Welcome!

Welcome to my Swing Guitar blog. My name is Jonathan Stout. I am the guitarist and bandleader of "Jonathan Stout and his Campus Five, featuring Hilary Alexander" and the "Jonathan Stout Orchestra."

I have played guitar for 13 years, but I've spent the last 5 years learning the art of Swing Guitar. This is a place where I can share with you the techniques, tools, tips and understanding of Swing Guitar that I learned, found or figured out over the last several years. Along the way we'll deal with playing techniques, gear choices and setup, understanding the music and the style, and other resources on the web, on record, and in print.

So, that begs that question? What is "Swing Guitar?" "Swing Guitar" covers all of the types of jazz guitar playing and players from the Swing Era (roughly 1935-1945) and later players in the Swing style. The style has several different facets - Rhythm Guitar - Single String Lead Guitar - Chordal Rhythm Solos - etc. Some of the guitar players we'll talk about are Freddie Green, Charlie Christian, Allan Reuss, Django Reinhardt, George Van Eps, Oscar Moore, Carmen Mastren, Eddie Lang, Dick McDounough, Carl Kress, Al Casey, Irving Ashby, Dave Barbour, and numerous others.

I'll be updating the links column as we go along, and we'll feature resources on playing, the gear, the original guitarists, and modern musicians and bands in the swing tradition.