Last week in The Fingerstyle Five, our monthly live Zoom workshop was about arranging and improvising on the blues and jazz standard "Careless Love." I honestly had no idea this particular song would be such a hit with everyone, but that has been this month's Pleasant Surprise For David. I did a lesson on "Careless Love" in C for the Youtube channel a while back, but for the membership this time I put it in the key of A, with some cool chord substitutions and up-the-neck voicings. Before we go live, I always invite people to post their questions in the membership forum, and Gilles, from Paris, asked a particularly good one:
In a recent post you spoke about a duo gig where you played with a mandolin player. I'm interested in advice and examples when you have to play guitar with a singer or another solo instrument you have to support.
This is one of those things that's really useful to know, but which nevers occurs to me to talk about because the whole point of fingerstyle so obviously seems to be "to play something satisfying all by yourself." And yet many of the things that make fingerstyle such a complete and expressive solo style also lend themselves to creating a much more musical and satisfying way to accompany and interact with other musicians, too. I drew a lot of inspiration in this department from Joe Pass, specifically his duet records with Ella Fitzgerald. And two more of my favorite guitarists, Ry Cooder and Mark Knopfler, are well-known for using fingerstyle technique to both drive the ensemble groove and provide particularly creative accompaniment to their own vocals.
I have all this on the brain because I played three gigs this past weekend, all pretty different from each other, but all tied together by this fingerstyle thread. On Friday night, I played a rehearsal dinner. I can't remember the last time I actually played a background music gig, but I was really curious to see if all these arrangements of old standards I play around the house would actually translate to a gig-worthy repertoire. So I brought my tiny PA up the stairs, perched in the corner, played music to pass hors d'oevres by, and collected more money for being as invisible as possible than I did at the next two gigs combined.
The next afternoon, I played five minutes from my house at an Austin institution, the New World Deli. Or, as the sign spells it, the "NeWorlDeli." Read
that five times fast. My pal (and fellow guitarist/songwriter) Joel books me to play the Deli once a month, on the condition that I invite someone to split the bill with me, which keeps things interesting and help with the draw. So I played a solo set of my own tunes for a listening kind of audience, but also took turns backing up and being backed up by this month's guest, self-described "recovering jazz guitarist" and badass blues singer, guitarist and songwriter Chris Bell.
Finally, that night, I did a set with the only real electric band I still play in, a collaboration with yet another great singer/guitarist/songwriter, Eric Bettencourt. We've had an on-again, off-again quartet called Club Staccato for the past few years, and this month it is, apparently, on again. The rhythm section in this band is so good and Eric is such a great musician to play with that even though we split the job of fronting the band and play an equal number of our own songs on any given night, my favorite moments onstage, the ones where everything just seems to just float, are when I remember to take a step or two back, stand close to the ride cymbal and be part of what's happening
behind the solo, behind the lead vocal.
So on each of these gigs, there was some kind of accompaniment going on. In the first case, I wasn't so much accompanying other musicians as accompanying the scene, which requires its own kind of taste and restraint. Playing with Chris was a matter of doing that two-guitar groove, getting the gears to mesh in a way that keeps things interesting without stepping on each other. Playing my solo set was about accompanying a singer and improvising guitarist who happened to be myself. And playing in the band was about remembering to listen, and to enjoy being
part of something. Each situation also called for a degree of stepping up, too – as Chris and I swapped tunes, we'd take turns singing, and trade solos, and the band also required me to sing and solo and communicate at least semi-coherently with the audience (I hesitate to use the word "crowd," as I don't want to overstate the situation in any way).
Accompaniment puts your attention squarely on the nuances that makes music flexible, dynamic and expressive. And that focus on listening and interaction gives you a lot to think about when you return to playing solo. I'm all for concentrating directly on the thing you want to do most, and if that's playing solo, then that may be where your focus belongs. But accompaniment and collaboration are great ways to deepen and widen your musicality, not to mention have fun and interact with your friends and peers while doing something you all enjoy.
More soon,
David
P.S. if you missed the Youtube "Careless Love" lesson, you can check it out here:
Chord Substitutions on Careless LoveAnd as a subscriber, you can download the tab without re-entering your email address:
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