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Which guitarist gave you enough ear-candy to set you on your jazz-guitar journey?
For me, it was dad's Julie London LPs in the 1960s, they put me right in the heart of Barney Kessel. I've now listened to those JL records my entire lifetime.
In my teens I began teaching myself things that spoke to me, so "Cry Me A River" was on equal terms with "Rebel, Rebel", "Oh Well" and "American Pie."
Fast-forward to the 1980s and my ear really turned around with Paul Weller's jazzy diversions in The Style Council. Hearing those chord-voicings on mainstream UK radio really made me sit up. Acid Jazz's Ronny Jordan was the next jazz guitarist I really listened to.
Now I'm at the point where I'm looking back at the masters and any weekend's purchases will include some pre-loved Herb Ellis, Charlie Byrd, Grant Green and Sal Salvador. I imagine that many here don't play jazz exclusively and have influences elsewhere too but for jazz, it's Barney K. and Paul Weller, so there you go!
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09-27-2023 06:07 PM
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Joe Pass, Mahavishnu Orchestra and Tony Mattola. Back in the 70's, there was NY FM radio and they played all this stuff without any genre distinction. They'd just play an hour of uninterrupted music and all of it was incredible.
It wasn't for another 10 years that there were factions that quantified differences. Back in the day, I loved those guys, was amazed by what they did and it was a lifetime journey that taught me what ties them together, and not what sets them apart.
Living around NY, I could see McLaughlin and Joe Pass. And I asked myself "Why is it so much better live?"
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Ernest Ranglin
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Tal Farlow. Completely flipped me out. Some of his stuff has yet to be equaled
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Seeing Tony Mottola on Ed Sullivan playing a Beatles tune on a classical guitar with a pick.Then a couple of years later i bought Joe Pass Virtuoso and the quest was on.
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Ted greene. I just heard him warming up in my 1st lesson + my journey changed for good.
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Ed Bickert
i got a Guitar mag many decades ago (Guitar player maybe) that gave u a flexidisc
with it as a teaching thing
(ask someone old about flexidiscs)
and this one month featured 3 canadian guitar players on it jamming talking a bit etc
then Ed played a
minor ii Valt to Em9
well you know …. that was it
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Jack McDuff
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It was this LP in the mid-70s:
Ensconced in rock, I didn’t really “get” jazz, but something about this record really spoke to me.
Favorite set was with Jimmy Smith, Wilbur Ware and Ray Baretto, favorite tune was this:
Kept this record for decades and keep returning to it. When I was studying with Remo Palmier in NYC in the 80s we worked on “Four on Six” from this record. When the wedding/lounge band that I was in at the time added “Misty” to a set list, I looked to this record for inspiration. And today here it is once again.
A strong second gateway was “Two for the Road,” with Herb Ellis and Joe Pass. I even tried recording a version of “Seven Come Eleven” in my small home studio. Joe Pass in particular was another gateway, especially the trio recording of Ellington tunes.
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At about the same time, the Kingston Trio and Laurindo Almeida--the latter's Guitar Music of Spain LP (never reissued, for some reason). Followed by lots more folk and blues guitar (Baez, Van Ronk, Jansch, Doc, John Hurt, Lightnin' Hopkins, et al.), flamenco, and a dash of Johnny Smith (the '67 Verve LP) and Django (via Grappelli). My jazz ear was formed by the likes of Goodman, Ellington, Brubeck, Armstrong, and the Riverside New Orleans Living Legends LPs, and I had to excavate a bit to find my way to jazz guitar, after which I dug all the way down and back to the roots.
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I was happily playing John Hurt and Son House at 14. Then I heard Lightnin' and BB. In about '69 my brother brought home Django. From there I quickly hopped to Wes and Kenny and Coryell and McLaughlin, who was huge for me for several years.
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Originally Posted by pingu
I love flexidiscs! My band's first calling-card to the world was a flexi we gave away.
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Originally Posted by sgcim
YES!! I picked up a TF record a few months back and it's been on high rotate since.
Such a cool player.
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Grateful Dead and Allman Bros. Kind of.
I had heard the Allmans in particular were into Miles Davis. I went to the library and found Dark Magus...thought the cover was cool.
I wasn't ready for that!
But a few weeks later I tried again with Kind of Blue.
And that was all it took.
6 months later, Dark Magus was my fucking LIFE.
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This is exactly my trajectory except replace Dark Magus with A Love Supreme. Originally Posted by mr. beaumont
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I wanted to be able to sing and play guitar - folk music.
I went for lessons at the same music school all the neighborhood kids went to.
My teacher was an old big band guitarist, Sid Margolis, who got me interested in jazz.
The first guitarist I really loved was Jim Hall. I had Glad To Be Unhappy. Next two albums were a Lionel Hampton anthology I bought because it listed Charlie Christian (can't recall how I knew his name) and Guitar Forms by Kenny Burrell. Charlie only played a short solo or two, which I learned to play and can still sing.
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The match that lit the fuse was Martijn van Iterson’s playing (and tone!) on a JoC tune called Shortcut. I was listening to Joe Pass and Martin Taylor before that, but that’s like seeing Rembrandt. Look, don’t touch. Shortcut made me realise that some stuff is within reach. Plus, I love the energy of swing and the vibe of a big band. I’m into swing more than I’m into hardcore jazz.
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Allan Holdsworth (in my teens).
But McCoy Tyner and Chick Corea were my gateway to Jazz (in my early twenties).
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I don’t think it was a guitar player - Brecker with Zappa… then onto Coltrane.
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Lester Young and Tubby Hayes - my sax-playing father had two LPs only. That was enough.
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Joe Pass all the way. I heard a cut from the trio album with Oscar Peterson and NHOP by accident one day and that was it.
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Sid Margolis alumnus here too, RP. 1965 to1966.
Still have his hand written lesson material.
Tony D.
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Years ago someone that I knew as Jobim's Verve Masters record. I loved it and went out and bought it shortly after.
I listened to it this morning due to this thread
Getz is such a melodic cat. Such a beautiful album. That's where jazz started for me.
Like Christian said above, there was little guitar involved as I was drawn more to the sax and vocal/musical harmonies.
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Tony Mottola's LP "Guitar/Paris" at age ten introduced fine chord melody and single note playing well recorded with rich tone.
At about age 18, I started to read Guitar Player magazine and that led me to the listening room at the Philadelphia Public Library where my jazz guitar education began with: Django' final electric album, Tal's "Autumn in New York" LP, Herb Ellis, Charlie Byrd, Joe Pass's Virtuoso and Ella duet LPs, Wes Montgomery's A&M records, etc. Listening Kessel, Smith etc. came later.
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Gateway is an interesting way to express it. I guess for me it was walking into the lesson room prior to my guitar lesson (1965) and my instructor was playing a very interesting song. I asked what it was and he said Moonlight in Vermont. I asked if there was a recording of it somewhere, I’d like to listen to it more times. He handed me his Johnny Smith album, saying please don’t wear it out or break it. I eventually bought my own copy. Other songs on the album also got my attention….Where or When, Cavu, Jaguar and Stars Fell on Alabama. On another one of Smith’s albums, I found Walk Don’t Run and realized the 60’s Venture’s rock version really did a disservice to that song!
Then a friend said if you like that stuff, you have to listen to Wes Montgomery. I did and that sealed the deal for me.
At the time I was playing in a local rock group. But I slowly saw my interest in jazz guitar grow while simultaneously learning and playing the tunes that our group needed to do. A local friend was a music reviewer and every time he was sent a sample Wes Montgomery album to review, after he was done, he gave all of those albums to me. Boy, how about being in the right spot at the right time? But I also bought a bunch of his albums on my own.
To this day I still listen to those albums. I do have albums by Christian, Burrell, Roberts and few others but Wes’s work has never left my mind or attention.
Tom
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