Jazz guitarists are guitar players (guitarists) who play jazz using an approach to chords, melodies, and improvised solo lines which is called jazz guitar playing. The guitar has fulfilled the roles of accompanist ("rhythm guitar") and soloist in small and large ensembles and also as an unaccompanied solo instrument.
In the 1930s, before guitar amplifiers were widely used, it was difficult for jazz guitarists playing acoustic instruments to be heard over drums, piano, or horn sections. As a result, jazz guitarists tended to act as accompanists, strumming chords as part of the rhythm section. After guitar amplifiers were developed in the 1930s, electric guitarists such as George Barnes and Charlie Christian were able to project their solo sound over a jazz ensemble.
The history of jazz guitar has been an integral part of the wide-ranging history of jazz. The early guitar players were the great blues singers who accompanied themselves on the guitar. By the 1930s, guitarists gained prominence in jazz and some were even featured performers, such as Carl Kress (1907â€"1965), who recorded in 1927 with Bix Beiderbecke. In Europe, Django Reinhardt (1910â€"1953), a Belgian gypsy jazz guitarist recorded with his Quintette du Hot Club de France. Beginning in 1939, Charlie Christian played with big band bandleader Benny Goodman, and in the bebop era, Tal Farlow was notable for his virtuoso playing.
In the 1960s, guitarists tended to play in small groups, such as Jim Hall, who did his best work in duos with Bill Evans, Ron Carter and others. Wes Montgomery was a self-taught guitarist who used his right thumb rather than a plectrum (pick) to produce his unique sound in his late-1950s and 1960s hard bop recordings. Joe Pass pioneered solo guitar with chordal substitutions in his duos with Ella Fitzgerald. Grant Green was known for his 1960s organ trio music. Fusion guitarists such as Larry Coryell, John McLaughlin, Pat Metheny, and Allan Holdsworth combined the sound and energy of rock with jazz-style improvisation.
Early years
Jazz guitar can be traced to the beginning of jazz in New Orleans. Most bands at the time had guitarists, such as Lorenzo Staulz, Rene Baptiste, Dominick Barocco, Joe Guiffre, Coochie Martin, and Brock Mumford. In 1889, Charlie Galloway led a band that included Buddy Bolden on cornet, while Louis Keppard, brother of Freddie Keppard, led a band in 1910 that included King Oliver.
Banjo, more than acoustic guitar or piano, could be heard above the rest of the band because of its metallic twang. In the early days of recording, audio engineers preferred the louder banjo over guitar, so banjo became the more popular instrument. The dominant player of the 1920s was Nick Lucas, who played both. In 1912, during the days of acoustic recording, he participated in experiments with Edison cylinders. Ten years later, when he recorded "Pickin' the Guitar" and "Teasing the Frets", he became the first person to make solo guitar recordings. He was also the first to have a custom guitar named after him, the Gibson Nick Lucas Special in 1925, and the first to have a pick named after him. Nevertheless, Lucas's career was built on his reputation as a singer. He sang on radio, Broadway, and in vaudeville. With his high-pitched voice, he sold eight million copies of "Tiptoe Through the Tulips". Both the song and singing style were borrowed decades later by Tiny Tim.
Replacing the banjo
The invention of the archtop guitar meant the guitar could provide enough sound to make it an important part of the rhythm section. Freddie Green played rhythm guitar for the Count Basie Orchestra for fifty years, contributing to the band's swing by inverting chords, also known as revoicing, on each beat. Eddie Condon played rhythm guitar his whole career, without taking a solo, while Allan Reuss gave rhythm guitar a place in the big band of Benny Goodman.
Wanting to do more than strum chords with the band, Eddie Lang played single-string solos. He drew attention as a member of the Paul Whiteman Orchestra and as a popular studio musician. Like most guitarists of the time, he started on banjo, and when he switched to guitar, many others followed. His Gibson L-5 archtop became a popular model among jazz guitarists. By 1934, largely due to Lang, banjo was no longer a jazz instrument.
Carl Kress and Dick McDonough made early guitar duo recordings. Kress was featured with the Paul Whiteman Orchestra in 1926. Kress played banjo and four-string guitar before changing to six-string guitar in the 1930s. He used an unorthodox tuning that he invented. He played in the 1950s on the Garry Moore television show and into the 1960s in a duo with George Barnes. McDonough led radio and performing bands and performed with many other musicians, such as the Dorsey Brothers.
Django Reinhardt formed the Quintet of the Hot Club of France, consisting of a trio of guitars, a violin, and a double bass. Reinhardt was a gypsy from Belgium. The Quintette du Hot Club de France included Django Reinhardt's brother Joseph Reinhardt as well as several other Gypsy guitarists and non-Gypsy musicians. Because of international commerce, records featuring Django Reinhardt were heard in the United States and inspired many guitarists. In 1946, Duke Ellington brought Reinhardt to the United States for a series of concerts.
Amplification
Reinhardt played electric guitar with the Ellington orchestra, but the Hot Club of France was an acoustic quintet, and so being heard over the other instruments was rarely a problem. Argentinian Oscar Aleman was in Paris at the same time as Reinhardt. He tried to overcome the volume problem by using a resonator guitar, as did Eddie Durham, a trombonist with the Jimmie Lunceford band who also played guitar. In 1938 Durham recorded sessions with the Kansas City Five using an electric guitar, the Gibson ES-150 arched-top, which Gibson had started making a couple years before. He became the first person to record with an electric guitar and persuaded Floyd Smith to buy one. While on tour, he met Charlie Christian and was likely the person to introduce amplification to Christian.
Christian opened up the electric guitar's potential while he was a member of the Benny Goodman orchestra. He had large audiences when he played solos with passing chords. Even more than Durham, he established the guitar as a solo instrument.
According to jazz critic Leonard Feather, Christian played a single-note line alongside a trumpet and saxophone, moving the guitar away from its secondary role in the rhythm section. He had copied Reinhardt's solos note for note, but he had more swing than the gypsy guitarist. He tried diminished and augmented chords while playing standards. His rhythm suggested bop. While in New York City, he spent many late hours in jam sessions with pioneers of bop such as Thelonious Monk and Dizzy Gillespie. He contracted tuberclosis and died at the age of twenty-three.
Post-Christian era
Although he had a brief career, he made such an impact that critics sometimes divide the history of jazz guitar into two periods, pre-Christian and post-Christian. Following Christian were Barney Kessel, John Collins, Irving Ashby, Mary Osborne, Kenny Burrell, and Tal Farlow. Guitarists who moved away from Christian's style included Oscar Moore, who spent ten years with the Nat King Cole Trio. Billy Bauer was a member of Woody Herman's first Herd and also played with Benny Goodman and Jack Teagarden. He was at the forefront of bringing the guitar into bebop, playing with Lennie Tristano and Lee Konitz. Bill DeArango played with Coleman Hawkins and Dizzy Gillespie.
Tiny Grimes recorded with Charlie Parker and Art Tatum. Beginning in 1953, Herb Ellis spent five years as a member of the Oscar Peterson Trio. Chuck Wayne played with the George Shearing Quintet. Red Norvo's Trio included at various times Tal Farlow, Jimmy Raney, and Jimmy Wyble. Johnny Smith used a chordal style that can be heard in his hit "Moonlight in Vermont".
Lenny Breau performed using an ensemble improvisational playing, along with a more orchestral finger-style solo jazz guitar. He used many diverse elements of music, including closed voicings, flamenco-style guitar, use of varied rhythms, fingered harmonics, modal jazz harmony, an intimate knowledge of inversions and tritone substitutions, and a great understanding of bebop.
From Brazil and elsewhere
Although bossa nova isn't synonymous with jazz, it gave jazz guitarists ideas to explore. These guitarists from Brazil included Antonio Carlos Jobim, Luiz Bonfá, João Gilberto, Baden Powell de Aquino, Oscar Castro-Neves, and Bola Sete. Laurindo Almeida was a native of Brazil who lived in California. Charlie Byrd popularized Brazilian jazz in albums with saxophonist Stan Getz.
Guitarists from other countries brought their heritage into jazz guitar, such as Attila Zoller and Gábor Szabó from Hungary, and Toots Thielemans and Rene Thomas from Belgium.
Fusing styles
George Benson's success as a pop vocalist in the 1970s made him a household name, but he was an influential jazz guitarist in the 1960s, particularly with his organ trio recordings with organist Jack McDuff. Benson's early work on Columbia and CTI Records demonstrates the strong influence of Montgomery with the articulation of Johnny Smith and Tal Farlow.
Grant Green's funky 1970s organ trio music makes him a favorite with 2000s-era lounge and club DJs, but much of Green's best jazz work can be found in his 1960s output. Green's style was full of groove and tone, and it is hard to replicate. Jazz fusion guitarist Larry Coryell was among the first to combine the sound and energy of rock with jazz lines in the late 1960s.
Early in his career, British guitarist John McLaughlin played on three albums by Miles Davis that influenced the creation of jazz fusion: Bitches Brew, In a Silent Way, and A Tribute to Jack Johnson. Soon after, McLaughlin founded the fusion band The Mahavishnu Orchestra.
John Abercrombie often explores the boundaries of jazz fusion and post bop. Allan Holdsworth is a fusion player noted for his chromatic lines and legato technique.
Ted Greene, a solo guitar performer and music educator, influenced rock guitarists such as Steve Vai and Steve Lukather with his chord melody work. In 1976 Al Di Meola of Return to Forever shook up the guitar world with Land of the Midnight Sun, becoming one of the most influential guitarists of the decade.
Mike Stern, who came to prominence with Miles Davis during the 1980s, fuses blues rock guitar with bebop lines in extended improvisations. Bill Frisell introduced folk and bluegrass music into jazz, using intervals rather than single lines, combining harmonics and fretted notes. John Scofield collaborated with Miles Davis, Billy Cobham, and Medeski Martin & Wood. At ease in the bebop idiom, Scofield is also well versed in jazz fusion, funk, blues, and soul.
In all directions
Stanley Jordan is an American fusion guitarist known for using the touch and tapping technique, playing the neck of the guitar like a piano.
Gilad Hekselman is an Israeli born jazz guitarist. He has performed with many artists including Jeff Ballard, John Scofield, and Chris Potter.
Jonathan Kreisberg is an American jazz guitarist and composer who has performed with Joe Henderson and Michael Brecker .
Julian Lage is an American jazz guitarist who has been playing and touring with Jim Hall and Gary Burton. He performed at the 2000 Grammy Awards at the age of 13.
Lionel Loueke is an African born jazz guitarist who has played with Herbie Hancock, Terence Blanchard, Wayne Shorter, and Charlie Haden.
Lage Lund is a Norwegian jazz guitarist who has worked with Ron Carter, Mulgrew Miller, and Wynton Marsalis.
Ben Monder is an American jazz guitarist known for his modern sound. He worked with Lee Konitz ,Toots Thielemans, and Paul Motian.
Adam Rogers is an American guitarist who had a long career playing and studying different music from rock to classical guitar to jazz. He has played with a numerous jazz musicians and was a member of Michael Brecker 's band for a few years.
Kurt Rosenwinkel is an American guitarist influenced by modern jazz guitar players of the previous generation as well as horn players like John Coltrane.
See also
- List of jazz guitarists
- Jazz guitar
References
External links
- "Modern Jazz Guitar", All About Jazz
- "'Big Three' jazz guitarists extended to a couple dozen", Howard Mandel, Arts Journal
- "Five Contemporary Jazz Guitarists Worth Exploring", Guitar Aficionado
- "Seven Contemporary Jazz Guitarists Worth Checking Out", Guitar World
- "15 Contemporary NYC Jazz Guitarists", Pickupjazz
- "10 Most Underrated Guitarists", Jazz Times
- "Ladies of Jazz Guitar", All Things Emily