Great Guitarist Rodney Jones's Jazz Guitar Private Lesson

[dotownwonderbros]

dunno if those mucony lessons are still avaliable but they are just fantastict. i hope his instructional DVD will come out soon.

[Robowx]

Rodney is playing the Yamaha SA 2200. The 335 killer! With Ebony fretboard and coil splitting capabilities! All for 2,000 bucks or less! Plus of course Rodney's playing and teaching is top notch!!!!!!!!!!! :)

[kennyreichert]

this video was made to demonstrate different techniques that you can use, and he's trying to make them obvious. I seriously doubt rodney would solo like this on a tune, have you heard his playing? Unbelievable guitarist. Enjoy it for what it's worth, music is meant to be enjoyed not critiqued.

[KnowKnot]

"this is not melodic." clever. it is also not truck driving, nor skeet shooting. there's more continuity here than you think; it's "harder" to hear because the usual cues from the bassist and drummer (etc) are missing. always happens, always the same complaint until the territory is made familiar via other players.

[GuitarCriti01]

This is not melodic.

[BeatBay]

@GuitarCriti01 thats JAZZ!! and he is a legend!

[GuitarCriti01]

@BeatBay You don't think jazz is melodic? Are you kidding me? I really hope so../

[BeatBay]

@GuitarCriti01 if you mean the old swing jazz from the pre-bebop time, than you`re right! but for me jazz started with bird, christisan , monk and dizzy. one of the most distinctive attributes of jazz are altered chords and the tension within the music itself. modern jazz isnt about playing the diatonic. its about dissonant notes, like the flat five (as a common example), that create a special "jazzy" tension in the music. but thats a "modern-jazz-opinion",if i can say so.but you are right too.

[GuitarCriti01]

@BeatBay So let me get this straight... you think that jazz before bird, monk and dizzy was not melodic? and you think that modern jazz can be summed up through theoretical increased amounts of tension?

[BeatBay]

@GuitarCriti01 no, the opposite! like tal farlow said, before bebop it was more melodic, because there a less altered chords and more diatonic scales used in the songs. with the arise of bebop, bird and dizzy established the whole altered chords thing and the added more chromatics to the soloing (for example in the so called bebop scale). this is less melodic (for the "normal consumer"), because of the tension that these notes create. but its still melodic (and you said this video isnt melodic).

[GuitarCriti01]

@BeatBay Yeah its not because he is just messing around doing fourths, fifths, substitutions etc. and has no concept of a cohesive solo (in this video)

[seventhsamuel]

I met Rodney at jazz camp in 2010. Great, great player, great joke teller too. Never met anybody that had his sense of humor, gotta love the guy

[kpmaynard]

This guy is one serious guitarist!!! I had the pleasure of meeting him when he was a smokin' 20 year-old playing with Dizzy, Micky Rocha and Benjamin Franklin Brown. This guy could burn up a guitar and sound soooo good doing it!!!!!

[bobgure]

Any tips about the right hand technique?

Is there any 'anchor' except for the top of the forearm resting on the top of the guitar?

Is the pick angled slightly upwards (downstrokes w/tip and right side, upstrokes -tip and left side?

Rogers, Bailey, Dan Wilson all seem to share this 'Benson' style with wonderful fluidity.

Help?

[brothaman34]

@bobgure I try to anchor the my pinky on the pick guard to achieve maximum control from my right hand.

[bobgure]

@brothaman34 Thanks...that helps :-)

[NAFTALI2]

I just heard a cut of him playing Barney's Blues, and he didn't sound anything like this--it was great, which is why I'm here. But I'm surprised nothing else from him has been posted, as in cuts from a CD, more small group videos, anything.

[johnnyguitarcarson]

Rodney Jones from the Juilliard School is a bad motherf*cker

peace

[goodsi]

Rodney is one of my favourite guitar-players out there today, he is THE man next to George Benson! nobody be tripping on him, understand what he is trying to say!

[lorenzopetrocca]

great!

[rpizell]

wow. whole lotta ego trippin going on in here

[dragondix]

He is actually a good player - he is playing so much material to demonstrate ideas, not as a melodic solo or perhaps as you would hear him play on an album or gig. This is often a good way to shed ideas, doing mainly continuous soloing using rhythmic divisions such as the swung quaver or triplet quaver etc, just to get into every corner of the harmonic framework he is laying down. It's an exercise in this form rather than strictly music, but you get to the music eventually, and yes, he can play!

[rpizell]

Thats funny. I meant ego trippin as in people leaving comments hating on his playing. And yes I understand the concepts he is trying to illustrate in this video. But hearing him actually play live I dont care for it too much. Is this ok with you?

[brandonman44]

iTroll, please provide links to your video lesson series, mel bay concert dvd, blue note records as a leader, and list of side man work, tv shows, etc, etc, etc....

[guitarman2839]

brandonman44, that is funny, I'm assuming you wrote all of that because those are some of the things Rodney Jones has done. You're probably right to guess iTroll hasn't.

[Jon00Wesley00Harding]

He's a troll you silly people... He's not misguided, all he wants is a rise out of you.

[johnnylance]

Hey iTroll: Kiss my bloody asshole.

[Soulmanifesto]

"Rodney Jones is a legend among musicians, especially guitar players. He is worthy of the ears of any true music lover."

- George Benson

[jazz1bro]

Rodney, Ignore the stupid remarks here. Great playing!

[BobiusBrown]

If you wanna learn Jazz guitar without all of the pretense...google Robert Conti

It took me 10 years to find this guy.

[renixe]

this certainly isn't bad, these two certainly know what they're doing. but it seems like rodney is not listening to the other guy at all. you can see that their feet are tapping two different tempos in the beginning. the accompanist held his ground on the time and the soloist didn't adjust.

[Soulmanifesto]

I always find the comments that are made on videos interesting. There seems to be a real lack of understanding of context i.e. teaching versus performing. There is always the principle in effect, "What you see a thing is, is what you see a thing as".

Perhaps the answer that you seek, and the things that you see now, will appear more clearly as you follow your path.

I am happy if anything that I offer musically, causes the listener to think, feel or even better BE something.

Safe Journeys

RJ

[aaronsmichael]

I studied with Rodney for 4 years in NYC. He was the reason I came up to the city to study 15 years ago.

I stumbled onto this video and watching it reminded me of the days when I was in the other seat soaking in all the information from my lessons.

This is an instructional video exploring the deep language of the jazz guitar, not a gig or a songwriting workshop. It requires an open mind, but a fundamental understanding. These comments below are mighty ignorant and clearly misses the point.

[BobiusBrown]

That was pretty bad.

[PhiberOptik001]

Are these guys on the same planet? Rodney is a fine guitarist, but he appears to be seeing or showing the student, who is desperately trying to comp a bass line, how many notes he can play how quickly. What nonsense.

[bmaniac1]

The other player is not a student. His name is Tom Dempsey. One of the top jazz guitarist in New York. I do agree with you, this has no groove. Just Rodney working in patterns he has worked out. Not musical, but I would have to see it in full. I am sure he was trying to make an instructional point.

[Soulmanifesto]

Wrong. The other guitarist is Josh Maxey not Tom Dempsey.

[zackie61]

great technique incredible guitarist but- where's the music?

[marazapan]

I thought what rodney was playing over "I'll Remember April" made alot of sense.....hes a pretty bad dude....i guess dizzy gillespie thought so too when he hired him to play in his band.

[lusterhigh]

y are you guys spiting on them? are you better?

[30percentplusreturns]

This guy sounds horribe. Its not even music. Its a bunch of notes that make no sense. This gives jazz a bad name.

[Zapppppp]

The notes make sense its just your dumbass brain and ears can't hear how they relate to the harmony you cocksucker.

[BlingMasterFunk]

Reminds me ALOT of like Lenny Breau with Dick Cotton.

[boozito]

He's a good player but, what a bad guitar sound.

sound like a banjo. and why playing the bass lines with a guitar?

[jazzcatuna]

because it's a guitar duet

[02x9]

Never the less, it still sounds funny when a guitar is playing a stand alone bass line in a duo setting given the fact that the guitar does not have the low range that a bass has in order to make the bass line sound fine by itself. For the sake of a jazz guitar duo or solo jazz guitar performance, it sounds much better if he/she alternates short staccato like chords with walking bass lines.

[bluenotesoul]

adding chord voicings would lock down the harmony when RJ is trying to superimpose various substitutions. It wouldn't work for the purpose of this demonstration

[02x9]

I get where you're coming from however using two and/or three note chords(double stops, basic triads, shell voicings, neutral note clusters,) would definitely work for this demonstration. That way the soloist can superimpose various substitutions at will while not having to worry about clashing harmonically with the accompanist or vice- versa. I've heard Joe Pass talk about these very concepts when asked about playing with a piano player, or accompanying a soloist.

[razsekeles]

Rodney is a wonderful musician that's why i must ask a question : why playing so mant notes???

you know extremely well how to work out motives right ?

i have alot of respect for your work , that why i ask .

peace

Raz

[eurocinema]

Maybe that's because the guy's not another faceless Jim Hall clone but a gifted musician with a vision of his own? I'm just guessing here ;-)

[HananRubinstein]

Rodney is the man!

[benlemp5055]

The other guy in the video is Josh Maxey - he's a pretty excellent player in his own right!

[joshmaxeygroup]

Thanks Ben!

- Josh

[benlemp5055]

The other guy (the white guy) in this video is Josh Maxey - he's a pretty excellent player in his own right.

[raypizzi]

YAH RODNEY, BEAUTIFUL ! Ray Pizzi

[ricaard]

Well, he's cool...

[bluessssss]

good sounds

[brothaman34]

rodney I'm stealing all that stuff ;)

[JesseGuitar07]

good job~ sounds awesome!

5/5