The recording is pretty raw, and it's an intense album, lots of notes, but still a melody based album. My personal favourite is an album called "Live At Elder Hall" but it's no longer available. He learned from a very early age and was a natural player, he plays chords, melody and bass lines at the same time without dropping a beat, and it's all improvised. One guy, one guitar and oceans of talent. A wonderful album, probably my personal favourite jazz album.
#Breezin george benson scale mode full#
Not full of technical stuff, beautiful melodies, wonderful interplay between the musicians. This is a slightly more outside album than Kinda Blue, but relaxing for the most part and some beautiful playing on it. There are some ballads, some up tempo stuff, but it's all melodic stuff. He was certainly one of the most influential guitarists in jazz, and this record is killer. I don't think there was ever a better jazz guitar player. Wes Montgomery - The Incredible Guitar Of Wes Montgomery This album was improvised, there is a book about the making of it, couple of takes of each tune and that was it. It's the biggest selling jazz album of all time. This one is essential listening if you wanna play jazz. So listed here are a bunch of jazz albums I really think are worth listening to, and why. Seems very obvious now, but at the time it was a revelation, which is why I'm sharing this with you. How can you play jazz if you don't know what it's supposed to sound like? He told me to go buy some records and listen to them. The guy laughed until there were tears in his eyes. Actually, I didn't really have any jazz albums. He asked what my favourite George Benson album was, and I didn't have any of that either. The teacher asked me what my favourite Bird (Charlie Parker) album was. At the time I had been playing in rock and blues bands for many years, I knew all my scales and arpeggios and stuff, but it just never sounded like jazz. When I was in my teens I drove a few hours to go and have a lesson with a guy who knew a lot about jazz, a sax player, and when I got there he asked about what I wanted to learn. but they got it all wrong :)Īnd also if you do want to study jazz then one of the most essential things you should do is LISTEN to it. The last section uses more bebop phrasing in F Mixolydian.Īs always, below the YouTube video you’ll find the backing track to play along with, and below that, the tablature.The last few weeks I have noticed a lot of people that are not keen on jazz, or have some kind of strange stereotype feelings about it - they think of tuba and old men playing too many notes. In the middle there’s a bit of the F Blues Scale for the trill, before continuing to the final double-stop bend. The final lick starts with a typical blues motif using a Dm7b5 Arpeggio (D, F, Ab, C… which can also be interpreted as Fm6). This movement is ‘answered’ by a typical bebop phrase. This one starts by nimbly moving from an F Minor Pentatonic Scale into cascading sixths intervals in F Mixolydian. This opening lick starts with syncopated F7 Arpeggio work before moving down the F Mixolydian scale using bebop phrasing. Here’s a breakdown of what’s going on with each lick: Lick 1 These 3 licks can all be played over Cm7 or F7. His Jazz playing always features a strong groove coupled with great bebop phrasing. Influenced by Charlie Christian, Wes Montgomery, and Grant Green, he plays Blues, Funk, and Jazz with equal virtuosity. Not only is George Benson a great singer, but he’s also a world class guitarist.