The Jazz Guitar Chord Dictionary
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  1. #1

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    I am a huge fan of the old jazz greats: Django, Wes, Grant Green, Joe Pass, Pat Martino, Jim Hall, George Benson, Kenny Burrel, Barney Kessel etc. They all have that funky, bluesy, jazzy guitar style that I love. However, for some reason I just can't get into Pat Metheny. I hear everybody talk about how great he is. And I really want to like it. So far the only thing I really liked is his version of ATTYA with Jim Hall.

    All his other stuff feels so corny to me. Like the smooth jazz you hear in the mall/the weather channel or that new agey stuff. Especially his synth guitar.

    Also, as a person Pat Metheny seems quite pretentious. Of course what Kenny G did is not cool. But as I said, I think his music sounds almost as corny as Kenny G's stuff.

    Will the jazz police arrest me? Am I tone deaf? Am I not smart/deep enough? Will I get the banhammer?

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  3. #2

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    No. No. No. And no.

    If you don't dig him then you don't dig him.

    Many musicians in jazz are an acquired taste for some, an instantaneous favorite for others. Pat Metheny is one of those. I strongly prefer his earlier stuff with the Pat Metheny Group (the albums "Offramp" and earlier) but my reaction to most of the PMG stuff after that ranges from "meh" to "OMG make it stop." I have talked to a lot of jazz fans over the years, however, who feel exactly the opposite. So maybe try listening to the first Pat Metheny Group album, which is just called "The Pat Metheny Group" and the next one which is called "American Garage." I liked the quartet with Lyle Mays, Danny Gottlieb and Mark Egan the best of all of his bands. I don't particularly care for his first big splash which was "Bright Size Life;" but for many people that's one of their favorite jazz guitar albums. Everybody's right: taste is very personal, after all. I do, however, like a lot of his records recorded outside of PMG. They tend to be more swinging, for one thing, and playing with different musicians seems to bring something else out of him that I like. I would like to see his duo with Ron Carter sometime. With those other groups his sound seems somewhat less processed with less delay, reverb and a little more directness.

    I suppose it is relatively easy to see him as pretentious in interviews but I think Metheny is one of the most articulate musicians to be interviewed. He can explain what it is he is trying to achieve with music very clearly whereas many musicians don't fare so well in interviews. Even if I don't particularly care for it he has a very clear and strong conception for every project he takes on. While he can play the standards he also does not lazily default to an 80-year-old repertoire and writes his own stuff. Metheny has an excellent grasp of the history and the sweep of jazz. He also understands where he sits within that context and does not usually pretend to false modesty. I also have quite a bit of respect in that he built his position and popularity in jazz the old-fashioned way: relentless touring for years on end. In the early days, he and his band drove around in a van, hundreds of thousands of miles, playing any gig they could get to get established. I first saw him in a college gym in Decorah IA in 1981. They loaded in their equipment, they played the gig, they loaded out their equipment, got in the van and drove away. The next time I saw him was two or three years later at the Northrop Auditorium in Minneapolis, so he had moved up a bit, and while he can fill large venues and festivals he still does some club gigs such as playing at the Dakota. He was just there with one of his projects called Side Eye last week.

  4. #3

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    I have tried several times to like Metheny's music. I have failed. I just can't listen to it. But my taste is just mine, there is no accounting for it.

  5. #4

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    Quote Originally Posted by Lark
    I am a huge fan of the old jazz greats: Django, Wes, Grant Green, Joe Pass, Pat Martino, Jim Hall, George Benson, Kenny Burrel, Barney Kessel etc. They all have that funky, bluesy, jazzy guitar style that I love. However, for some reason I just can't get into Pat Metheny. I hear everybody talk about how great he is. And I really want to like it. So far the only thing I really liked is his version of ATTYA with Jim Hall.

    All his other stuff feels so corny to me. Like the smooth jazz you hear in the mall/the weather channel or that new agey stuff. Especially his synth guitar.

    Also, as a person Pat Metheny seems quite pretentious. Of course what Kenny G did is not cool. But as I said, I think his music sounds almost as corny as Kenny G's stuff.

    Will the jazz police arrest me? Am I tone deaf? Am I not smart/deep enough? Will I get the banhammer?
    I dunno, among some he's a divisive figure. I find his music a bit too smooth the stomach, but I do like some of his tunes, James, Phase Dance, Bright Size, they are classics....

    Myself - I've ALWAYS prefered him as a sideman. I can't be bothered with much of the PMG stuff, but I REALLY like Bright Size Life.

    So here's my case for the defence





    It sometimes striking how different he sounds when not on his own stuff....

  6. #5

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    I was in the same boat regarding Metheny. Then one day I was driving down the country road leading to my house and a track came on NPR and it really blew me away. After it was over, they said it was Pat Metheny. Since that time, I'd say I enjoy about 80% of what he does. The really far out experimental stuff I respect, but don't really enjoy. But everything from "Question and Answer" to "We Live Here" brings me a lot of pleasure to listen to.

    I saw him live in Detroit at maybe the 2nd or 3rd performance of "The Way Up" and it was electrifying. The second half he played almost 2 hours just doing the tunes he knows his fans love. While the ensemble changed up a lot, Pat never left the stage. My wife commented "That guy really works hard up there!" His total investment in the music and in performance really inspired me.

    Who knows what it is that suddenly causes our ears to open up to a player? I don't rush it, but when there is a player who doesn't do anything for me, but I know he is truly talented and people whom I respect admire his work, I just figure maybe one day I'll "get it" with that player and add one more to my list of people I enjoy. Until then, I take care not to disparage someone who is truly talented, accomplished, and yet whom I still don't really "get."

  7. #6

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    When I was a student at GIT in the early 80's, I heard Charlie Haden was doing a gig at a vegetarian restaurant in Venice CA and would have a "special guest." Partway through the set, in walks Pat--just as I had hoped.

    After the gig I went up to Pat to say hello and tell him how much I liked his music, that I was a student, transcribed some solos.

    He was extremely cordial. Shook my hand, said very encouraging things about studying and playing, GIT, Howard Roberts, Joe Diorio. That was a long time ago, and Pat wasn't as well known as he is now. But he was about as nice as could be to a young player with a mild beer buzz trying to hang and act cool.

    But I totally get if not everybody likes everything he ever played. I could live with "Zero Tolerance for Silence," for example.

  8. #7

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    I don't really get him either, and I'm also not altogether sure why.

    My favourite of his albums is "Question and Answer", more or less a straight ahead trio set. But it's just an enjoyable album, not something that's going to make my "favourite albums of all time" list. I like bits and pieces of his other stuff, but none of it blows me away.

    I've seen him live a few times, and always find my attention wandering. I can appreciate the skill, but he somehow fails to engage.

    Oddly enough I massively prefer many players supposedly heavily influenced by Metheny, particularly Rosenwinkel but also guys like Ben Monder and Matthew Stevens. Having sat virtually unmoved through Metheney's set 4 or 5 times I've saw Rosenwinkel once thought it was mind-blowingly good, one of the best concerts I've heard.

    It's got nothing to do with his personality: he doesn't strike me as particularly likeable, but that's true of so many of my musical heroes. You have to separate the man from the work.

  9. #8

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    I liked Bright Size Life and PMG, also Watercolors.

    I though that he did a terrific job on this arrangement and performance, even better than the album version of the same tune.


  10. #9

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    When the jazz police come knocking, just tell them that you only listen to horn players.

    Then you don't have to deal with Metheny, AND you get street cred for being a self-loathing guitarist.

    Win-win.

  11. #10

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    I think the non fans mostly like BSL. I think it's hard to argue with that album.

    I'm a big fan. Not into his synth either but I've seen him live in several occasions and formations and he's always been really good. Fun fact, I've never learned any of his sos but his phrasing sometimes makes it into my playing.

    He's not pretentious IMHO but he created this image/persona/brand purposefully to be more popular and mainstream, and it worked.

  12. #11

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    Quote Originally Posted by Jazzstdnt
    I liked Bright Size Life and PMG, also Watercolors.

    I though that he did a terrific job on this arrangement and performance, even better than the album version of the same tune.

    I adore that too
    he did it as an encore at a concert I was at
    It was trancendant....

    and I don't love everything he's done by any means

    but he's a great straight ahead changes player
    He played a standard , Alone Together or similar ....
    and absolutely killed it stone dead , mashed it
    wonderful

  13. #12

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    Quote Originally Posted by Lark
    I am a huge fan of the old jazz greats: Django, Wes, Grant Green, Joe Pass, Pat Martino, Jim Hall, George Benson, Kenny Burrel, Barney Kessel etc. They all have that funky, bluesy, jazzy guitar style that I love. However, for some reason I just can't get into Pat Metheny. I hear everybody talk about how great he is.
    Well he is great, and always was. And the players that you listed are the classics of jazz guitar, no doubt.

    The thing is, the baby boomers felt the need to move forward. They grew up on rock, they heard/saw/contributed to what Miles started with his "Directions In Music".

    McLaughlin said something to the effect of "we can't just stay frozen in the 60s" (something like that). To me, that's a big pointer at Wes. Wes and Joe (and a few others) really took that style of straight-ahead jazz guitar to its zenith, did they not?

    My final, and politically incorrect, point/observation on this topic. Can white players ever really sound like black players? The closer they get, the more forced and disingenuous they sound, or so it seems to me.

    So what's a white, baby boomer or later, jazz guitarist to do? Strike out on something new, or try to ape Wes for the whole of their lives?

  14. #13

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    He definitely has some stuff I don't care for... the PMG material, pretty much anything with Lyle Mays on it. And I agree, the synth guitar stuff is pretty cheesy (never liked when Holdsworth did it, either).

    There's also the fact that he casts a long shadow over jazz guitarists after 1980 or so, and we're on the third generation (give or take) of guitarists whose sound can largely be traced back to him. It's not an exaggeration that a huge part of my aesthetic and approach to the instrument has been a conscious avoidance of his influence.

    All that said... he's just too good. The trios he's put together, from the first Jaco/Moses one to the present day, are almost all universally great. For every PMG album, he put out a record with absolute top-tier players like Haden, DeJohnette, Roy Haynes, Dave Holland, etc. The album with Ornette is great. And so help me, every other recording of Steve Reich's Electric Counterpoint I've heard just sounds sterile.

    The reality is that the guitar has been a second-rate instrument for most of jazz's history. You can tell how non-guitarists thought of a player by the calibre of musicians that would play with them. Wes, Benson, Grant Green, Jim Hall helped make it more respectable. Metheny (and Scofield... and Frisell...) is a pretty big part of that story, too.

  15. #14

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    I hate to say it but I never liked him, except maybe on Joni Mitchell's Shadows in Light double live lp w/Jaco, Brecker et all, where he played sparingly.
    That said some of my friends who I believe have excellent taste love him.
    As a matter of fact I really don't like Kurt or his disciples either. People tell me to check out this guy or that guy, but they mostly bore me to tears, the 'new' school of players don't interest me at all. None of these guys swing, they kinda all sound the same to me.
    I think the last crop I liked was Bernstein, Cohn, Cherry, Malone, etc, and they're really not innovators and not exactly young at this point. But they swing.

    "McLaughlin said something to the effect of "we can't just stay frozen in the 60s" (something like that). To me, that's a big pointer at Wes. Wes and Joe (and a few others) really took that style of straight-ahead jazz guitar to its zenith, did they not?'


    Different cats that I like playing straight ahead still keep me interested, it's not so much the style but the individuality within the style I dig. If that makes me closed minded or stuck in the past, so be it, I can live w/ that.
    So I guess I'm going to have to say I'm going to die frozen [btw, never cared for McLauglin either]

  16. #15

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    It's fair to say that Metheny isn't exactly stuck on the blues.

    TBH - I tend to like blues more than any other song form (jazz/blues that is). I never really get tired of it, as long as the tune is great and the players play well.

  17. #16

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    You don't like Pat Metheny? You will make a lot of friends here!

    Envoyé de mon SM-G930F en utilisant Tapatalk

  18. #17

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    Quote Originally Posted by Ozymandias
    I don't really get him either, and I'm also not altogether sure why.

    My favourite of his albums is "Question and Answer", more or less a straight ahead trio set. But it's just an enjoyable album, not something that's going to make my "favourite albums of all time" list. I like bits and pieces of his other stuff, but none of it blows me away.

    I've seen him live a few times, and always find my attention wandering. I can appreciate the skill, but he somehow fails to engage.

    Oddly enough I massively prefer many players supposedly heavily influenced by Metheny, particularly Rosenwinkel but also guys like Ben Monder and Matthew Stevens. Having sat virtually unmoved through Metheney's set 4 or 5 times I've saw Rosenwinkel once thought it was mind-blowingly good, one of the best concerts I've heard.

    It's got nothing to do with his personality: he doesn't strike me as particularly likeable, but that's true of so many of my musical heroes. You have to separate the man from the work.
    I basically am of the same mind, but there was one tune (in a 3 hour concert) that I heard Pat do live that was real improvisational jazz, not heavily arranged stuff with keys pads and so on, and it was up there with the time I heard Kurt in a cramped little club.

    Everyone else went to the bar and came back for the PMG stuff.

    If Pat had carried on doing that kind of stuff I doubt he would have had the same success. I think he would have been a guy on the scene, playing with great musicians, but not a star with cross over appeal. His music hit a resonance with so many people, but I just want to hear the guy blow.

    But I’m just a basic bitch jazz guitarist lol.

  19. #18

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    I don’t like the Pat Metheny Group stuff much. I prefer the trios etc.

    Question and Answer is probably the one I like most. It’s worth listening to just for Roy Haynes’ drumming, which dominates the album anyway!


  20. #19

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    Lot of people seem to be talking about Pat Metheny the song writer, not Pat Metheny the guitarist. His music definitely has a certain "vibe", but as a guitarist, it's pretty indisputable - he's one of the best. You need to listen to his time feel and articulation. The way Pat plays ahead and behind the beat is second to none. I can't name a single guitarist that does it as well as he does. As for articulation... well just listen to how he plays the head to "How Insensitive" (around 1:21)
    I'd recommend checking out his straight ahead stuff if you're not into his music, but yeah, he's a giant.

  21. #20

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    Pat Metheny is definitely one of the best composers and guitarists on this planet. In terms of musical quality generally speaking he doesn’t differ much from other musicians though. Some of his materials are great, some are mediocre and some are terrible. That’s how it is and should be, we can’t be perfect musicians. We must have our dips in creativity and expression.

    In my opinion, the ECM albums are the best productions in Metheny’s music catalogue. If I want a real listening experience the earliest PMG and solo albums from ECM are perfect choices. There’s nothing wrong about his later productions, but I feel they’re better suited as background music than ”intensive-jazz-listening” albums. I’ve no problem at all with ambient and new-age music in general, but I think there are far more better ambient and new-age guitarists than Metheny.
    Last edited by Bbmaj7#5#9; 09-12-2019 at 07:50 AM.

  22. #21

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    Quote Originally Posted by powersurge
    Lot of people seem to be talking about Pat Metheny the song writer, not Pat Metheny the guitarist. His music definitely has a certain "vibe", but as a guitarist, it's pretty indisputable - he's one of the best. You need to listen to his time feel and articulation. The way Pat plays ahead and behind the beat is second to none. I can't name a single guitarist that does it as well as he does. As for articulation... well just listen to how he plays the head to "How Insensitive" (around 1:21)
    I'd recommend checking out his straight ahead stuff if you're not into his music, but yeah, he's a giant.
    Hey! I was!

    Not my favourite straightahead dude.... but.... how many people are instantly recognisable from note 1?

    I hear his playing in a straightahead context as a uniquely guitaristic take on bop. It’s not like classical bop, but it’s his own take. Very slippery....

  23. #22

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    I've been a Metheny fan since, when was it, I'd guess about 1980 when I saw him in concert. My favorite concert of all time.

    Even though I'm not a Kenny G fan, I found Metheny's bullying of him disgusting.

    This just trancends, high level stuff, his own vocabulary...


  24. #23

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    I wish there’ll be more duet recordings with Pat Metheny in the future. We need more guitar duets in this world!


  25. #24

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    I agree with the OP. Mr. Metheny for me goes into the "admire but don't enjoy" category, along with many other players with genius skills. I could keep listening to him, trying to understand. Or I could listen to Wes or Bird for the millionth time and have fun, along with my intellectual/musical experience.

    Also I agree that his putdown of Kenny G for releasing a G-plus-Satchmo recording of "Wonderful World" was justified, but way over the top, like squashing a mosquito with a sledgehammer.

  26. #25

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    You certainly don't have to like Pat.

    It does seem to me that all of the other guys you dig have a lot in common. I'd say if you'd like to get in to Pat, try listening to a lot of players outside of your comfort zone, not just one. Something might click down the line, and eventually turn you back towards hearing Metheny in a new light.