Swing Guitar

MOVING!

2010-01-05T16:29:00.000-08:00

I'm starting this blog over from scratch, and moving it to a new home on the Campus Five webpage. I'll be adding more lessons, tips, tricks, videos, gear stuff, and it should be a bit more manageable to update than this blog has been.

So, we'll see you over at the new blog site:
http://www.campusfive.com/swingguitarblog/

So finally I update something!

2009-05-18T22:52:00.000-07:00

Now that I'm out of law school and passed the California bar, I'm planning a major overhaul of this site, and I've been spending a lot of time working on a rhythm guitar instructional book. For now this post will have to do.

So, last night my band, Jonathan Stout and his Campus Five, played at the Cicada Club in Downtown Los Angeles. The entire show was webcast, and the show is achieved on youtube. So here are the videos.

Why am I posting the videos on the swing guitar blog? Because you can really hear the rhythm section. I hope that anyone who has been struggling to hear rhythm guitar because of the relatively poor recording mediums of the swing-era will be able to hear that 4-beat feel loud and clear.

For the guitar gear geeks: I'm playing my Eastman AR805 for most of the rhythm work. Additionally, I've got my LeVoi for the Django-stuff, and my Franken-ES-150. You can also hear and see my 1939 EH-185.

The band is: Jonathan Stout (duh), Hilary Alexander (vocals), Albert Alva (tenor/clarinet), Jim Ziegler (trumpet/vocals), Richard Geere (piano), Wally Hersom (bass), and Hal Smith (drums).

Here's part 1 (-45 mins)

Here's part 2 (~35 mins)

Here's part 3 (~35 mins)

New Guitar - Franken-ES-150

2008-07-07T10:45:00.000-07:00

Hey guys, I've now graduated from Loyola Law School, and am now preparing for to take the California State Bar Exam (which is like the 9th level of hell). But I do have an update.

Last year I borrowed a mid-90's Gibson Custom Shop Reissue ES-150CC. Although many people have dissed the reissue as not quite as authentic as it might otherwise be, it was the first time that I have felt happy with my electric tone in a long while. I accumulated a trio of Gibson "Charlie Christian" amps - a 1936 EH-150 (10" speaker), a 1930?'s EH-160 (12" speaker AC/DC version), and a 1939 EH-185 (a transitional model actually labeled as a EH-150). Playing the CC pickup equipped guitar through any of those amps was magical, and there were times I felt like I was channeling Charlie.

But then, my friend took it back (although he offered to sell it to me first for $4k, natch). Going back to using a DeArmond guitar mike was really unsatisfying by comparison. The guitar mike was not bad sounding, in fact it sounds great, even on a guitar with bronze strings. However, the CC pickup had a really unique sound, and THAT was the sound that I've always wanted.

In an attempt to chase that sound, I decided to frankenstein an ES-150 using one of the new UK-made "CC Pickups." I had heard good reviews from people on the yahoo CC forum, and especially favorable as compared to the other remakes, such as Lollar, etc. I bought a CC pickup with a B-string notch on ebay, and looked for a guitar to put it in. I found "the Loar" brand guitars and was intrigued. They look just like a 20's Gibson L-5, except for the fact that the sunburst is too modern looking, and they offer a blonde which is was only offered in the late 30's. Anyway, I purchased an LH-500, and it was an small-sounding acoustic archtop that couldn't really hold a candle to my Eastmans. I didn't really care because I was going to be carving a big hole in the top anyway. However, I was really disappointed to learn that CC pickup wasn't going to work on the guitar. Basically, the neck was set too far off of the top, and that made the distance between the top where the pickup would be mounted too far from the strings. CRAP!

I was stuck in limbo, and I tried to offload the guitar. I managed to sell it on ebay, but because of finals and the holidays last christmas, I never shipped the guitar. Good thing the never send payment because he got fed up. I was lucky he only left neutral feedback.

Anyway, everything changed when I saw a listing for this guitar:
Now, this was promising - someone had already done the work for me. I wasn't too concerned with the guitar being a disaster because it had a UK made CC pickup in it, and that was the main tonal component. Hell, the resale on the pickup and the good looking pickguard would likely be enough to make the purchase risk worthwhile. I'm waiting to talk to the seller some more to get the whole back story on the guitar. So far, I know it started out life as a cheapo washburn archtop guitar. Hell, the only thing that is not dead on is the body depth - which is pretty thin. I'll post more details when I get them.

So the guitar arrived last week. It played fine, although it had 11's on it, and the tone was pretty generic - not bad, just not that signature CC tone. After some tweaking, I managed to improve things significantly. I changed the strings to 13 flats - D'Angelico (my flats of choice), which beefed things up. And more significantly, I lowered the pickup height, and bam - there is that tone. The guitar became really inspiring, despite the fact that the action was not a bit uneven and the intonation was pretty off in places - to be expected when moving up from 11's to 13's without setting the guitar up. I did tweak the truss rod, but it needs a proper set up. The only thing left is to play it on a gig to see how it responds at those volume levels, and under fire. I suspect already that the guitar is too bass-y because of the flats - which I suspect were not used in the late 30's-early 40's, but no one seems to have a definitive answer - and that issue will be solved by moving to roundwounds.

Still, it's really good to get that close to the goal without dropping $6k on a vintage guitar. Plus, I still have the CC pickup I bought, so I may eventually frankenstein my own, using a Gibson L48 or L50, or maybe even an L-7 or something.

More Swing Guitar on Youtube

2007-03-30T10:10:00.000-07:00

Here are a couple other videos of note on swing guitar on youtube:

Count Basie - "Twenty Minutes After Three" - From Ralph Gleason's Jazz Casual series from the late 60's. While I generally try not to get into Freddie's ideosyncrasies - because he could do stuff none of us can pull off - and especially not his later stuff, because late Basie stuff has a straight-ahead rhythmic feel - real laid back. That is not the same as pre-1950 Basie, which is "Swing" with a capitol "S", which is what this website is about. Still, this example gives us a pretty good glipse at Freddie Green and we can hear him really well. Also, check out another from that session, here. Dig how Basie quotes a little bit of "Splanky" in there. Another on "I Don't Know." (by the way dig the way Sonny Payne juggles one of his brushes in one of his fills at the end.)

Fats Waller - "Ain'tMisbehavin' / Honeysuckle Rose" - A soundie of Fats Waller, whose band featured the fantastic Al Casey. Besides recording the milestone "Buck Jumpin'", you can hear Al pretty wellin a c0uple fills on "Ain't Misbehavin'" and he gets a full chord solo on "Honeysuckle" which is awesome.

Also, I should be noted that a lot of great videos have been removed from YouTube so here are a couple from Daily Motion. By the way, it seems like the video sync is way better on Daily Motion as well.

Marty Grosz - "Porter's Lovesong to a Chambermaid" - One of the only people who keeps alive the Carl Kress school and tuning. He seems pretty goofy and perhaps not the best singer, still those all describe Fats Waller too. More important is the guitar solo, which is straight out of the Carl Kress school. Also check out "Swing that Music!" which is also really badass. By the way the tuning is Bb, F, C, G, B, D, which is basically Tenor banjo with two extra bass strings.

Bing Crosby - "Dinah / Please" - Here are a couple of Eddie Lang's movie appearences right before he died. Oh and here's some Eddie Lang w/ Joe Venuti.

I'll put some more up soon. Thanks.

Swing Guitar on YouTube!

2006-12-24T09:41:00.000-08:00

With Time magazine giving "us" collectively person of the year due to innovations like blogging and youtube, it's about time I picked out some of the best swing guitar clips currently on youtube. Some of these clips are really inspiring and some are just amazing historical rarities - as we all know, during the swing era guitar was not the feature instrument it is today.

Here are two rare ones to start.

Louis Prima/Pee Wee Russell - "Isle of Capri" (Gerry McAdams - guitar)
Kind of a dixie tune with a slammin' chord solo from obscure player Gerry McAdams.

Les Paul - "and the Teenagers"
Les is playing the "Log" through a 40's Epiphone Electar Amp. Rad....

Django Reinhardt - "J'attendrai"
one of the very rare vids of Django
"La Route Du Bonheur"
A bad-ass clip of Django playing in a more bebop style from 1952.

Lester Young, et. al, - "Jammin' the Blues" (Barney Kessel - guitar)
This is easily one of the most inspiring film clips I've ever seen. Everytime I hear or see it, I just want start jammin'. The link above is just the up blues part, here is the whole film (10minutes).

Coleman Hawkins - "I Found a New Baby" (Mary Osbourne - guitar)
This is early TV jam session, featuring 1st generation Charlie Christian devotee Mary Osbourne. The story is that she heard CC play in '37 or so, and went out the next day to get a Gibson 150 set.

Benny Goodman - "One O'Clock Jump"
Check out the featured Electric Guitar solo on this! This film dates to 1943, so this still pretty early to feature a guitar solo. I can't remember the name of the player right now, but I'll update when I remember.

Basie All Stars - "Dickie's Dream" (Freddie Green)
This is pretty rad clip anyway, but there are several shots of Freddie chunking, plus you can actually hear him in places.

More to follow....

I'm Back, again - no really....

2006-12-20T13:32:00.000-08:00

So, I finished my last final yesterday, so now I have some time to put up several posts I've had planned.

First a gear update. So, last time I mentioned using a 1947 Dearmond FHC Guitar Mic and a 1936 EH-150. Well as I mentioned both of them had problems. The Guitar mic had a short in it somewhere leaving the output about a quarter of what it should be - which is not even remotely enough to use with the amp. The EH-150 had a blown speaker and other problems. I had the speaker reconed and the circuits cleaned up and it worked pretty good and sounded fantastic. But the big problem was that the cabinet was falling apart and the bottom was falling out, I used it for months and it was worth the hassle.

Since I couldn't use the two together, I got an 1965 Guitar Mic off ebay and started using that. Now that sounds great! Oddly enough the 60's Guitar mic seems as though its balanced for nickel (read:electric) strings, not bronze, whereas the 40's pickup sounds balanced for bronze strings and has a compensated B string. I guess in the 40's people where just sticking pickups on their otherwise acoustic guitars with bronze strings, and by the 60's people where more interested in the elctric sound and kept nickel strings on their jazz boxes all the time.

So now I had a working pickup that sounded great paired with the Gibson amp. But I was still dealing with a very, very fragile amp that was falling apart. So. next I bought another EH-150 on ebay, this time a Style 3 1937-1940, with a 12". Another selling point was that this amp had its back cover. But when the amp arrived, I realized that it was not a 150, but a very, very rare EH-160 - the AC/DC version. The thing has 11 tubes in it, a battery bias, and a bunch of other wierd features. Plus, get this... its a shock hazard! So I had to get an isolation transformer - which is like 15lbs - to keep from killing myself. Anyway, my bass player Wally gave the thing two different going overs and now it sound unbelievable. It has more bass because of the 12" speaker and I used it on our new record (recorded mid november - still in post). Of course, there are still some problems, the main one being that the bizzarre circuit in the 160 is actually only 5-6 watts, so its too quiet.

I tried to have the 1947 Deamrond rewound, with mediocre results. I don't know what I'm going to do with it now. As it stands I've got the '65 guitar mic on my blonde Eastman 810CE, and nothing on my sunburst Eastman 805. I've been taking the EH-160 to gigs and I'm planning to get a cover for it from studio slips. After christmas, I'm planning on getting either another regular EH-150 with a 12" speaker or an Epiphone from the era. I'm also planning on having my 1936 EH-150 reconditioned, and having the cabinet reglued.

I'll post sound samples when I get the rough mixes from our last recording.
More to come!

Chord Melody works in progress

2006-05-19T23:24:00.000-07:00

Here are some chord melody sketches I've been working on. These are all played on my 805 using a 5mm Wegen pick, 13-56 Martin SP 80/20 strings. The mic is my Rode NT-3 into an M-Audio Fasttrack USB interface, recorded with Audacity. I just added a touch of 'verb, and compression.

I'm Confessin' - mp3
I Can't Give You Anything But Love - mp3
All of Me - mp3

(update: the samples are now fixed)

New Gear, pt.1

2006-05-19T22:24:00.000-07:00

So, I went over board on ebay a while back and got a 1947 DeArmond Guitar Mic pickup and a 1937 Gibson EH-150 amp. Well, I'll tell you - you get what you pay for! The EH-150 had a blown speaker, the cabinet is falling apart, and the handle is completely shot. The good news is that I just took the speaker in to Orange County Speaker. I'd heard that it's the only place to go, and they knew exactly what they were looking at and what to do with it. I'm picking it up in week - we'll see what happens.

As for the DeArmond, it worked great when I got it, except for an intermitent short in the cable by the jack. So I fixed that. But then a problem developed where the pickup only put out a quarter of its output. This happended on-and-off, but eventually stayed muted all the time. So, I have to crank my Peavey Classic 30 all the way up just to get useable signal. But, damned if it doesn't sound pretty good. It really does have that old-school single coil sound!

Also, I made some changes to my Eastman 805. I had taken the guard and pickup off, and I got a really nice repro tortise shell guard from archtop.com. It's shaped like an early 30's, 16" L-7 guard, but triple bound and redish shell color. I had my tech install the guard and also do some wiring to acommodate the new DeArmond. I had him wire the pickup into the end pin jack, but put an RCA connector in-between so I can take the pickup completely of the guitar whenever i want. He's also modifying my 810 for the same thing, so I can put the pick up on either guitar. Also, I had him redo all of the pick up cabling with mogami wire, because the old wiring was pretty frayed.

Here a before and after on the 805:
Before:

After:

Rose Room

2006-05-19T21:13:00.000-07:00

Here's that first new lesson, on the classic tune "Rose Room". This is an example of classic swing rhythm guitar and rhythm voicings. The chords don't move that fast, but there are a few variations included. Check out the time feel - 4 beat - "chunk-Chunk-chunk-Chunk" - 4 even beats with a slight accent on two and four.

I could do an extensive play by play, but most of what's going on are the standard 3-note voicings on the E, D and G strings. Put, here are the hghlights:
1) Looking at the Eb7 & F7 chords, notice the root on the A string, moving to the 5th on the E string. Thats a pretty standard variation. Although the bass player will be taking care of the low end, movement like that helps keep things interesting (at least for yourself).
2) Also, notice the walk down from the F7 & Eb7 chords to B7 & A7 respectively. It's a classic tritone substitution, although the only note being changed is the root, so it's not really a complex move.
3) The walk up from Ab7 to Db6 is pretty standard as well.
4) Also the walk down from Ab6 to F7 is pretty standard.
5) Finally, the four-note chords toward the end are another simple way to add some variation. Also, the're good for increasing volume in louder sections of tunes with out having to play a lot harder.

Rose Room - pdf
Rose Room - mp3

Give it try, and feel free to leave any questions.

I'm back....

2006-05-19T19:30:00.000-07:00

We'll I just finished my first year of law school, so I'm back. I'll be putting up some more rhythm lessons, and some chord melody stuff. Also, I'll be writing about my new gear - a 1947 DeArmond Guitar Mike, and a 1937 Gibson EH-150.

Rosetta

2006-01-02T23:45:00.000-08:00

Here's the next in my our series of rhythm guitar changes to classic tunes - Earl Hines' Rosetta.

Rosetta - pdf
Rosetta - mp3

Notes:
A1 - Here we start with a I-V7+, then a I-VI6 descending move, and finishes off cycling through the II7-V7 back to I. Here we make a couple breaks from the standard 3-note voicings, but nothing big. The F6 is standard but I play the root on the A string, instead of the 5th of the E string - then again I do that a lot because the voice leading just sounds better when there is no bass player. The 4 note chord for the C7+ is also no big deal, I just like to hear the full chord there. The descending line here is classic and can be used all the time in tons of tunes. Finally you might wonder why there is a jump up from the C7 to the F6 voice; well, any voicing below that C7 voice is just never going to come out clearly and just sounds muddy.
A2 - Here I switched out the C7+ for a E7 with no 5th. It's a common sub. Also notice the classic ascending line used on both the G7 and the C7.
B - This actually pretty standard. The only change is the Fm6. If you were to play a regular m6 at the 13th fret is gets a little too high on the neck, so it's a little hard to finger and doesn't sound great. The 8th fret voicing is the exact same notes, but it sounds better.
A3 - This is pretty much like the rest of the A sections, except a transitional tritone sub from the D7 into the G7.

New Background, New Gear

2005-12-30T01:10:00.000-08:00

So you might have noticed the new background image. That is Al Casey from the mid-40's playing with drummer Denzil Best. He appears to be playing a Epiphone Deluxe with a DeArmond FHC Guitar Mic.

Oh, and I was pretty bad on ebay the last couple of weeks. So I got two things: 1) a DeArmond FHC Guitar Mic - I'm guessing its mid-40's based on the black bakealite volume knob, and 2) an 1937 Gibson EH-150 amp - the earliest version with square corners all around and a 10" speaker.

And speaking of a 10" speaker, the one in the amp is shot! If anyone has any leads on getting a replacement 10" field coil speaker, let me know!!!

The guitar mic is really awesome. I was getting tired of an electric tone that was just too modern sounding, and I was considering the crazy step of getting another Eastman and putting a Charlie Christian pickup in it. I was also looking at the Kent Armstrong single coil pickup on archtop.com, or the Tom Short Western Swing Pickup. The problem for me, at least, was that the Tom Short could not be used with Bronze strings, and the Kent Armstrong needed to mounted to a pickguard. Moreover, I released that vintage gear gets vintage sounds a lot easier, and that it was the modern pickup that I didn't like in the first place.

The guitar mic is great - its gets that vintage sound because it is really vintage. Plus, I can move it from guitar to guitar really easily. I put flats on my 810CE so I could get a more vintage sound, and the guitar mic sounds great on it. Sometimes, however, I just want to bring one guitar to a gig, and in that case I can put the pick up on my 805.

Bb Blues - simple and variations

2005-12-29T23:52:00.000-08:00

Here's the first in a series of lessons on classic rhythm guitar songs and patterns. We'll start at the beginning and go over a Bb Blues.

Simple Blues
First is a simple pattern with no frills. It works well for playing fast, and as a good starting point for the beginning swing guitarist. All of these voicings are classic and can be found in Charleton Johnston's Swing and Big Band Rhythm Guitar. And this time, I've included some sound samples - because the ones in the Johnston book are terrible.

Bb Blues - simple - pdf
Bb Blues - simple - mp3

Blues Variations
Here is much more complicated chorus. Bear in mind that I crammed as many moves into this one as I could. You probably wouldn't bother to play all of these moves all the time, but you can use any of these moves to spice up a regular chorus.

Bb Blues - variations - pdf
Bb Blues - variations - mp3

Bar 1-2: Rather than play a simple I-IV-I, we put a I7 into the IV, and then a #IVdim leading back to the I.
Bar 4: This is another classic voice leading move that I learned from John Reynolds. I often also play this move two beats per chord over two bars.
Bar 5-6: This is a little more unusual move that I came up with looking for some kind of descending voice leading move.
Bar 7-8-9-10: The C#dim into the Cm7 is another classic chromatic movement. You can use the dim for beat or two or whole bar before moving to the ii7 chord.
Bar 11-12: Just a classic turnaround. You will use this everywhere.

*** Sound Clip Notes: I just got a M-audio Fast Track USB, which is a handy and simple audio interface, so I can finally record decent sounding sound samples. I used my RODE NT-3 for both. The simple changes were recorded with my Eastman 810CE (now strung with flatwounds - I can still hardly bring myself to say it) and the variations were played on my Eastman 805. Both were using the new Wegen 7mm.

Picks and Strings

2005-12-06T22:15:00.000-08:00

Last week I received a nice big order from bigcitystrings.com, so I've some nice post fodder.

Picks
I'm a firm believer in Wegen picks - giant, massive, gargantuan picks. I have been using the 5mm Fatone or FatTone for 3 years and I could never go back to using regular picks. It took a little while to get used to, but the volume, projection and body are unparalleled. At $15 a pick, they aren't cheap, and you have to get used to always keeping tabs on your pick, but they are totally worth it.

My newest acquisitions are the "Button" and the "7". The 5mm button is fashioned after an old button which would have been whittled down to use as a pick - very old school, ala Django. This one is bit harder to us, but after a few minutes it became much more natural. This is the pick of choice for a lot of the djangobooks.com guys. But the real story is the "7". This is the mother of all picks - 7mm! I found this to be only a small change from the fattone and it created absolutely amazing volume. I'm stuck on this pick!

Strings
String Type
Acoustic
I think phospor bronze sounds to bright and tinny, so use 80/20 bronze. When I received my Eastman 805, it came with nickel 12's, and the only thing I could find to replace them at the time were Martin SP's. I had never used Martin strings and boy was I surprised at how great they sounded. I've tried a couple other brands, but kept coming back to the Martins. Also, I did try Martin Marquis and regular Martin 80/20's but neither sounded as good as the SP's. The Martin SP's just sound great, and, as advertized, have great longevity.
Electric
I can't believe I'm saying this, but I just put flatwounds on my Eastman 810CE. Shudder. Ok, I'm over it. After talking to a couple people lately, I realized that back in the 30's and 40's people like Charlie Christian probably used flats. I got sick of having crappy string balance from bronze strings, and crappy acoustic tone from nickel. Since I have an Eastman 805 non-cutaway, that is now exclusively electric, I figured I could skimp a little on the acoustic tone of my electric guitar. Honestly, the acoustic tone isn't that bad. I could only find Thomastik Swing Flat 13's, and they are pretty good, but I really like D'Aquisto Flats. I've used those for years and they sound really good. Just stay away from "ground-wound" strings like D'Addario Chromes. The difference is that ground wound strings are normal round wound strings, except they are shaved flat. Real flatwounds are tape wound, and the wrap is a flat tape.
Gauges
According to archtop.com, "Even the oldest archtop guitars are remarkably sturdy for the most part, having been built to accommodate high E strings of .014 or higher." Now I don't generally go that big, but I have 13's on both my Eastman's. I think anything less than a 12 is worthless.
If your treble strings are a bit thin sounding, you can try to go up a guage on the E and B strings - for quite a while I was using a 13 set but switching out for a 14 and 18 on the top two strings. Also, pay attention to the G, D and A string guages. I noticed that the "Medium" guage Martin SP 80/20's are 13/17/26/35/45/56, instead of the usual 26/36/46/56, which they use in the "Bluegrass" gauge. The D and A strings have the greatest volume and projection on an archtop guitar, and by using bigger guages you can increase the power and projection of the whole guitar. I made the move from the slightly lighter Medium to the slighter heavier Bluegrass, and the guitar sounds even bigger, especially for rhythm.

Requests

2005-12-01T22:58:00.000-08:00

So I've been tossing up posts whenever I get an idea. Plus, I've got several mega post lessons that are in the works.

But I have no idea what you guys my actually like to see. So write back with what you'd like to see more of...lessons?...gear ideas?...style and genre commentaries?...sound clips?

Let me know. Thanks!

X-mas Gift List: CD's to buy now

2005-11-29T10:01:00.000-08:00

Since the Christmas season is rolling around again, I figured I'd put together a list of essential recording you might want to look into or ask for this Christmas.

Overview Samplers:
Various: Pioneers of Jazz Guitar: 1927-1939 (Yazoo) - This is a 24 track collection of Eddie Lang, Carl Kress and Dick McDounough playing in solo and duo settings. These are examples of the original jazz guitar tradition. All jazz guitar starts here.
Various: Hittin' on All Six (Proper Box) - This $20 dollar, 4-CD set is a fantastic value, AND it's an essential collection of early jazz guitar. It has a pretty scattershot sampling of some artists, but has so many great tracks, and many that you'd otherwise have to buy a whole CD to get one track. Plus the liner notes are informative and the personel is listed on everything.
Various: Swing to Bop: Guitars in Flight 1939-1947 (Hep) - This one CD has perhaps the best sampling of rare and unique tracks, without adding too many duplicates. There is no Charlie Christian, no Freddie Green, no Eddie Lang, and no early Django - franky, you should have the complete recording of each of those artists anyway. This has a bunch of track you'd otherwise have a hard time finding. Pickin' for Patsy (Allan Reuss), Buck Jumpin' Al Casey) are crucial tracks, and the samplings of George Barnes, Mary Osbourne, early Les Paul, and Tony Mattola are really good.

Artist Collections:
Charlie Christian: The Genius of the Electric Guitar (Columbia Legacy) - This 4 CD Box Set is bascially the single best thing I've ever bought. Here, you get ALL of the BG sessions that CC played on, including all of the alternate takes. The sound quality is top notch (you can hear the pitches of Nick Fatool's tom-toms on the intro to "Sheik") and the liner notes are superlative. A MUST HAVE. But it doesn't have any airchecks or the Minton's jam sessions...
Charlie Christian: Complete Live Recordings (Definitive) - This 4 CD Box Set is all of the CC airchecks and jam sessions at Minton's. Add this to the Columbia box and you've got all of CC's recordings, except for his random sideman work with other artists such as Lionel Hampton, Edmund Hall, etc.
Oscar Aleman: Swing Guitar Masterpieces 1937-1957 (Acoustic) - This 2-disc is most of the Oscar Aleman that is available outside of Argentina. The liner notes are loving written by David Grisman and feature a transcription of Aleman's "Sweet Sue" solo.
George Barnes: The Complete Standard Transcrpitions - George Barnes is definately the first electric jazz guitarist, and he is pretty unknown quantity relative to his contemporaries. Growing up the midwest some of his work has a fantastic western swing influence, but its all jazz. This 2-disc features Barnes' own small group which is very orchestrated chamber jazz. Good stuff none-the-less.

I'll keep adding stuff as I think of them.

Great record

2005-11-09T11:02:00.000-08:00

I though I should plug a great record I played on last year.

Jeremy Wakefield - Steel Guitar Caviar - Eccofonic Records

Jeremy Wakefield is probably one of, if not the best lap steel guitar player in the world. He's played with Asleep at the Wheel, Wayne Hancock, Big Sandy and his Fly-Rite Boys, the Hot Club of Cowtown and currently of both the Lucky Stars and the Bonebrake Syncopators. The record is a classic 50's-style instrumental jazz steel guitar record. Since that style would mostly be pre-bop, its really swings. Jeremy is a jaw-dropping soloist no mater what instrument you play. The other musicians are just fantastic as well. The legendary TK Smith, formerly of Big Sandy and his Fly-Rite Boys and now of the Bonebrake Syncopators, plays lead guitar on several tracks as does Russ Blake from the Lucky Stars. On the track "Sugarfoot Stomp", Jake Erwin and Whit Smith of the Hot Club of Cowtown sit in. Carl Sonny Leyland plays organ as well. Finall, DJ Bonebrake, of X and the Bonebrake Syncopators, plays vibes on several tracks.
Yours truly plays rhyhtm on all the tracks, and lead on "Delaware Drive" and "Dark Circles."

Another forum resource

2005-11-09T10:56:00.000-08:00

Here's another resource for Django-style playing:
www.djangobooks.com/forum

Also, the whole www.djangobooks.com site is filled with Django resources.

The forum has some unique sections, such as some non-guitar categories for other instruments. I was just posting in the bass section about proper bass playing. Basically its the same stuff I've written about here. I'll probably use that post as the starting point for a post here on the proper style of swing bass playing.

So Freddie Green never took a solo, huh? Not so fast!

2005-10-17T09:20:00.000-07:00

UPDATED: Sound Samples Working!

The legend of Freddie Green very clearly states that Freddie never soloed. Well ... like most legends, that's not exactly true.

Freddie can be heard soloing on "Dinah" by Pee Wee Rusell's Rhythmakers from 1938 (I really should double check that date....). Freddie's using a chordal style much like Allan Reuss or perhaps like Al Casey. But this short 16-bar break was supposedly the only exception in Freddie's career.

"Dinah" - Pee Wee Russell

Until......

Hal Smith recently turned me on to another Freddie Green solo from the New Testament Basie band (which I generally do not consider to be "Swing" in the genre sense of the word; that band was very straight-ahead, although they may have been "swingin'"). The solo clearly indicates Allan Reuss' influence on Freddie's solo style. This clip is a live version, and appearently there is studio version which is much clearer.

"The Elder"- Count Basie

Songs for Beginners

2005-10-14T16:29:00.000-07:00

There was a thread on the Django Swing Page forum - www.hotclub.co.uk - about good songs for beginners. I thought I should put something here about good songs to start with for players new to the style. Some of these good for practicing leads, some better for practicing rhythm, and most for both.

Here are some suggestions:
Blues
Rhythm Changes
Minor Swing / Dark Eyes / Blues en Mineur
Honeysuckle Rose
Rose Room / I Can’t Give You Anything but Love
Rosetta
Dinah / Lady Be Good
All of me

Here’s a little explanation as to why these can be helpful
Blues: This is clearly something every jazz musician needs to know backwards and forward. Of course it is a good place to start since it contains only 3 chords at its most basic level.
Rhythm Changes: Now, this song does have a lot of chords during the A sections, but more often than not, I just consider them to be 8 bars of Bb when soloing. The ability to play over the most simple of changes is far more important in the long run, than being able to mechanically run through complex changes. Playing 8 bars of a single chord is a great way to make yourself play melodically. Changes create interest – when there are no changes you have to create the interest.
Minor Swing / Dark Eyes / Blues en Mineur: Each of these is a variation of a minor i-iv-V progression. You could basically play though the entire song with the harmonic minor scale. But you can also use arpeggios throughout. Either way, it is good training ground to balance chordal movement and scale-based playing.
Honeysuckle Rose: A great example of playing V-I tunes, like Sweet Sue, or You Rascal You. V-I is a very simple move, but since its so obvious and entirely diatonic it can be hard to play something that doesn't sound cliche or corny. Step one is to embrace the corny, and then move on. The bridge is also a classic set of movements, which will come up time and time again. I7-IV is classic as is the II7-V7. The best part is that all of the changes go by fairly slowly – only every 2 bars.

These are a bit more difficult:
Rose Room / I Can’t Give You Anything but Love: Another song with classic movements you find all of the time. Both have a I7-IV-iv movement which is very classic. Additionally, each has a II7-V7 section, and I-IV7-ii-V movement as well. Again, here the chords don’t go by too fast.
Rosetta: More classic changes. I-V+-I-IV7-II7-V7-I. Each of these changes is classic. These changes do go by a bit faster. The bridge can basically considered a 4 bars of Am, then 4 bars of C going back to F.
Dinah / Lady Be Good – The A section is another lesson in I-V movment (although Lady has that IV chord). Each bridge has more common movements. Lady has a classic IV-iv-I movement along. Both have the vi-vimaj7-vi7-vi6 movment (say, Em, Em/D#, Em/D, Em/C).
All of me: This is the most complicated of the list. See my earlier post about the breaks down all of the changes. Again, the changes only come every two bars.

Some final thoughts:
I know when I started, so many modern jazz tunes have changes that go by 2-per-bar, and move in unfamiliar or novel ways. I found that I couldn't play melodies, but just mechanically run through the changes. Once I started playing the swing/hot jazz style, I found that the simpler and more conventional changes of the style allowed me to play melodies instead of simple hoping to get through the changes. Now I can handle more complicated changes because I know how to play melodies, not just run mechanical lines.

Allan Reuss - Rhythm Revealed

2005-10-06T20:49:00.000-07:00

Allan Reuss is possibly my favorite guitar player. Allan played with the Benny Goodman band at its height from 1935-1938, reportedly taught Freddie Green, learned from George Van Eps, played one of the swing era's only real guitar features - "Pickin' for Patsy", and went on to do session work in LA in the mid-40's. There are some links in an earlier post to some samples of Allan Reuss' chordal solo work. Those are essential listening for learning to play chordal solos. But besides being a standout chordal soloists, Allan Reuss played fantastic rhythm guitar. Hearing 4-beat rhythm work, however, is usually impossible. But there's one example where you hear Allan loud and clear:

Kay Starr - The Complete Lamplighter Recordings 1945-1946.

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/B00000I4ZP/

I found out about this record from Whit Smith's recommendations on the Hot Club of Cowtown website. The record mainly features a series of sessions recorded in Los Angeles in 1945-1946. The rhythm section for most of the tracks is Zutty Singleton on drums, Red Callender on bass, and our boy Allan Reuss on guitar. The best part is that you can hear Allan well the whole time. There are several great chordal intros and interludes, but the real star is Allan playing rhythm over Zutty and Red. Top it off with Barney Bigard, Vic Dickenson, et al, and you've got some great tunes.

If you aren't sure what a swing rhythm section sounds like ... Zutty, Red and Allan Reuss is just about perfect.

Comments update

2005-09-27T18:10:00.000-07:00

Because there have been several (and by several I mean 2) spam comments, I will be requiring verification for comments. Hopefully, that will get rid of the problem -- otherwise people will have to register. Frankly, I' d rather keep this forum open and encourage new people to post comments, because I know I probably wouldn't register to leave a single comment.

Marty Grosz and Al Casey on NPR

2005-09-24T22:54:00.000-07:00

Thanks to Molehill for reminding me of this!

Last year Marty Grozs was interviewed on NPR's Fresh Air, in celebration of the Fats Waller centennial. During the interview they called up Al Casey and spoke with him about playing with Fats. Here's the audio link!

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=1902468

Al Casey RIP

2005-09-13T08:26:00.000-07:00

Al Casey was always one of my favorites.
Click here to listen to some Al Casey tracks, especially "Buck Jumpin'" - one of the great acoustic swing guitar solos of all time.

September 13, 2005
Al Casey Dies at 89; Early Jazz Guitarist
By THE NEW YORK TIMES

Al Casey, a guitarist whose playful acoustic rhythms and solos were a defining feature of Fats Waller's band in the 1930's and 1940's, died on Sunday in Manhattan. He was 89.

The cause was colon cancer, said Albert Vollmer, leader of the Harlem Blues and Jazz Band, with which Mr. Casey played until 2001. He had been hospitalized at the Dewitt Rehabilitation Center for about a year.

Born Sept. 15, 1915, in Louisville, Ky., Mr. Casey joined Waller's group in the early 1930's and was Waller's main guitarist until Waller died in 1943. Mr. Casey also worked with Teddy Wilson's big band in 1939 and 1940 and recorded with Billie Holiday, Frankie Newton and Chu Berry.

Mr. Casey played and recorded with Louis Armstrong in 1944 when both were recognized as leading jazz musicians in the Esquire magazine readers' poll, Mr. Vollmer said.

Along the way he switched from acoustic to electric guitar. Over the next decades he freelanced in swing and blues venues and from 1957 to 1961 played rhythm and blues with the saxophonist King Curtis.

In 1981, Mr. Casey was coaxed out of retirement to join the Harlem Blues and Jazz Band, said Mr. Vollmer, who founded the band.

Mr. Casey is survived by his wife, Althea, and his son, Al Casey Jr.

A 90th birthday celebration for Mr. Casey, scheduled for Thursday evening at St. Peter's Church, 54th Street and Lexington Avenue, will now be his musical memorial service, open to the public.

Where have I been?

2005-08-22T23:44:00.000-07:00

So, sorry for the lack of new posts. My computer ate it about 2 weeks ago, and I just started law school today. I'll get some more stuf up asap. Thanks for reading.

Classic Three Note Voicings

2005-08-13T01:37:00.000-07:00

In my last post about variations on "All of Me", I used a series of classic 3-note rhythm guitar voicings. The voicings, using only 3 notes and mostly on the G, D, and low E strings, are the basic vocabulary for Swing rhythm guitar. While there is no "rule" against 4-note voicings or other variations, understand that these chords make up most Swing rhythm guitar for very practical reasons which we'll talk about now.

More notes would be redundant - With up to 13 horns in a big band, chances are that every note in a given chord is being covered somewhere. Of course, some of the notes will be doubled, but unnecessary doubled notes coming from the rhythm guitar will sound muddy and obscure the rhythmic punch and zing of your four beat pulse.
The Narrow "Window" - Again, with so many other musicians, there is a limited space in the frequency range for the rhythm guitar to poke through. There is small hole above the bass, but below the right hand of the piano, and this is exactly where those classic three note voicings come in handy. These voicings fit perfectly in that narrow range.
They are easy to finger - This especially true when you get up-tempo. Unlike a modern jazz setting where you can comp sporadically, swing rhythm guitar requires you to play quarter notes the whole time. Since you have to play every beat, why use complex, hard to finger chords?
You don't have to play as loud - It might seem unrealistic for a rhythm guitar to be heard amongst so many other instruments. But, if you stay within that frequency band I mentioned above, you don't have competition from other instruments in that range. Since you're not competing directly in that range, you can get by without having to play as loud. If you were to play higher, you'd be competing with the right hand of the piano - and you'd have to play over the piano to be heard. Lesson: Don't work so hard!
Lower Interval Clashes - Although a close cluster like E, G, B, C (Cmaj7) might sound good on the top strings of a guitar, or in the right hand of the piano. But small, dissonant intervals do not sound good in the lower registers. This is why the classic voicings are voiced on the low E, D and G strings. The space large space between the note on the low E and the D strings helps avoid the muddiness of the low register.

These are the reasons why the classic three note voicings work so well, and are therefore so prevalent. But of course, rules were meant to be broken, or at least bent. There are sometimes when the 3 note voicing is not practical, or just doesn't sound right. Here are some examples of bending the rules.

Notes on the A string instead of the low E string: Take the example of the Am6->D7 change in "All of Me". The normal voicing for both chords would be A, F#, C on the E, D and G strings - yes, the same voicing with no change for both chords. Realize that the bass player has got the root covered, so the change will be heard. But, to me, it sounds so weird to hear the guitar not change - at least when I'm the one playing it. So, I often play a root on the A string instead.
Awkward fingerings higher up the neck: Often times a Dm6 or Em6 chord at the 10th or 12th fret is a little awkward to finger on an acoustic. I'll often substitute the same chord (D, B, F) on the A, G, and B strings. Since it's the same exact notes as the lower string voicing, I don't worry about the range issue. Honestly, any of the minor chords between Dm and F#m are easiest to play with this voicing, and I'll rarely go out of my way to play the standard voicing.

Hope this helps to make some sense of the traditional 3-note rhythm guitar voicings.

Expanding Basic Chords - All of Me example

2005-08-09T01:03:00.000-07:00

In my previous article about swing-era harmony, I demonstrated the ways to simplify the chords to the song "All of Me". But remember that simple doesn't have to be boring.

So today we're going to cover a technique I learned from Charleton Johnston's rhythm guitar book, something he calls "expansion." Here's the thing - although the song may have simple chords, we need not simply chunk a root-position chord for 2 bars at a time. Using inversions, basic substitutions, and some passing chords you can fill out the song. What's important about each of these techniques is that they do not change the fundamental harmony of the tune.

Again we'll use the tune "All of Me"

1. The Basic Rhythm Chords - Click here for a pdf.
Here the chords are chunked each for 2 bars, very simple. Bear in mind there is nothing wrong about these - and at fast tempos this may be challenge enough. But chunking the same chord for two whole bars can be a bit plain.

2. Exapanded Rhythm Chords - Click here for a pdf.
Okay - there's a lot of stuff going on here. We'll take it in two measure chunks:
Measure 1, 2 - Starting with a C6 is pretty standard. To create some motion, jump up to a C/E chord (E, C, G), and then back down.
Measure 3, 4 - Here's a standard E7/B voicing (which also works as a Bdim chord). Jumping up to Ddim (D, B, F), back to Bdim (B, G#, D), and then to G#dim (G#, F, B). Since Bdim, Ddim, Fdim, and G#dim are all the same chord and are interchangeable, we can jump from one to the other.
Measure 5, 6 - This A7 walk-up is a classic rhythm guitar trick that I learned from John Reynolds at my first Swing guitar lesson. Starting with the A7, walking up to A/C#, using diminished passing chords. A7, Bdim, Cdim, C#dim (which is A/C# with the Bb replacing the A on the D string). That C#dim leads right into the Dm in the next measure.
Measure 7, 8, 9, 10 - Here this is just a Dm6 that walks down to the E7. The other alteration is the E7 to Bb78 move is a classic tritone substitution (E, G#, B, D vs. Bb, D, F, Ab(G#)).
Measure 11, 12 - Here is an Am6 with a jump up and back to Am/C (notice it's the same voicing as C6).
Measure 13, 14 - When moving from Am6 to D7 (which would often be the exact same voicing), you can't really hear a difference, so I've added a little bit of bas movement just to clearly hear the change from measure 12 into 13. Using that kind of root-fifth bass motion is standard for the era.
Measure 15, 16 - Here's a Dm7->G7 change with an added tritone sub (Ab7 into G7). Also, here is the same walk up trick from measures 5 and 6, this time with one chord per beat. Again, this is a classic trick.

And that was just the first half of the song! Each of these tricks - Diminished passing chords, the 7th chord walkup, the tritone subs, the inversion movements - are all standard rhythm guitar tricks and moreover, are classic orchestration techniques used in swing era arrangements. In fact, you'll see them all of time written out on rhythm guitar parts on old stocks.

Recommended Books

2005-08-05T16:07:00.000-07:00

Here are a few books I can personally recommend for learning to play swing guitar:

Swing Guitar Essentials - Published by Acoustic Guitar magazine, this book is a series of articles on various styles and subjects of traditional swing guitar playing, from Eddie Lang to Django to Freddie Green. The beginning section on how to solo are very basic - in a good way, and progesses all the way to a full length Django Reinhardt transcription. A good resource that you can come back to as you progress.

Swing and Big Band Rhythm Guitar - Written by Charleton Johnston (who took over Freddie Green's chair in the Basie band), this book is a must-have for learning to play swing rhythm guitar. Be advised, however, that it is written from a distinctly modern perspective, and many of the examples feature more modern harmony (see my explanation here). Oh, and the play-a-long CD is absolutely dreadful modern crap - not even close to Swing. Those flaw aside, it is the resource for learning to play rhythm guitar - it has the best lay out for learning the basic voicings and learning their inversions.

The "Straight Ahead" Problem

2005-08-05T13:16:00.000-07:00

When given a jazz standard, 99% of professional jazz musicians will automatically play the song in a "Straight Ahead" style. If you're not familiar with the term "straight-ahead", it basically refers to the general style of jazz in the post-bebop era upto, but not including, fusion. When you listen to Charlie Parker, Miles Davis, Oscar Peterson, Dave Brubeck, or almost any other major jazz figure of the last 50 years, outside of fusion and smooth jazz. Although the artists mentioned are varied in style, they all fit into the "straight-ahead" umbrella - laid back, swung eighths feel, walking bass, ride cymbal led drums, sporatic comped piano. Each of these stylistic hallmarks are modern developments from the bebop era.

So, what does that have to do with Swing?

Well, when playing swing simply playing old songs does not make Swing music.
Consider that swing (and much other traditional, pre-bop jazz) is very much dance music. Accordingly, the beat is central to Swing, and playing the proper Swing feel is crucial.

Listen to these two excerpts:
Benny Goodman Sextet (w/Charlie Christian) 1941 - A Smo-o-oth One - mp3
Herb Ellis (w/Freddie Green) 1955 - A Smooth One - mp3
(The second one has been slowed slightly so the tempos are the same ~130bpm)

Notice how Herb Ellis' phrasing is much more laid-back, and behind the beat. The feel is almost like a shuffle, rather than 4-beat swing. The Goodman version is very much on the beat. Although both versions are slow (~130bpm), hear how the Goodman version pushes evenly, not lagging or laying back. Benny Goodman and company are playing Swing. Herb Ellis is not. Herb and company are playing Straight-Ahead Jazz.

99% of today's professionaljazz musicians would consider the 2nd version as the "correct" way to play the song "A Smo-o-oth One". Those same musicians would consider the first version "corny" or "hackneyed" or "lame". Most Swing bands are full of those 99% is spoke of, and consequently, most Swing bands don't play Swing music.

The first step in overcoming the problem is identifying it. Learn to recognize when other musicians are playing in the swing style and when they are not. If you can understand what not to do, it helps to figure out what to do.

New Link: Nuages de Swing - Play-a-long Tracks

2005-07-26T00:10:00.000-07:00

Here's a new addition to the links list: Nauges de Swing
This a french-language, Django-oriented site, and has really great play-a-long tracks. Click on the "Playback & Grilles" tab. There is a long list of tunes and you can click for the chords, or "grilles", or stream rhythm tracks as mp3's or real media.

The tracks are well played in the proper gypsy, "le pompe" style, and have some arrangment. There are breaks, and changes in dynamics, endings, etc. They're perfect for practicing leads over, since it has stuff for the soloist to respond to.

Be aware that the chords are in the modern gypsy jazz vocabulary, which is not exactly the same as the swing vocabulary. For example "Dark Eyes" (or rather "Les Yeux Noir") has the Bb in the 7th bar rather than A7. "Dinah" goes to the IV7 in the 2nd bar, etc. So just be ready for tunes with some slightly hipper changes. Still, despite the modern changes, this is a great resource.

Comments Welcome

2005-07-25T16:06:00.000-07:00

Although I want to share my discoveries or understanding with you all, I'm definitely open to you ideas and perspectives.

Amplifying your Rhythm Guitar

2005-07-22T02:07:00.000-07:00

Guys like Freddie Green and Allan Reuss routinely managed to cut through Big Bands using only an acoustic archtop guitar.

How'd they do it? - Well it helps that those bands existed in the era before amplification. Even with 9-14 horns, those bands had to play softly enough to hear Count Basie's or Jess Stacy's piano. The instruments of the day were designed to be much quieter - gut bass strings, calf skin drum heads, etc. So the question for us now is "How do we can that now?"

Today, most bassists play with amplification, often pianists have to use synthesizers, and drum kits are designed to keep pace with Marshall stacks. To balance properly, the rhythm guitarist has to be amplified as well.

The key to amplifying rhythm guitar is to keep the acoustic sound of the instrument in tact. Boomy and bass heavy sounds will muddy the sound, and moreover will be much, much more prone to feedback. The main choices are pickups or microphones. I recommend using a microphone because the sound is closest thing to sound of your actual guitar. You can use a piezo/transducer pickup if necessary, but the microphone will sound much more natural. A lot of guitar players I know who don't like to use mic, have had problems trying to use the wrong kind of mic in the wrong setting. Here are some tips on mic selection and usage:

Mic Type - Use a hyper-cardiod, small diaphragm condenser. For those of you who have no idea what that means, hyper-cardiod, just means that the mic captures more of what it's pointed at, and less of the other stuff around it. Small Diaphragm refers to the microphone element itself, and without going into excessive detail, Small Diaphragm mics are more sensative than a Dynamic mic (ala SM57 / 58), and not as sensitive (or fragile) as a Large Diaphragm (think big studio quality vocal mics). So a mic that is sensative (but not too sensative) and pretty focused on its target (capturing less of the drummer to your left or the sax player to your right) is the right tool for Rhythm guitar.
Internal Shockmount - Again without too much information, bascially that means the mic element is shockmounted inside the mic case, and thus it wont need one of those spider mounts to protect it from bumps. With an internally shockmounted mic you can move the mic, bump the stand, etc., without creating a really loud low boom. Your soundman and/or audience will appreciate it.
On / Off Switch - Having an on/off switch means that you can turn the mic off when you are finding your music, or when you adjusting your mic, or changing guitars, or most importantly when you are talking to the guys on stage. How much of the between song conversation do you want the audience to hear? Also, you can minimize fedback by only having the mic on when you need it to be.
Battery powered - All Condenser mics require power, but most PA systems already have phantom power. But for those occasions where the system does not have phantom or when you might want to use an "acoustic" guitar amp (usually these don't have phantom either), a battery-powered mic, will generally take phantom power, but use the battery when it needs to.
Proper mic placement - Clearly this can be a selective thing, but I've had the best results with the same position. Point the mic down at the bridge of the guitar, and position the mic 6 inches to a foot away from the top of the guitar. You can always experiment for different stages, instrumentation, etc., but that's a good place to start. What you don't want to do is place the mic closer than 4 inches off the top, and definately pointing into one of the f-holes. The "proximity effect" (which means that at very close range mics exaggerate bass frequencies - good for full vocals, not for natural acoustic guitar) will take over less than 4 or so inches away, and the most boomy sound comes from the f-holes (where the air is pumpin out of the guitar. Also - boomy = feedback city.
Stage setup - If posible, set up so that there are no other instruments behind you. Playing right in front of drummer will just cause the drums to bleed into your mic. Also, being right in front of the bass can be feedback inducing, because the boomy bass can bleed into the mic.

I personally use a RODE NT-3. It has each of attributes I mentioned and sounds superlative! When I started using it, I got compliments from the musicians I was playing with about how great it sounded. And its pretty cheap - under $200 street. I think a lot of other companies make something in the same style., though when I checked out the RODE, I stopped looking. I had given up on mic-ing my archtop guitar live, but once I found the NT-3, I knew there was only one way to go. It allowed me to stop compromising my on-stage sound.

If you absolutely must use a pickup, I recommend the K&K Archtop transducer. You could also try the Fishman bridge pickup, but I haven't tried that myself. The bottom line with pickups is that they'll never sound as good as a mic. After all, you don't listen to your guitar with your ear pressed up against the sound board.

(Re)Interpreting for Swing Era Harmony - Getting the chords right for Swing

2005-07-18T11:23:00.000-07:00

If you've ever cracked a fake book to learn a tune, you might have noticed just how "hip" some of the songs are. Bebop has brought a host of new substitutions and complications, and moreover the basic default for harmony are unique to both early and later forms of jazz. To get the swing-style chords you will often have to de-bopify the changes, removing unecessary ii-V movements, and complex extensions. But at the most basic level you will have to reevaulate the types of chords used. Here's what I'm talking about:

I got these bebop-ed chords for the first half of "All of Me" from The Jazz Guitar Primer.
Also, be aware that I will replace the "code" with proper notation as soon as I can.

First, lets look at breaking the song into its most basic form:


C--- | ---- | E7-- | ---- |
//// | //// | //// | ---- |

A7-- | ---- |Dm--- | ---- |
//// | //// | //// | //// |

E7-- | ---- |Am--- | ---- |
//// | //// | //// | //// |

D7-- | ---- | G7-- | ---- |
//// | //// | //// | //// |

Now here is how the chords were playing the swing era:


C6-- | ---- | E7-- | ---- |
//// | //// | //// | ---- |

A7-- | ---- |Dm6-- | ---- |
//// | //// | //// | //// |

E7-- | ---- |Am6-- | ---- |
//// | //// | //// | //// |

D7-- | ---- | Dm7--| G7-- |
//// | //// | //// | //// |

Using these examples here are some tips:
1. All regular major chords become major 6th chords. Hence the I chord "C", become "C6". Generally I and IV chords can be used as just major chords, and so these most often become 6th chords. In a modern, bebop context, these chords would be made to be maj7th chords. Maj7ths are rarely used in pre-bop jazz. V chords are often used as a dominant, so they would be 7th chords anyway. So for basic rhythm guitar work, swing players almost always play C6 instead of a simple C. Also, most big band horn voicings of the era have similar voicings.
2. All regular minor chords become minor 6th chords. Henece the Dm and Am become Dm6 and Am6. This also occurs mostly with i and iv chords (notice that A7->Dm6 is a V-i, as is E7->Am6). In later jazz, almost all minor chords become min7 chords. In swing, min7 are only used in a ii-V cadence (see next tip). Rhythm guitar and big band horn voicing again `also follow this mold.
3. Remove "extraneous" ii-V movement. Cadences at the ends of phrases often end with a ii-V - and that's one thing (like the natural Dm7->G7 in the Swing version). Adding them everytime there is a dominant chord classicly bebop, and really overkill for swing playing. The Bm7/E7/Bm7/Bbm7 movement in the bebop version above, can simply be E7. The Am7/D7/Am7/D7 is can just be D7. Two bars of the same chord is standard in the swing era, but in bebop it would be considered boring, unsophistocated and passe.

These tips work for any kind of 30's or 40's era jazz-based music. Gypsy jazz songs often follow these harmonic conventions, but be aware that some gypsy jazz adopted modern "hip" bop voicings. But for the tradition way of playing those, these tips will work. Also for playing western swing, these will work as well. Have fun.

Due credit

2005-07-17T13:46:00.000-07:00

I wanted to point out that my inspiriation for starting this blog came from djangology.net, a great blog about Django-style guitar playing. Although I do some Django-style stuff, and since I come from a more "American" perspective, this blog could cover some of the more American Swing oriented subjects and style. But again, credit where credit is due. Thanks Djangology.

Essential Recordings Volume 1: Acoustic Chordal Solos

2005-07-17T13:01:00.000-07:00

Here are some recordings of acoustic chordal solos that I consider essential (and are easily linked to at Classic Jazz Guitar).

Allan Reuss - Allan was the protege of George Van Eps, and when Van Eps didn't want to go on tour with the Benny Goodman band, Reuss took his place. He was the real pulse of the classic Goodman band. He is also reported to have taught Freddie Green how to play rhythm guitar. His chordal style is comes from the Van Eps school.
Arnold Ross Quintet f/Benny Carter - Bye Bye Blues
Lionel Hampton - Rhythm, Rhythm
Jack Teagarden Orchestra - Pickin' for Patsy
Coleman Hawkins - Stuffy
Benny Goodman Orchestra - Rosetta

George Van Eps - Although he is now famous mostly for inventing and playing 7-string guitar, Van Eps was a fantastic 6-string rhythm and chordal player.
Adrian Rollini Orchestra - Somebody Loves Me
George Van Eps - Ain't Misbeavin'
Jess Stacy - Indiana

Carmen Mastren - Another great rhythm player, Mastren started out with Wingy Manone, but most famously he played with the Tommy Dorsey Orchestra and even did some arranging for the band. He later joined the Glenn Miller Army Air Force Band during World War II.
Delta Four - Swingin' on that Famous Door
Bechet-Spanier Big Four - If I Could Be With You

Carl Kress - Kress' chordal style descended from extented Tenor Guitar / Banjo tuning. He famously recorded duets with Eddie Lang. After Lang's death in 1933, he partnered with Dick McDonough, until that guitarist's death in 1938. Kress also did duets with Tony Mattola, and later George Barnes. Here he is presented without another guitar player.
Edmund Hall All Star Quintet - Seein' Red
Edmund Hall All Star Quintet - Rompin' in '44

What dancing can teach you about guitar.

2005-07-14T23:53:00.000-07:00

Form often follows function. Movements look a certain way because they are done in a certain way. This idea can be used to your advantage.

A trick I learned from dancing is to watch old clips. It can take years to learn proper technique for dancing, and there are various styles to choose from. But, if you can match the look of the old dancers, often you will end up using their technique. After all - form follows function - the old dancers looked like they did because their technique was such. Match the form and the function can come with it.

I learned that my drummer, Josh Collazo, has done this same kind of thing in learning to play swing drums. I always noticed that he didn't just sound exactly right, he looked just like an old drummer from a clip. Well if was using the same technique, then it ought to look the same.

So for applying this to guitar playing - watch an old film clip of a big band from before 1945. Watch the rhythm guitar player and emulate his look. Pay attention to his posture, guitar position and arm position. Most often the guitar player will be sitting with his left leg crossed over his right, with his guitar sitting on that left leg, angled up, and his left arm strumming near the nech on 1 and 3, and by the bridge on 2 and 4. Don't take my word for it - go watch TCM (Turner Classic Movies) and check out the guitar player.

Further, beyond just swing rhythm guitar you can use this for any swing style. If you prefer to play gypsy-jazz style rhythm guitar, then watch some gypsies. Although related to American swing rhythm, gypsy rhythm has its own ideosyncracies. Watching someone play it right is often a lot better than reading a book or listening to a record without seeing the player. After all a picture is worth a thousand words.

GEAR: What I play. Guitars

2005-07-11T20:20:00.000-07:00

It's often said that a poor workman blames his tools, and while it may be true that Django or Charlie Christian would sound like themselves on almost any instrument, having the right tool for the job usally makes it easier and allows you to do a better job. Since we're talking about a vintage style of music, that usually means vintage gear. But there are some other options as well - I thought I should let you in on my various gear choices. My pragmatic collection has a vintage piece or two, but is mostly new and was assembled piece by piece as cheap as I could get them.

Guitars:
2003 Eastman AR810CE - "Golden Age" (which means Blond) finish, 17" Cutaway Archtop w/Pickup:
My 810CE is strung with GHS White Bronze strings (14 / 18 / 26 / 36 / 46 / 56), and has some pretty knarly action (I'll update this when I get it measured). Because the guitar has a floating pickup, it does double duty for acoustic rhythm, acoustic solos, and electric solos. I generally use a mic, so all I have to do is roll up the volume knob to go from Freddie Green to Charlie Christian. The GHS White Bronze are not actually Bronze, but are magnetically active and still sound "acoustic" when playing acoustic stuff. Although a cutaway always reduces the acoustic quality of a guitar, this thing has no problem - it's still one of the loudest archtops I've ever played.
Eastman Guitars are a fantastic value for an archtop, but they would also be great at twice the price. Why? They are designed to be acoustic guitars first and foremost. Most luthiers are so used to making electric guitars that their great imstruments lack that acoustic cannon quality. Then again, most jazz guitar players don't play acoustic music - too bad for them. Eastman is really the only serious choice besides going vintage. Of course, like buying a used car, it can be problematic for the uninitiated. At least with an Eastman you know what you are getting.
I used this guitar on almost everything on "Crazy Rhythm" (except for "Dark Eyes" and "Comes Love") as well as all of the rhythm guitar parts on Jeremy Wakefield's "Steel Guitar Caviar" (and also the lead guitar on the tunes "Delaware Drive" and "Dark Circles").

2002 John Le Voi 12-Fret Petite Bouche - Vintage Finish, Short Scale, Oval Hole Selmer-style:
This guitar is a hybrid design, featuring the small, oval hole and body of the later Selmer-style guitars, with the shorter scale of the earlier Maccaferri-style guitars. Personally, I prefer the long scale style, but I got such an amazing deal that I couldn't turn it down, and I couldn't possibly get rid of it. The top has unbelievably figured bearclaw spruce, the back and sides superlative birdseye maple and the neck is flamed maple. I use GHS Custom Shop Gypsy Strings since they are cheap and last as long as any of the other brands I've tried. Gypsy-style strings are silver-coated copper, and are therefore very weak - they break, the windings come undone, etc. Also the GHS gauges are just slightly heavier through out. Mine start an .011. The guitar came with a dual pickup system - a highlander bridge and a macintyre feather. Both sound terrible - I have a feeling that's why the original owner who commissioned the guitar sold it. John usually puts in a Bigtone, but this customer wanted that combo - his mistake. Again, I mic the guitar, so I have few problems.
The guitar does sound superaltive and I used it on the "Crazy Rhythm" tracks 'Dark Eyes" and "Comes Love"

2005 Eastman AR805E - Sunburst, 16" Non-cutaway Archtop w/pickup:
This my newest acquistion, thanks to the fine guys at Eastman. I wanted a guitar just for acoustic rhythm work, and an 16" non-cutaway is the perfect guitar for that. 16" archtops aren't as full and round sounding as a 17", but since they have a bit more zing and cut, they sometimes work better in cutting through a dense band. Also this has a slightly wider nut width, which make Allan Reuss-style chordal work a bit easier.
As with all Eastman Guitars, it came set up with D'Addario Nickel 12's. I just got it last Thursday, so I strung it with what I could find, which were Martin 80/20 SP 13's. Even without bumping the E and B up to a 14 and an 18, the guitar is clearly the loudest thing I've ever played.
Although I was planning on just getting an acoustic, they only had guitars with pickups already on 'em in stock. They did send me a couple pickgaurds, so I'll definately be getting rid of the new Chuck Wayne-style gaurd.

Other guitars:
I have several other guitars, bu I don't use them for Swing playing.
1998 Ibanez PM20 Pat Metheny - That guitar is a great value in a compact, electric jazz box. I served me well for almost 5 years, and I used it for all the electric guitar parts on "Jammin' the Blues".
1996 Gibson Les Paul Standard - Another guitar that has served me well. It has the Fat 1950's neck on it and is strung with .011's. It's pretty beefy.
1999 Taylor 310 - I got this after playing for 6 years, and never having a regular 6-string acoustic. Go figure. Bad news is that I have absolutely no use for a dreadnaught guitar these days. I'd much rather have a Martin OOO or OM instead - I prefer Taylor, but I prefer Martin's in the small body range.
1995 Ovation Celebrity 12-string - The guitar that isn't worth enough to sell. I got this a long time ago, and since then I have rarely played it. It's hard to play, but I have used it on a few recordings. I would sell it, but I'd get less than $300 on Ebay. I'd rather keep it just in case I ever get a call for one.

Why new bands don't sound old.

2005-07-07T11:31:00.000-07:00

This was written in response to question about why new bands don't sound enough like the original swing bands:

As a bandleader and musician who's tried SO frickin' hard to get that vintage sound, both live and in the studio, let me share a couple of things I've figured out - God knows I've still got more to learn.

1. The Beat - The "swing" feel of late 30's-early-40's swing is different that the modern jazz "swing" feel of almost all post-1945 jazz. The stacato 4-feel of Swing changed into the the more legato shuffle of post war jazz. All of the modern recordings outside of the "trad-jazz" scene have a modern feel. Even all the great swing soloist's 1950's recordings are all "swingin'" rather than "Swing". It's more than on(or ahead of) the beat vs. behind the beat, but that certainly is true. Three things are responsible for this:
- The ride cymbal/bop drumming: Swing Drumming (from watching Josh Collazo on every gig) involves four-beat bass drum, and four-beats on the snare or time on the hi-hat. Very choppy. Because of the flowing ride cymbal, the choppy four feel was smoothed out. Plus the bass drum left four-to-the-floor duty so it could be free to comp and drop "bombs". The beat lays back because of this, giving that slinky feel that a lot of "groove" dancers like.
- steel bass strings/legato bass: Listen to Walter Page, then listen to Ray Brown. Page goes "dunk-dunk-dunk-dunk" - very staccato, choppy. He's playing his gut strings as hard as he can to project over the (large) band. Now, listen to Ray, he's playing "doo-doo-doo-da-doo," each note blending into the next, very legato. Again the beat will lay back because of this. Guys can play either feel on either string, but steel strings allowed bass players to lay back so they were originaly responsible for the change in sound.
- lack of rhythm guitar: although I'm partial to rhythm guitar for obvious reasons, its essential to a 30's-40's swing feel. Bear in mind that Freddie Green chunked his whole life through the Basie band and "Corner Pocket" doesn't swing like Basie in the 30's-40's. Rhythm guitar helps to chop up the rhythm, but it can't change a whole band playing in a modern style. Oh, and electric guitars don't count. They just do not work timbre-ally.

2.Old vs. Modern instruments - Swing (ie the 30's-40's sound) was largely pre-amplification. The reference point for volume was an acoustic piano - The loudest a band could get had to take into account the maximum volume of a piano. As microphones, sound systems and guitar amps got better and louder, other instruments changed to keep up with their electricifed collegues. Drums in particular, are vastly different today. Today's drums and also cymbals are made to keep up with amplified music - they are decidedly louder. It is impossible to play swing drums on modern equipment. I did two gigs on drums, borrowing Josh Collazo's kit, and got compliments from the other guys on the gig. I go into Guitar Center and sound stupid on their modern kits. (pause for jokes about my drumming) A vintage kit, and one set up vintage (heads, cymbals, etc.) are essential to play the style.
All of the other variations with horns are responsible, but I think drums and bass are the two most important.

3.Isolated Recording vs. Room Recording - The sound of a live band is the combined sounds of all the instruments interacting together in the air and then reaching your ears. The sound of modern recording is all of the instruments mic'd individually, and interacting in the sound system artificially. Appearently the overtones don't ring out right, or something -on one level this is pretty audiofile stuff, most people can hear some difference. The organic vintage sound of Mora's Cd's (www.morasmodern.com), or Swing Session's, or my own Cd is due to room recording. Everyone is the same room, with all of the frequencies interacting organically picked up by one or two mics - just like they did back in the day.
The guy who recorded Mora's and my CD (who also plays trumpet with the Chicago Six) uses a MS stereo pair to get the room sound. If something needs a boost, he has everythig mic'd individually for safety, but 99% of what you hear is just the room sound.

I could write a book about this stuff, so I've had to simplify a bit, but I really find these to be the case. Most musicians don't really bother with the specifics of the genre, but that "Swing" feel vs. "swing" feel issue really prevades every musician. 99% percent of the musicians in this city (or any city) can't play or don't try to play with a real "Swing" feel.
There's a reason some of the same guys show up in the different bands. I find that Western Swing bass players are better for Swing than most jazz players, because they are more dedicated to the style. Hope that helps explain the discrepancy.

Rhythm playing position.

2005-07-07T11:28:00.000-07:00

To get things going here's something I posted to the All About Jazz board:

To play Freddie Green style properly, try strumming like the old rhythm guitar players. If you watch any old clips (another trick I learned from dancing...) the rhythm guys played back and forth: Chunk 1 and 3 over the neck pickup and 2 and 4 more toward the bridge and snap your wrist slightly. All four beats should be stacato, with a slight accent on 2 and 4. It should NOT sound like, "boom-chick-boom-chick" unless your playing 20's or early 30's hot jazz. Swing should sound like "chunk-chunk-chunk-chunk".

Also, the beat should push slightly, and never be behind the beat. That's straight ahead jazz - not swing.

Give a listen:
2 beat: 20's-early 30's
4 beat: late 30's-40's

Welcome!

2005-07-02T23:32:00.000-07:00

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.