Small Clanger - may I just point out that even Charlie Parker and Dizzy Gillespie didn’t start out playing bop? If you’d like to play jazz, make your life a lot easier and spend a month or two going through the earlier Eddie Lang, Lonnie Johnson, Carl Kress, Dick McDonough stuff. Even Charlie Christian had been playing with Benny Goodman for a few years before he started playing bop. Dare I say bop isn’t particularly guitar friendly? Other than Charlie Christian, the other guys that come to mind are Barney Kessel and Tal Farlow, both of whom were utter monsters.
You forgot it being about -12, with four foot drifts of snow outside. And the wind blowing in through the chinks of the windows. But yeah, pretty much Croydon.
Wow - cool info and analysis, **Le Ministre **- thanks. It all tracks with my understanding of those players, but I hadn’t threaded it together that way…
Anyone? Bueller? Only 46 views? There’s gotta be more guitar and woodworking geeks on the Dope than that…
bump
I looked at it, but it made me feel so shamefully obsolete that I don’t feel I deserve thumbs…
Well, no argument there. But it’s so damn cool…
I seem to have cut off my own thought - at one point, I went on to talk about playing Maj7, m7b5 and 13 chords through the stomp box and/or the built in overdrive on the amp, only to produce an impenetrable mess. I can only imagine how frustrating it would have been to a sax player listening to sort through and make a significant contribution around a big ‘grrghhh’ chord followed by a ‘grrlccchh’ and a ‘grnnngh’.
That stuffy ‘neck pickup with the tone rolled off and a little reverb from the amp’ allowed for better clarity of the upper extensions of complex chords, while leaving the bass player free to emphasize root and fifth.
Joe Pass’s Virtuoso session was recorded with a mic on his guitar, and another on the amp (or maybe direct to the board, I’m not sure), and the track with the amp was famously lost or destroyed for most songs. The resulting album was kind of a tone disaster.
It’s a matter of how much you listen to. It’s true that the “classic” jazz tone is warm and clear, but I know of no jazz guitar player (BTW I am one) that would say all jazz guitar has one tone. I can’t name two well-known jazz players that have the same tone.
Guitar and amp have a lot to do with tone, although most of what we think of as “tone” is really in the way the guitarist plays the instrument, which is extremely personal. I heard a recording of a usually-electric guitarist (maybe Robben Ford, can’t remember) playing an acoustic, and to me the “tone” was still unmistakably his.
All that being said, Bill Kirchen was once quoted in Guitar Player magazine as describing jazz tone as that “throw your coat over the amp” sound. 
In Robert Benedetto’s book about how to build archtops, he said the kind of wood doesn’t really matter as much as everyone thinks. He built a guitar out of knotty pine, pictured in his book, that he says sounds just as good as the fancy woods. The tone is in the luthier, not in the wood…or cardboard…
Just a note to say that Joe Pass’ album Virtuoso 3was huge for me for a while. Just him and a guitar, holding down all the parts in ways I couldn’t possibly imagine.
CookingwithGas: we can talk a while about woods and tone - I geek out a bit ;). There’s the Torres paper guitar, the Taylor “pallet guitars” and Ovations, composites and solidbody electrics made from plastic and aluminum. There are a few factors that influence sound before materials, but they are high on the list. In terms of archtops, remember that a lot are “sophisticated plywood” i.e., laminated layers of tonewood, like an ES-175 made out of lam’d maple. Archtops have a specific job and design matters a lot more than materials…and Benedetto is one of the masters of creating them.
…and know that we mere humans will never be this good.
Chet Atkins and Jerry Reed hamming it up with Jerry’s Breakdown.
Jerry’s playing a classical guitar in a chicken-pickin’ Telecaster style with the fingerpick palmed (i.e., not used and tucked in his index-finger crook) so he is using a thumbpick and other three fingers - and just slaying.
Chet - well, he’s just the best. Notice the sweep-picking about 1:13 in - making the metal-shredders proud…
Can’t remember if this has been linked to - but always worth a look!
There’s a 1 and a 2, don’t overlook them 
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Those guys are great. Every time I hear Chet Atkins I think of the countless players he’s influenced. I would have said that Jerry’s playing with a very banjo-like approach. That’s weird that he doesn’t use his index finger.
I met one of my idols tonight. I first heard Manuel Barrueco on an EMI disc of Villa-Lobos, Brouwer and Orbon in 1998, and it was what got me back into playing guitar. He played a fantastic concert tonight at the Glenn Gould Studio in Toronto. Every note worked beautifully into the phrase, every phrase into the piece and no trace of any technical difficulty, even though I know all of his rep was killer hard.
The Program -
José Ardévol, Sonata;
Astor Piazzola, Cincos Piezas;
intermission;
Dmitri Yanov-Yanovsky, Little Lute Music in Memory of John Dowland (a North American premiere);
Manuel M. Ponce, Sonata Meridional;
Francisco Tárrega, Capricho Árabe;
Joaquín Malats, Serenata Andaluza, Serenata Española.
Three encores - Manuel Barrueco’s arrangement of La Cumparsa;
Francisico Tárrega’s arrangement of ‘La Raton’ and
Francisco Tárrega’s arrangement of Mendelssohn’s ‘Barcarole’.
I waited around afterwards and politely snuck backstage to get his autograph. While he signed that CD from 1998, I said ‘Thank you, Maestro, for many wonderful years of inspiration. This disc was what rekindled my love for the guitar.’
I don’t yet know if I get to hear his master class at U of T tomorrow…
Very cool, **Le Ministre **- thanks for sharing that; wish I was there.
Missed this. Yes - other good Joe Pass worth mentioning and owning; V3 is what did it for me.
Yeah, I am behind in my knowledge of differentiating between various *Americana *styles, e.g., clawhammer vs. frailing vs. etc…as you say that, it sure does look banjo-y. I suspect I will be learning more over the next view years; my tastes seem to be shifting in this direction and I sense a potential return to a primarily-acoustic-guitar phase in my playing…
DoctorJ - My apologies; I’ve been meaning to respond to this for about a week now. I’m locked in a struggle just to maintain my current status of ‘Maximum Acceptable Level of Being Behind’ rather than slipping into some sort of Einsteinian paradox of being Black Hole Level behind.
I don’t know what you already have, and I’m not entirely sure which style of ‘lead’ you’re after. That being said, here’s a list of some things I find particularly useful, and I hope you’ll forgive anything which you find too elementary or that you already have.
First things first - do you have any means of recording yourself/listening back? Even better, if you have some means of laying down 4 or 8 bars of your own rhythm guitar work and playing it back so that you can a) play your own lead over and later on b) record your lead over your rhythm track, that is immensely helpful. I use a Zoom Q3, which is fantastic for recording video or audio. If you get one, buy the adaptor (sold separately, for reasons I don’t understand.) as it goes through batteries like shit through a cat. Also, most smartphones now have some kind of application which will allow them to record ambient sound. Your computer may already be set up to record as well…
Depending on your computer & platform, GarageBand is useful (and it’s free on yer Mac; I don’t care for it much, myself, but I know others who swear by it.) Band in a Box is great, but the Mac version has stagnated since whenever the Hell they last upgraded. If your running a PC (or have some means of running your Mac as a PC), I highly recommend it.
I’ve really enjoyed the materials I’ve got from both Mel Bay and Homespun. I don’t know of any specific publications or videos on learning lead guitar, though.
I understand when you say a teacher isn’t a possibility for you. I just want to throw out the idea, though - is there some way to see someone once every two weeks? or once a month? I highly recommend coming up with something…
So while you wait for other recommendations, materials, etc., here’s an idea - just start playing the melody of a song that you already know and work from there. When I say that, I don’t mean just play the notes. I mean, take something like ‘Amazing Grace’ in E Major. ( B | E - G# F#| G# - F#| E - C#| B - , and so on…) Try playing it on just one string - how does that go? Try it first on the second string, then try staying on the same string with the other strings. Then move on to playing it with two strings. Look for the positions that are most comfortable and sound the best. (For most of us, that’s the same thing…) Once you’ve found positions where you can play all the notes comfortably, start experimenting with sliding up to or down to notes. Add bends. Add reverse bends, where you start out with the string bent up to a note and then release it down to the next note. Done right, it’ll sound like that shiny Red Tele of yours has a whammy bar that it doesn’t have… Add hammer-ons. Add pull-offs. Play with a slide. Somewhere in there, start playing it overtop of yourself playing rhythm…
All these things I’ve mentioned change the phrasing and change the feel of a melody. Once you get comfortable with that, start changing notes. Stay within the scale (E, F#, G#, B, C# - E major pentatonic, but ignore that if it doesn’t mean anything to you right now.), and change it as you go. Add some notes in between to start with, then start doing things that change the melodic contour. Try following the shape of the melody, eg. go up when it goes up, go down when it goes down, but start on a different note that makes sense within the chord. Try going the opposite direction from the melody. Throughout all of this, work on developing your taste for what additions of yours work and which ones don’t. This is where listening back is invaluable - it frees you up to experiment. When you listen back, let your ears tell you what you did, and decide whether that’s a keeper or not.
Hope some of this helps, and let me know if you want to hear more - I could go on like this for days. (That’s both a promise and a warning…)
Here are videos of my jazz workshopgroup giving a performance. Remember this is an amateur group. The recording quality is just the camera at the back of the room but better that I expected. This is the first time I’ve played out with this guitar and am still working on adjustments for the right tone, and am thinking about getting a different amp (this is a Peavey Studio Pro 60). (ETA: I tried a Fender Acoustasonic, but I don’t recommend it for jazz. It’s voiced for a dreadnought.)
http://www.seiglefamily.com/photos.php?dir=2010JBM&cols=1&cappos=right&ppp=10
I wanted a carved top and the Hofner was the only one I found at this price point, which was $2000 brand new from Legato Guitars(Bill Fender). That was when Bill was still in the DC area and I went to his house and played a bunch of guitars, including a $20,000 Benedetto just for fun. (In my search I also played a Heritage, a D’Angelico, a couple of other Hofners, a Gibson Tal Farlow, etc.)
The guitar has some cosmetic flaws in the pearl inlay. Also has a long crack in the finish that runs parallel to and under the strings. I didn’t notice it when I bought it, not sure if it was there new or showed up later. Playability is very good, although I had to pay a tech to do a very thorough setup, including hammering down frets that were not seated properly, so there were some quality control problems.
Tone is great. It sounds really nice unamplified. The pickup is reasonably hot; the tone actually sounds best if I roll the volume knob down a bit. I am still struggling with a rig that will allow that acoustic warmth to make it out through the pickup and out of the amp. I have gotten very nice tone playing through a Roland Cube 30 at workshop sessions, but it’s not loud enough for gigs. I get a nice tone with the Peavey but you don’t get the acoustic tone coming through, very “electric” sounding. I am considering a Henriksonbut am not eager to drop a grand when I’m not gigging regularly.
I don’t think you will find a better carved top at this price point. I’m not sure you can find one at all at this price point.
Hey - I just listened to Billie’s Bounce and your solo work from around 4:45 in - great job! I love the high octave work around 5:15.
That guitar dealer is in a parallel universe to me - I deal with dealers of vintage acoustics and rock/blues electrics, so know the pedigree. Nothing better than wandering in and spending an afternoon trying uber$$ guitars and geeking out with folks who know their stuff.
Why’d you want a carved top - assume I know nothing about jazzbox tonality (not far from the truth). Did Wes Montgomery’s L-5 have a carved or lam’d top? You sound great; what is different vs. an ES-175 which can be had at a similar price point but with a laminated top?
What’s the neck profile on the Hofner - I can’t recall if I have played many Hofners…
As for amps - why not just find an old Roland JC-120?
Clapton is selling off more guitars…
Jeff Beck, along with others, is adding a guitar to the auction. ::drool:: - if it was a White Strat with a RW fingerboard and huge neck - basically one he really played or just like it - man, would I be interested…but couldn’t afford…
Very nice of you to say so :o I just hear the clams…
Well, I’m no expert. A lot about guitars is black magic and folklore. I’ve heard people argue about how brass bridge pieces sound better than nickel on a Tele :rolleyes: Anyway, in general, a carved top will resonate more, and more consistently, than a laminated top (this also increases the tendency to feed back). Many laminated-top guitars also have top-mounted pickups which require more reinforcement, also dampening resonance. My ES-335 has a solid block of wood down the middle. My guitar has a single floating pickup; it’s mounted on one side to the base of the neck and doesn’t touch the top. The bridge is also held in place by the tension of the strings; no screws (like a violin). That said, there are certainly some fine laminated-top guitars. My 335 has no shortage of resonance (although IMHO the electronics aren’t right for jazz, and I’m not enough of a gearhead to start switching out the pickups, etc., etc.).
I’m afraid I don’t know the details of Wes’s guitar; the modern L5 CES looks to have a solid spruce top.
I would have to check. I’m not sure how to describe the neck profile, kind of medium. I don’t like them flat, and I don’t like them fat. I don’t know the radius, but I think have a gauge squirrelled away somewhere.
Not familiar with it, I’ll look for one!