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    TedGreene GeorgeVanEps Interview

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    803 Ansichten8 Seiten

    TedGreene GeorgeVanEps Interview

    Hochgeladen von

    Bob
    TedGreene GeorgeVanEps Interview

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    © All Rights Reserved
    Als PDF herunterladen oder online auf Scribd lesen
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    August 1981 $1.50 (Canadian $1.75, UK 90p) BOB a WEIR JOE __ ; | GUITAR PLAYERJAUGUST 198 GEORGE VAN EPS Harmonically Speaking, The Greatest Ever By Ted Greene st edt Seatac significantly extended the play Barry Galbraith taste. Theres no category inthe union book for George. Ask him what he plays, and hel tell you: lap piano. More than 4? years ago, George Van Eps ig range of the guitar by adding a seventh string. wning it to a low A, one octave below the fifth string. Because of his radical approach tothe instrument, itis likely that his work has cared him a place in musical history such ‘that twill ong be studied bya diverseassort ‘ment of musicians including bass players arrangers. and composers "And then thre i is impact on guitarists, that clas of fellow creatures who have bene” fitted the most from Van Eps work. In a fast-food, instant world where one may’ vit= twally become an overnight star and then fall back into obscurity almost as quickly. the ‘esteem in which the more knowledgeable and respected players have held George has ‘endured, indeed even grown, He has been a guitar hero for more than 40 years ‘Tributes from many of the world’ lead- ing guitarists are voluminous, A sampling Tony Mottola [GP, Nov. "7], himself atop recording aris for 40 years, sys, “George is the master of them al. He influenced me so ‘much with his chordal harmonic concepts — fof course be influenced everybody.” Barry Galbraith (GP, July "76,2 giant among jazz ‘guitarists, has “wished thatthe younger play ers knew more about Van Eps. There's rnobody like him. Harmonically speaking, hie the greatest ever for guitar.” Bebop jar star Remo Palmier (GP. Aug. “8] com- ‘ments, “If you mentioned George Van Epsto any of the ja77 greats hike Jimmy Raney or Tal Farlow, they'd bow to the waist” And Barney Kessel thoughtfully reflects, "George isa master. George on guitar and Ar Tatum fon piano were light-years ahead of almost everyone else harmonically. Van Eps is simply a genius, a superb guitarist with exquisite taste.” ‘Of course. younger players have also honored George. Earl Klugh considers ‘George to be one of his major influenoesand favorite players. The late bluesman Michael ‘Bloomfield found that “unlike most jazz guit- arists, George plays real romantically and emotionally, with a lot of heart. There's a fgreat deal of soul in his music.” And these {quotes are just the tip ofthe laudatory ice= ‘berg: many guitarists pay even stronger trib ute to George in the waysthat they play, You can easly hear Georgein the unaccompanied styles of Joe Pass. Jimmy Wyble, Johnny ‘Smith, and Howard Roberts. among others ‘Suffice to say that very few guitarists in his- tory have catved a comparable niche, ‘George Van Eps was born in Plainfield New Jersey on August 7, 1913, into highly creative, rather remarkable family. There hhad been five earlier generations of both pro- fessional watchmakers and musicians, and George’ was no different. Besides pursuing ‘music, he and his three older brothers pianist Bobby, trumpeter Freddy, and tenor saxophonist John—also learned watch= ‘making from their grandfather (itis no ac- cident that George often deals withthe guitar in terms of what he calls “harmonic mech anisms”). George’ father Fred was consi- dered the premier classical $string banjoist fof his day, and his mother Louise was a fine classical and ragtime pianist. George started on banjo atage ten, was playing pro- fessionally within a year (he joined Plain- field's musicians" union when be was I!).and switched to guitar when he was 13. He quickly progressed, and started gigsing with his brothers and soon after withthe legend- ary banjoist Harry Reser From 1929 10 1931 he was @ member of vocalist Smith Ballew’s group, which in- cluded the famous Dorsey brothers. It was the first of many respected dance bands with whom George would be associated. A two- year stint in Freddy Martin's ensemble ‘between 1931 and 1933 further tempered the young guitarist. His first bigtime break came in 1934, when he joined clarinetist) bandleader Benny Goodman's orchestra Although he was with Goodman only fora year, it started George’ professional mo- menturm. In 1936 be became a member of English singer Ray Noble's orchestra, which had been hand-picked by one ofthe day's top bandleaders, Glenn Miller. Van Eps’ tenure ‘with Noble lasted on and off until 1981. He moved from New York to Hollywood in 1938, and lived there for two years, appear ing on radio shows and on record dates. (It was during ths period that he wrote his frst method book. The George Van Eps Guitar Method). When World War Il broke out.he returned to Plainfield to help in his father’s recording equipment factory. bur returned to Hollywood in 1943 to resume musical work In 1944 George worked in radio with Ray [Noble once again, but also appeared on record with the Paul Weston Orchestra. ‘Around the time of his late-0s hiatus from the East Coast, George became fast nated with the possibility ofa 7-sting guitar. Having long dreamed about extending the low-end range of the instrument so that he could play his own bass lines, George approached the Epiphone company’ and {hey agreed to build a7-string for him. Iwas from B for you ‘is rahe mentalprocessinvolved in one versus the other? Sure i's the mental prosess. You see. sheet of music manuscript is a very cold thing, It doesn’ really speak to most of us Butit can in subtle ways. For instance if 1 -write a piece of music in the key of End it hhappens to be on the jovial, bright, oF light- hearted side, and I have to choose between ‘writing a note as either 2 Baor Ce, its going to be Bk On the other hand, ifthe piece is ‘more serious or somber. then Til write it as (Co.Ithink itadds something, since youcan't hear the paper. When you reharmonize a piece, do vou think in rms of chord progressions, or only in terms of lines? Do the chord progressions result as @ product of the various lines? Changing the voice-leading of any line changes the progression. The harmonic Counterpoint changes the harmony for you. think primarily of the motion of the tines, ‘Tere is a bassline, a cello line. 2 French hora line, and sofort, Issort of likeorches- ‘rating and distributing the notes between the different instruments, For me, its a whole bunch of themes, and they Fe going 10 hhave to shake hands and be friends—but ‘without losing their own identities. What does one do 0 get 10 the stage where they can mentally orchestrate lke this? The only thing I know of isto just do it fand do it, and do it. And try to bear the colors; listen to the sounds.of the different instruments of the orchestra, and the lines ‘that they weave ‘Are youable to hear all hese melodies, at least in part, because on a Subliminal level there is a subsiructure of various progres- ‘sions with which you have become familiar over the years? Yes. You know, I don’ lke to listen to my records, but sometimes I beat friend’ house, and theyll put one on, and Tl hear myself and think, “Why did you do it that way?" I hear different lines today than I did then; hear the voice-leadings slightly dffer- cently now than I used to. ‘But are they based on the same progres- Yes, ina rudimentary way. But by chang- ing them just slightly, you change the har ‘monic picture a lo. -Baen ifthe result isthe same chord pro- ‘gression per se, such as C fo Am? Yes. And sometimes ornery voicings result momentarily from the motion of the lines, OF course, you don’ linger on them, land in this way they are perfectly usable. Then the forefront of your attention isnt ‘ceupled anymore with chord namesas such, even when you see lines coming together, coalescing into recognizable chord shapes? ‘Let me put it this way: The chord names are in my subconscious, and Tim aware of them, But Tim more conscious of them as collections of lines that swim. They're going some place, Ifthe lines are swimming, let them go where they want, because they ate free entities. And if they wind up in uter disaster, dont give up; sort of give them swimming lessons-—et them go. If I start to ‘think that this is dis chord, and thatis shar chord, and when ths note changes while that line moves against these sustained notes it ‘becomes this chord, it's too academic. Iso longer music in my mind: Tm making a cal» eulator out of it. 1 want 10 listen to those tones, tothe overalleffect Atleast for me, if don’ listen to the overall effect, 1 wont be able to guide those lines that want to go someplace, And even after having said all this, in another sense, what I'm really think ing aboutthe bottom line of this—is inier- vals. That’s the way my mind works. And they don’ have to have any names. They are just this far apart or that far apart Piciorial imervals? Audible intervals? Tm conscious of the relationship of each note to every other it's actually an air gap. [And wh do you prefer to thnk of them Tes not that I prefer it; 1 just automati- cally doit this way. That'show I hear them— as intervals. And you've got to let them talk ‘As each one moves around, it changes the chemistry of what’ going on, and one may ‘rigger the other. It'S just like people getting together telling stores. The story that the first fellow just told will rigger something in the others mind, Now he tells a story that’s related to the first one, but alte differen, ‘and so on, Is ping-pong; they're all banging ‘against each other, uying to remain frends, and tying to be egoists, 100. Buty tokeep them all happy. Have you reached the point where you Just see whatever lines you think of allover the guitar neck? Yes, And thats the result ofstudying the types of exercises you have in your new Books, or AUGUST I98/GLITAR PLAYER 81 GEORGE VAN EPS ———_______________ from playing so many songs? ‘Oh, yes~the result of taking al the dit ferent voice leadings like the super and sub series of the little triads I deseribed in my book. (£d. Nove: Van Eps'book, Harmonic Mechanisms For Guitar, defines the super and sub series as follows: “When any one of the voices ina triad is raised tothe next step of its scale, itis in super position. When a Woice is lowered by one step of the scale 1s sub position. "] By the way, there isa very Important aspect ofthis whole thing that Ive never really expressed in any detail before, except toa few students; thats, we think we are limited by what we know we can pro- duce, but our thinking should go past this. ‘The mind wants to goback into the safe area, Dut I keep kicking it out. You have to push yourself stretch, work harder, overcome the laziness, and not take the easy way out, It ‘may hurt, but it won hurt for long. This ‘opens up new areas of harmonic adventure. ‘AS you become more proficient, your ideas naturally expand, Its a wonderful process. With chords having more than one ‘name—such as Am6, Fem 76S, DS, e1e—are there any principles that influence your choice of which names are appropriate at certain times? Once again, the overall effeet is more important to me than calling out notes or being conscious of what something actually is. Combine any wo notes and they're going toproducea certain musical lavor, a certain taste, a certain chemistry all their own. Ifyou ‘add another voice, this will create a new Tavor. You were once quoted—or possibly rmisquoted—as saying that you played in all 22 keys at once. Maybe you could ket ws ‘mortals in on your secre. ‘What 1 meant was, because of having practiced all my lfe inal 12 keys, and there- fore not favoring any, Tim somewhat con- scious of the [2 Keys al the time, And since any note belongs to all keys, you can, for instance, bein one key atthe beginning of phrase, change to another key in the middle And come out of it in still another. You can ddo anything you want, and go any place as long as its done with taste ‘But do you alo play in more than one fey ata time? Oh, yeah. | like to play passages where fone oF more voices are in one Key, and another voice or voices are in a different ‘one—for instance, tenth interval inthe key of G with a melody line in the key of Bx ‘But nobody on this planet with ten fins _gers is playing in all I2 keysax one time—are they? ‘No. You mightas welltakea two-by-four and put it on the 88 keys ofthe piano atthe ‘same time [laughs]. ‘Are many’ of Your arrangements spon ‘aneous, or do you find particular sounds ‘hat you love and wish 10 use repeatedly because of the certain joy that you know they will bring? Think we all fallin love with certain 82. GUITAR PLAYER/AUGUST 1981 sounds, Good, bad, orindiferent, lean get ‘vay rom the way think. Iwan purposely play phrase or progression exact the same tay tvie, but thee are notational combina- ions that tekle my mental funnybone. Its impossible to getaway from that. And on some days when we're not feeling well, and sullhave to deliver inorder to make living, these old fends these harmonic devices provide a storehouse from which to draw How do you fel about those In the 30 caled avant-garde who say that tonal music 1s dead oF exhausted, ‘We haven even begun to scratch the surface of the surface yet. But I think there ae those who are more intrested in sound effets than musi. A sharp noise [pause]. hak squeak on the blackboard [pause] & Stoigun [pause], potatoes faling down the cellar steps—these are sound effects. But | an¥ agree with tone being dead, because i that day aries, thats the end” of mus Muse is al tone it has tobe. What about atonal musie—could it be the bridge berween tonal music and sound fects? Te heard some atonal music that was pleasing-full of surprises and rather iter- sting, But Iknow leouldn' stand tolistento it for 24 hours a day. Long before the 24 hour period was over. would long to heara simple progression where the voices were fen and were having a litle love affair with each other, notabstractly trying toblow sour mind ‘Because the raved Ith is part of the natural overtone series, some theorists fel ‘hat the Tydian scale—which conaain this ‘note—rather than the commonly acepied ‘major scale shouldbe the center of ou onal system. How do you feel about this? ‘Nothing shouldbe used al the time. The raised Ith s already a wonderful part of our {onal stem. Every interval. every notation, isa bona fide member ofthe musical family. had ane fellow ask me recently. “Are You into dhs yet? asked him what he meant, and he replied, “Well you know. the coming thing is ths" | sid. “The coming thing? 1 didn know they ever lef; must be behind the times (laughs) And s0 we Ve somewhat arbitrarily chosen the major sale asthe center of our tonal syste? ‘Well my concepts thatthe major scleis not the cener of our sytem. The chromatic Scale isthe mothe scale. All of our scales are bome ofthe chromatic scale. Its the most important: It contains everything Why did you decide 10 extend the low end of the instrament, 10 add the seventh suring? T vant ts get down where my’ brother ‘nas playing: I wanted tle more range, But Tic want to change the wonderul Span- jsh guitar tuning. You know, it evolved —it ‘wasn thought-out by one person. Every ‘morning Ido a bow tothe east and thank God for whoever’ mind decided to put the thd inthe taning. (Note: All adacent srings on a gular are tuned a perfect fourth ‘apart except the G and B sirings, which are ‘tuned a major third apart.) Did you ever experiment with extending the top-end range? Oh, yes. [spent a year doing all kinds of experiments, but the extra tp string sounded. too thin for me whenever | would tune ittoa place where it would be worth the difficulties Feajired to learn a new string, to fully incor- porate it, ‘Just as a sidligh, Lenny Breau is now playing a nylon-siring guitar with an added high seventh siving tuned 10 A. ‘Thats beautiful. You know with his cas- cading harmonies, he’ way up inthe piccolo register. That’ great for him and his style of playing Why did you decide to tune the iow sev ‘enth tring toan A rather than, say, a Tow B, which would have kept more symmetry between all of the botiom strings? ‘Because it provided what I wanted: The instrument i still ehromatically playable, ‘and it doesnt add a new note to the tuning. | just added another A,and i's nota stranger. ‘any chord whose root isnormally on the itth String ean now have iton the seventh, Carl Kress used to tune his guitars in unusual and rich ways. Was thisan influence on you? ‘No. You see, Carl's tuning was in fifths with the top string lowered an octave—a kind of tenor banjo tuning. He wanted to be able to play what be called “lush” chords Your guitar is actually tuned a whole- step lower than actual pitch, making your lowest notea G rather thanan A. Isthis done 10 further increase the low-end range? 'No, its done because I love the feel of nylon strings, and the ste! strings feel too hard to me. The tension is too great when they're tuned up to pitch, So I use a medium ‘gage, 2 fat enough gauge so thatit hassome ones” in it~not the slinky sound, Yet by tuning down, the strings have a softer feel under the fingers. Why do sou prefer a low action? ‘A high action defeats its purpose, which is supposedly to givea better sound, because the strings won' intonate correctly” Segovia doesn't use a high action—we discussed it ‘once at @ party in New York ‘On your Mellow Guitar album, yougora wonderful tone quality that sounds almost ‘out-of-phase—far different from the stand ‘ard jazz tone. TTused one pickup out alittle ways from the bridge, Thad to make that pickup. Lowell Frank, who was an engineer for Columbia at that time, wanted to try an experiment. So ‘we took the uitar right from the pickup into the board. He seta microphone fairly close to the guitar and picked up the acoustic sound, and then he mixed the two sounds together. ‘In another vein, many musicians seem to have an anit-business, antecapitalism att tude. As one who has seen the inner workings fof the music business for so many years, do / George with his Van Eps Pouring holowbody elec produced from 1967 wll the le 0s by Gretsch - The production model featured a threplece maple neck with a 28)" scale, an ebony fingerboard ‘mulipteply maple sides and top (witha single cutee). v0 Fllerron pickups and gold pled hardware you feel this is @ valid position? ‘No. I can understand their feelings, but | don't think its sensible. 1 think they can ‘moderate their felings a little bit, because almost nothing is all good orall bd. And think if they would give a lite bit on this point—try to develop some understanding. ‘twould help them. I would also help every~ body’ else; theyre not helping anybody by ‘being deadly against business. Pus, isnot realistic evaluation of the situation, bocause vwe players need the hard-nosed, cigar- smoking businessmen, Somebody has to sell the product and take eare of the bills. And they need us, too, OF course, they shouldn’ dictate taste and try to force us into playing and promoting things that ae against every= thing we believe in musically. ‘So, a company is willing 10 give you a contrac, they should have enough faith in You as an artist or they shouldbe signing, ‘you up in the first place? ‘Yes. OF e6urse, they should have some voice in the matter—afterall they are paying the bills, But there should be an understand= ing on this point at the outset. Both parties Iwas ited witha Floating Sound Unita buckle device tha! as rspended in he tring ust ahead of the bridge) ond attached to a tang fork inside the body: it was iene 10 Increase ssa should have leway. You know, sometimes hard-nosed businessman has a berter sense of what a crowd is going to expect. And it isn" oing to kill even the purest of the pure,

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