The Jazz Guitar Chord Dictionary
Reply to Thread Bookmark Thread
Page 4 of 4 FirstFirst ... 234
Posts 76 to 95 of 95
  1. #76

    User Info Menu

    This is way too heady for my taste. I'm bowing out. I'll just go play now.


    Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

  2.  

    The Jazz Guitar Chord Dictionary
     
  3. #77

    User Info Menu

    I've always put JM in the positive "out there' category, where he has company from ie. Allan Holdsworth. There's this kind of on the edge feel (melodically and rhythmically) in his playing all the time (especially live when improvising). Whatever cosmic feel or pulse it is, he hears it and is aiming for it. It may not always open up for me but the fact that he's going for it without any preconceptions makes it great.

  4. #78

    User Info Menu

    I actually feel Allan Holdsworth phrasing can be rather boppy in the rare occasions when he played with a jazz rhythm section playing swing time. Here's an example, take the phrase at 2:20 and there are several phrases after that are very boppy in articulation alongside those pure legato swirls and floating phrases...



    I think his phrasing is rather subtle in general. But his whole technique is based on freakishly accurate subdivision. And he always phrased a lot in quarter triplets generally giving in his playing. I don't hear that in JM much.

    I'm not sure I would ever describe Allan as 'heavy old school swing' but in these cases, I can really feel the influence of jazz sax players and the guitarists like Jimmy Raney who sought to emulate them. To me Allan is a natural evolution of what Charlie Christian, Wes and Jimmy Raney were doing.

    (I wish he'd done more stuff with acoustic rhythm section, but hey. Like Mike Stern, Allan has the problem of being judged for his guitar tone by the Jazz Police.)
    Last edited by christianm77; 05-13-2017 at 05:52 AM.

  5. #79

    User Info Menu

    Here is Johnny Mac playing in a straightahead swing time environment.

    I actually think his playing sounds great here, I really like it - but there is no question that his rhythmic approach is very different to Allan's, and also to a conventional rhythmic jazz approach. But very distinctive.

    He can play his straight 16th notes against Elvin's mighty polymetric tinged flow and it's all good.


  6. #80

    User Info Menu

    Quote Originally Posted by AlsoRan
    Quick question:

    Can a soloist swing while the band plays straight?
    Hmmm. I've heard it said that Joe Henderson often played swing on straight 8s IIRC. I'll try and track down an example.

    While this is basically a straight 8s groove I feel a lot of 6/8 and swing time inflection in Jamerson's bassline.



    I feel like straight 8s/swung 8s isn't a clear cut thing in US Music.

  7. #81

    User Info Menu

    I like this record, sounded better than some of his other straight ahead recordings. I remember listening to him play oleo once and it was pretty bad, but this one I liked

  8. #82

    User Info Menu

    man he can burn

  9. #83

    User Info Menu

    Quote Originally Posted by PMB
    Not wishing to sway anyone's opinion on JM's sense of swing but I thought it might be instructive to hear him in a pre-Extrapolation context. McLaughlin had a working band with saxophonist Tony Roberts and bassist Danny Thompson (ex-Pentangle) in the mid '60s that played lots of standards and bop classics along with more free improvisation. Here's a sample (most of the YouTube clips featuring the band have disappeared):

    Thanks for posting, that IS interesting.

    JM is certainly swinging his upbeat chord stabs when comping - very Red Garland.

    Soloing wise - well this a bit of a contrast to his later style. I would describe his phrasing as behind the beat but pretty straight - anyone disagree? The upbeat placement is not straight here to my ears, so swinging in the sense of catching a swung upbeat. (Just being super empirical here, IMO JM does indeed swing on this cut.)

    So he had gone through the bop thing before moving into fusion. I hadn't realised that because it wasn't manifest in any of the recordings I had listened to.

    I have it on good authority that JM was known as a feel guy in the 60s before he developed his alternate picking chops.
    Last edited by christianm77; 05-13-2017 at 06:27 AM.

  10. #84

    User Info Menu

    Quote Originally Posted by christianm77
    ...So he had gone through the bop thing before moving into fusion. I hadn't realised that because it wasn't manifest in any of the recordings I had listened to...
    You might want to check out the English R & B sensation known as Graham Bond. JM played with him on several recordings. I only have "Solid Bond" but I think that there are others. JM isn't a one trick pony. He probably could have stunted himself on any style (like Clapton sort of did with the blues), but I think that Miles Davis encouraged him to get out on his own and put himself into it. He was intelligent enough to take the advice.

  11. #85

    User Info Menu

    Hi all, interesting thread, I have the same feeling about JML, great player for sure but certainly not one known for his "swing" feel.

    In a great jazz school in France (CMDL), teachers talked about this modern swing feel, and what they said is exactly what this guy discusses in the following video. I wasn't sure at first, but I've seen the results with a friend of mine who worked on this since several months : it just changes everything ! In a jam session with several guitarists who played good, he just stood out from the crowd, and note because of the notes he played but because of his time feel. It's kind of "laid back". It took him some time but he was dedicated to do so, and it worked !



    Have a great swingin' day (pun intended) guys !

  12. #86

    User Info Menu

    Lots of subjective stuff about 'swing' and I am absolutely no expert on anything 'Jazz'..

    But I do use now the 'type' of 'swing' used by people like Benson and Norman Brown ( more forward in the Beat compared to many Jazzers ) ( which you would or could actually see in a DAW where they show the
    Tracks in squiggly lines plotted against the bar lines- lol).

    As far as I know there is NO PRECISE WAY to notate 'swing' on a Score- it IS subjective.

    But Sequencers have 'swing' programs or Templates for hi hat Patterns etc. and they DO have a 'range' of 'swing' and it 'works' to a large extent..go too
    far forward or too far backward in Time and even to a layman - it will lose 'Sync'.
    A good time sensitive Musician will Instinctively Add to the Rhythm with accents pushing or lagging etc.
    But those are secondary to being in the accepted 'swing' value.

    Say - Quarter Note Triplets ( easier to identify quantify) - IF you are Playing them you can Rush very slightly and Pop ( Accent ) the second 'Group' of 3 and it will sound really cool and Funky and Rhythmic but that is a Stylistic Thing and you have to be able to PLAY quarter note triplets before you can Stylize them..
    I hear Swing that way..probably being 'outside ' Jazz and not having heard 100 different Jazz Guitarists gives me a layman's perspective and a broader overview...

    That's definitely not how or why I adopted it- it's because it fits rhythmically over R&B or Rhythmic Modern Music with no adjustment..and allows me to groove better with Tracks and feels good.

    IF you try that with 'some' of the more 'relaxed' or
    'lazier' ' swing' Styles- it will fall behind the Beat and not 'Sync'.

    Ideally a Jazz or even any Guitarist would adjust slightly to the Song or Rhythm Track for Time Feel with a few defaults when they ' freewheel' in their own 'Style'.

    I was always a tight Rhythm Player able to slightly push or relax against the Beat or play almost 'quantized' grabbing the chords ( not strumming) but
    it is leaking ( the tighter timing and varied Rhythmic Figures ) into my Solos now
    because of adopting 'swing'and the Jazz influence, and because of a fret hand change just a few years back I can now keep up with the Picking I developed long ago when Dinosaurs roamed the Earth...

    But People who say you will sound good no matter what if you have good 'time' are obviously
    exagerrating...to play ANY type of Music - you have to land on Accepted Notes for THAT Style .. Jazz and it's Cousin R&B allow more chromatic Notes than Country for example...but you obviously need the acceptable notes at the ends of your lines ....

    Generally it's easier for Players ( and Dancers ) who
    Naturally feel the 1 and other secondary Beats who can have lower 'lag time' to 'relax ' in the Rhythm than it is for laid back Rhythmatists to move 'forward' in the Beat.

    Visualize a Dance Audition and it's R&B- some Dancers really land their foot on the 1 and on secondary beats..some Dancers who are ' following'
    the Beat rather than really 'feel' it are always a little late and don't' Sync Up' to the rest of the Dancers.


    So some of it is Subjective but IF you can be Michael Jackson on the Guitar or Benson who both have ( had) very very low' lag time ' you can go more places Rhythmically ..guessing that Jackson could do Fred Astaire FAR more easily than Astaire could do Michael Jackson...


    It is quite amazing that Benson being an - 'old school'
    Era Player has a feel that transfers directly onto most Modern Pop/ R&B as well as Motown Era /Hip Hop / Electronica...

    If Norman Brown was here ( a great bad ass Guitarist despite the 'Smooth Jazz' label)- I think he would agree.

    I also wonder - if McLaughlin really wanted to and immersed himself in a Project with a Rhythm Section and Drummer etc. in a Style requiring aggressive 'swing' - he could and would- the Long Video on Fluency he did actually has a relaxed ( not too relaxed )
    swing to it which leads me to think he could IF he wants to.
    If I was the Producer I would 'trick' JM into it by asking him to phrase like Brecker rather than name a Guitar Player...

    Imagine me asking JM in an Interview- ' John I play guitar also and have about 80% of your chops...about 3 to 5% of your Knowledge and about
    .0003% of your Musical Accomplishments - how come you don't Play more like me ? "

    I bet he would pause then get a big laugh out of that one...because he's heard it in other forms before many Times...
    Last edited by Robertkoa; 05-19-2017 at 08:59 PM.

  13. #87

    User Info Menu

    @RobertKoa - Benson AFAIK spent some time being mentored by Jo Jones the drummer with Basie orchestra back in the 30s, so there is a deep link back into that era, which was ALL about playing for dancers.

    Really the values of that music is not so different to the R&B, Soul and Pop Benson ended up performing.

    If I had to call it, I would say the modern use of rhythm in jazz is more intellectual, less physical. It's more like 'hey what can I do with this cool rhythmic idea' and 'how can I play really evenly and accurately' than 'how much am I and the audience feeling this?' or 'how can I get this rhythm of this phrase to POP?'

    And I feel that latter thing was even present in the jazz/rock movement which gets much maligned by the old guard. Those guys were playing Cuban music, funk, bebop, rock, all sorts of stuff and it ended up amalgamated. To me guys like Mike Brecker were absolutely coming from that physical realm in terms of time even if their music wasn't swing 8's all the time.

    Brecker even said he had trouble synch'ing up with a metronome. Sure, typical humility from him, but it's interesting to contrast this attitude to players who have banked more time with a click than with great drummers. The click has become the final arbiter of time to many.

    You know I know this Robert Glasper interview got some controversy for some of the alleged sexism of his comments but that's a damn shame because he is talking about exactly this type of thing:

    Interview with Robert Glasper | DO THE M@TH

    So as a result while you can say there is such a thing as a modern swing feel, and it can indeed swing, it's a lot more cerebral and cool, and the nature of jazz performance - seated, focussed listening and an audience mostly consisting of musicians, music students and hardcore afficionados is the reason. Kurt for example, is really cool, but does he make me want to move? No.

    I mean he does swing, in so much as he catches the swing up beat and phrases in a swing jazz way, and plays a lot of music with a swing feel. But it's.... cool... his music isn't 'hot' in that way - I mean it can be really exciting - I've heard him live - but it's a different feeling, more to do with building tension rather than grooving if that makes any sense. I love his playing anyway, so I don't want to come across as criticising him. I'm just trying to say it's a different flavour.

    And plus, I feel I understand how Kurt got where he is even if I can't exactly follow. Benson on the other hand - no way.

    I'm willing to bet Kurt practiced a lot with a metronome and *fixed* his time, synch'ing up his 8th notes etc, much as most of us on the forum do....

    On the other hand I can't imagine Benson was ever out of time, because I suspect his musical process is profoundly different. It's actually laughable to imagine Benson ever playing a weak rhythm.
    Last edited by christianm77; 05-19-2017 at 11:37 AM.

  14. #88

    User Info Menu

    I have always greatly enjoyed the music...or is it music(s)...of John McLaughlin. I guess I first became aware of him on Bitches Brew, then a few years later I saw Mahavishnu Orchestra.

    I do agree that JM swings differently than, say, a guitarist like Joe Pass. Although Johnny Mac is definitely a bebop-based guitarist, he does not swing the way a bebopper like Joe Pass does. If Pass soloed on one note, it would swing very hard. It was just his habit. JM, by comparison, would definitely tend to displace the accents while making the metrical rhythm work out. 4/4 would still be 4/4, but the swing would be different, for sure.

    The word "lilt" was used above. I have always found McLaughlin, Metheny, and even Scofield to be more lilting players than Pass, Kessel, or Farlow--who were more "bam, bam, bam" swingers. They tended to emphasize the 1 & 3 much more strongly than the "lilting" guys, who just float along, even when they are close to shredding.

    It might be a generational thing.

  15. #89

    User Info Menu

    I think Raney had a lilt no? Actually Raney has to me a very modern feel i guess

  16. #90

    User Info Menu

    +1 I think Raney is sort of transitional. A long line, bebop guy with a lighter touch. He flows and flows.

    I find Raney compelling and listenable--not that the others I mentioned aren't. They are some of my favorites.

  17. #91

    User Info Menu

    TBH, as much as I love the immediate post Christian generation players, it did take a while for the guitar to develop a true bebop feel. Raney, Hall, Wes, Burrell... Slurring and playing a bit softer perhaps.

    But CC was a different feel - very guitar. No bad thing. Barney was the closest to him in the early years IMO. Herb too. It's a different thing. I love those guys. Not what I want to emulate though, despite my idolisation of Charlie.

  18. #92

    User Info Menu



    My playlist is on complete shuffle 24/7, so it is always hard for me to have complete recall. IMHO JM swings on this.

  19. #93

    User Info Menu

    Hi there fellas, I have to confess that I did not listen to John much in the past 20 years, a bit more when I was younger but right now he hit me hard with some of those performances I found on youtube so I would like to open this thread to share exercises, chords, scales, permutations, repertory, anything you guys know or have, please, about John´s style.
    I have watched his instructional video about modal permutations, sounds a bit like Hanon but with modes and interesting pattern displacements, but when he plays, specially with the bigbox, DeFrancesco... he sounds more swingy and bebopy to me.

    Cheers guys!

  20. #94

    User Info Menu

    Well he played a lot of post-bop in the 90s, which was great. His playing really matured and evolved through the 90s and continues... Of course, he doesn't play bop like Joe Pass or Wes, but neither does George Benson for that matter.

    He plays his own way. I think his improv course is the best way to understand his approach. I'm not certain if the DVD technology still works with MS Windows though.

  21. #95

    User Info Menu

    Some useful resources here:

    johnmclaughlintranscribed - transcriptions