz world, and to an extent it was uncharted territory. Only since the 1970's have there been a sizable number of guitarists who were harmonically and rhythmically advanced to hang with the best horn players; there were just a few before that. But now in the post-Coltrane era, there are many great guitarists and endless possibilities for the instrument." Yanow, The Great Jazz Guitarists, pg. 135.

Now, think for a second. Where would PM fit in, in this above analysis?! And think about what he's really saying here...he's managing to dismiss almost an entire older generation of people.

(Let me anticipate an objection. Earlier on, I said the post-Christian guitar people were not what drew me into jazz, and that's true. But there are at least a dozen older guitarists I'll listen to before listening to Pat Metheny: CC himself, Barney K., Herb E., Joe P., Johnny S., Billy Bauer, George Barnes, Chuck Wayne, Hank Garland, Joe Puma, Sal Salvador, George Benson, Wes M., Ed Bickert, Grant Green, Barry Galbraith, Jim Hall, Oscar Moore, Kenny Burrell, Billy Bean). If I really thought about it, I could add to this.

The other day there was a quote also from Pat M. discussing Pasquale De Grosso, in which PM dissed a lot of his contemporaries who he more or less accused of trying to sound like him.

There you have it....the guys before PM were feeble and his contemporaries are 2nd-rate clones of PM himself.

It's like Miles claiming "he changed music four times"...the statement has a surface plausibility to it, but it really doesn't withstand scrutiny, and boy, oh boy, is there ever a hidden agenda, involved.

[Lobomov]

There you have it....the guys before PM were feeble and his contemporaries are 2nd-rate clones of PM himself.

I thought the above was common knowledge


There is that tape of Pat Metheny talking to one of his student on Youtube, where the student (unfortunately) has beep'ed out all the names. It's been a long time since I've heard it, but I think PM said there is only one or two guitarist that can in time besides him.

[christianm77]

You guys are funny, trying to be all contrarian.

Who did all your favorite bop guitar players transcribe?

Charlie Fucking Christian.

Right place right time? Maybe. Most important guitar player in jazz history? You bet your ass.

Hey I'm not!!!

[christianm77]

Charlie is such a swinging mf. A fantastically talented musician that stood head and shoulders above mere guitar players.

Setting aside his historical importance (boring) he has recorded some my favourite improvisations on jazz full stop.

I still maintain that swing to bop maybe the greatest jazz guitar solo ever recorded.

I make no allowances for historical context or him being the first. If he turned up today playing the exact same stuff he would still be a genius.

[christianm77]

Let me put it this way, who do you think is better now, or comparable? (I will allow benson)

[goldenwave77]

Pretty much any of the guitarists mentioned in post #86, are comparable.

There are tons of good examples, e.g. Hank Garland's ATTYA, Johnny Smith's Cherokee, and Chuck Wayne's Lil' Darlin are all good.

I mean Swing to Bop is good, but it's a little slow to get started, and then it's kind of riff with some variations, and some outside stuff mixed in. Some of it's a little tentative, but there is kind of the excitement of being "present at the creation". I have a CD called The Immortal Charlie Christian which has some Minton's tracks. There is a trumpet player on it named Joe Guy, I think, and you can hear him feeling his way on "Swing to Bop", and also on "Up on Teddy's Hill". Now compare Joe Guy to the cuts with Dizzy later on in that CD (CC is NOT on those cuts), and Dizzy has it figured out....his lines just flow a little more smoothly.: Like Eddie Jefferson said (sings), "Bebop, my friends, ...was just a whole lotta fun, You can take any old riff', and make a real long run, ...sca dooba dooba, "etc. I think this CD really shows that CC, is important to guitarists, right he's one of us...but the language was being developed anyway.

More recently, there's a clip of Oscar Peterson (1994) playing "There Will Never Be Another You" with a good guitarist on it. I think it's Lorne Lofsky...clearly Lofsky and most of these other guys listened to Charlie C. and his "disciples". (Oscar P. almost buries the soloist...not the most accommodating accompanist.) Just generally, it's hard to play convincing bop lines on guitar. I think a small # of people do it really well.


PS: I think the little guitar bit on "Blue N' Boogie"(off the CD mentioned above) is just amazing...it's only a few bars, but it really flows.

[mr. beaumont]

Hey I'm not!!!

LOL, I was pretty cranky in that post, huh? Long day at work and the wine we opened for dinner went down too easy

I do think Charlie is THE MAN, though. Those solos were just so perfect, so swinging, so rooted in the blues but probably sounded otherwordly to a generation of young guitar players he influenced. I think of all the people Charlie inspired as his legacy, but if he never inspired a soul and all we had was a lost body of work that somehow resurfaced now, I'm pretty sure I'd still find his playing riveting.

[grahambop]

Swing to Bop is one of the all-time classic guitar solos as far as I'm concerned. Whenever I hear it I'm grateful someone captured Charlie live, in full flight (in 1941!). Otherwise we would not have such a good impression of the experience of hearing him live in a small club. It's a miraculous recording.

[Dutchbopper]

I don't think playing fast has much to do with creating meaningful jazz music. It's just a device that originated in the bebop era:

Bebop or bop is a style of jazz developed in the early to mid-1940s in the United States, which features songs characterized by a fast tempo, complex chord progressions with rapid chord changes and numerous changes of key, instrumental virtuosity, and improvisation based on a combination of harmonic structure, the use of scales and occasional references to the melody.

If you want to play in that style on tunes such as "Cherokee" "Donna Lee" and "Oleo" etc. you simply have to be able to play fast. If you can't, you won't sound that great. Being able to handle changes over high tempi is part of the deal.

I see speed as part of form rather than content. Players such as Tal Farlow, Joe Pass, Pat Martino and probably most name players play just as meaningful and sophisticated lines over high tempi as in ballads.

To me, the content is what counts, regardless of tempo. You can easily hear when a player is not comfortable at a higher tempo. He is not able to play interesting stuff anymore.

All my favourite players can play fast. Some exceptionally so. I kind of dig the excitement playing fast creates.

I do think you need a fast "processor" to be able to play fast though. I don't think everybody has one but most of the classic players probably did.

The reason why beginners cannot play fast and meaningful is simply that they still need to think while playing. Thinking and improvising over fast changes don't go together. Come to think of it, neither does it work over slow changes. It's not a cognitive process.

DB

[pingu]

The reason why beginners cannot play fast and meaningful is simply that they still need to think while playing. Thinking and improvising over fast changes don't go together. Come to think of it, neither does it work over slow changes. It's not a cognitive process.

DB

That's very interesting Dutch , could you expand on that , I do seem to be thinking when playing ...

Do you mean you have to let go and fly ?

[christianm77]

Pretty much any of the guitarists mentioned in post #86, are comparable.

I mean Swing to Bop is good, but it's a little slow to get started, and then it's kind of riff with some variations, and some outside stuff mixed in. Some of it's a little tentative, but there is kind of the excitement of being "present at the creation". I have a CD called The Immortal Charlie Christian which has some Minton's tracks. There is a trumpet player on it named Joe Guy, I think, and you can hear him feeling his way on "Swing to Bop", and also on "Up on Teddy's Hill". Now compare Joe Guy to the cuts with Dizzy later on in that CD (CC is NOT on those cuts), and Dizzy has it figured out....his lines just flow a little more smoothly.: Like Eddie Jefferson said (sings), "Bebop, my friends, ...was just a whole lotta fun, You can take any old riff', and make a real long run, ...sca dooba dooba, "etc. I think this CD really shows that CC, is important to guitarists, right he's one of us...but the language was being developed anyway.

More recently, there's a clip of Oscar Peterson (1994) playing "There Will Never Be Another You" with a good guitarist on it. I think it's Lorne Lofsky...clearly Lofsky and most of these other guys listened to Charlie C. and his "disciples". (Oscar P. almost buries the soloist...not the most accommodating accompanist.) Just generally, it's hard to play convincing bop lines on guitar. I think a small # of people do it really well.


PS: I think the little guitar bit on "Blue N' Boogie"(off the CD mentioned above) is just amazing...it's only a few bars, but it really flows.

You are insane. There is no hope for you. :-)

Seriously...Well it's all personal taste. In Charlie's case it's the swing that carries it for me, the endless rhythmic variation with a fairly small set of ideas that builds up and builds up. He's a fantastically sexy player... He comes from a time when jazz music was the music of the young and you can feel that energy.

There's also a type of fast playing and virtuosity that comes out of the rhythm - Benson for me is the exemplar.

Some of the players in your list have this, some (IMO) do not. You can point to Herb, Wes, Grant Green, Barney as being in that tradition of swinging. Others are masters of other avenues

The most interesting thing, to me, about Charlie is that it is absolutely not about what notes he played, but HOW he played them. It's now the HOW rather than the WHAT that interests me primarily now.

The other thing is most of the people on your list are dead. Who is around of the younger generation that can do what Charlie did with a handful of arpeggios and blues licks? Perhaps this is no longer something that is possible within jazz. I'm not talking about guitarists who are pastiching 40's guitar styles - I mean players who are doing something analogous in a modern way?

Re - bop lines on the guitar. Yes. It's like a dog standing on its hind legs. And yet I persist. Whhhhyyyyy?????

I would say that one of the things the past twenty years has brought is the advances in technique required for guitarists to really play bebop (a lot of players coming out of shred rock and fusion?) Most of the top NY guys have big chunks of bop in their playing - and it sounds like it's coming out of saxophone language. And then of course you have the true hardcore bop guys like Pasquale Grasso.

[mr. beaumont]

That's very interesting Dutch , could you expand on that , I do seem to be thinking when playing ...

Do you mean you have to let go and fly ?

First you have to know the tune well enough that you can.

[Dutchbopper]

That's very interesting Dutch , could you expand on that , I do seem to be thinking when playing ...
Do you mean you have to let go and fly ?

What I mean is that you have to reach a certain proficiency in your playing that allows the music to come out without you having to think what the changes are or what scale you are going to play etc. I mean, you can't really think when you are blowing over Cherokee right. The music is way too fast anyway. But that's not even relevant. You practise a tune and you play it over and over again. Then comes the time that there is no cognitive process involved anymore. You just play and the music comes out. It's just like talking. You normally don't think what you are going to say next right? You just talk. I once heard a psychologist say that's it's not possible to have good sex when you are thinking about it in the act. He's right. Just do it.

To quote Joe Pass:

“You can’t think and play. If you think about what you are playing, the playing becomes stilted. You have to just focus on the music, I feel, concentrate on the music, focus on what you are playing, and let the playing come out. Genius of Jazz Guitar, 2001, Video interview

So think all you want in the practise room. Play your tunes over and over again. But on that stage, forget everything and just play. If you can't do that, go back to the woodshed until you can.

DB

[goldenwave77]

I just think the heavy persistent beat thing in so much of rock and fusion, is anathema to the sound of bop. I think the phrasing is just a different thing altogether. The heavy bass in so much rock and fusion music just kills it for me. I don't automatically dislike rock, but a bassist like Entwistle of the Who is not that common. He really plays like a jazz bassist, I think. Paul McCartney, too, and the Allman Brothers band.

The other thing about CC is that when he came along, he was truly something new, and he was given blowing avenues that a lot of other players were not. He was a featured soloist, but on "Relaxin at Camarillo", is it Barney K. who is given 8 bars. So, I'm not sure a lot of these other players were not capable.

TBH, I'm kinda out of touch with most players since the last time I seriously bought music, which was a long time ago. Certainly Bruce Forman and Russell Malone are capable. I'm sure there are others

[christianm77]

In response I might add in reply to the thread, that there is a type of fast playing that doesn't sound fast.

I'm really thinking of players like Wes and Lester Young here, a legato way of phrasing and playing everything absolutely accurate in time, that sounds easy until you try to play it. Peter Bernstein has a similar quality.

Furthermore, the ability to run endless 8ths at tempo is certainly a technical accomplishment, but if you master this the onus is on you to do something interesting with it.

I can think of Pat Martino as the example of this. His playing has an ebb and flow and space within the continuous flow of notes that actually rather mesmerising. It's pretty alienating at first for many listeners, but you do get into it (or at least I did.)

There's an interesting (to me) relationship between double time and single time fast.... Being able to swap between double time and single time at slow tempos and half time and single time at fast tempos is an important skill allowing you more freedom.

Another thing is improving your 'rhythmic resolution' is learning to lock in up beats at high tempi and being able to nail the distinction between these and the various quarter and half note triplets.

As we edge up to somewhere around 280 this becomes very difficult and most players tend to end up playing much more on the beat.

At the moment I am working on this very hard because I am so bored to listening to myself reel off 8th note lines. This might be considered a high quality problem. That said my articulation is not as consistent as I would like it to be.

Actually, one of my favourite 'hot tempo' solos (not crazy fast, but quick) is this offering from Jim Hall. Technically the solo is easy, but the precision with which he nails the rhythms - there's a virtuosity in there. Reminds me of Louis. And Hall, not really a bop guy, harking back to a pre-Parker way of playing burning tempos.

So there's more than one way to do this.

Ultimately - it's all rhythm. You need to master the execution of rhythms at all tempos and hone your vocabulary of rhythmic phrases. That doesn't mean playing fast necessarily, but it does mean playing - and hearing time - with great precision.

As soon as you think of playing something 'fast' you are f**ked, quite frankly.

[DaveF]

The guitar gives up nothing to a horn.

I just had to fist pump at work (open plan office) when I read that.