Jazz Tones

[57-classic]

Which body and pickups are better for jazz or even 50's rock & roll or blues? I might get a Dean Palomino. But I am thinkin about a Gibson.

[rct]

Friends Don't Let Friends Play Jazz.

 

rct

[Versatile]

IMO most great jazz and early R&R was created with a hollow body and P90's evolving to H/B's around '57

 

Semis then came into the mix with McLaughlin/Coryell/Carlton et al

 

Gretsch's, Rickenbakers, ES 330's, ES175's, ES295's, L5's etc

 

So much pleasure !!

 

V

 

[stein]

That is a hard question because what most think of when we think of a typical jazz sound is very different from a 50's rock and roll sound or a blues sound.

 

One thing for sure is that p-90's often are a missing link to SOME of the tones to some of that early music, such as certain rockabilly stuff, or T-bone walker stuff, and they can get good tone and colors for jazz.

 

But at the same time, a neck humbucker played clean on a GOOD sounding accousitc archtop is very typical.

 

Also, got to point out that even though the palamino there looks like a "gibson" type you are asking for a comparism between a hand made guitar that cost thousands and and an asian made one with surely a poly finish. No doubt the Gibsons are going to sound better and be sweeter, but for less than 500 bucks?

 

I have no idea what the Palamino there is going to sound like or be in terms of quality, but it looks like it would be fun for the price.

[CajunBlues]

I get my smoothest warmest tones from my Les Paul Custom... I have a very nice Guild Hollowbody but it usually stays at home...

 

I am a semi-pro jazz player and I gig almost exclusively with my ES-137 (semi hollow) and my Les paul Custom

 

Really you should play the guitar you are most comfortable with.. The only guitars I would steer away from are the fender type guitars with the thin single coil pickups... But in reality I have seen jazz players use non humbucker teles... more so than I have seen ones playing lp customs...

 

I would go with 57 classics... as far as pickups... But p90s are great too... just dont go cheap with pups...

[DAS44]

I can't say much for pickups, but you see a lot of semi hollow and hollow bodies.

Two

[dem00n]

P-90's, hollow body. Dont use a pick, only fingers. If you use a pick make sure its light, not heavy. You dont want a harsh sound. Very smooth, amp is well important to. Go SS, yes SS...

 

Well thats what i belive for a good jazz tone.

 

Any guitar can do Jazz, Les Pauls do it well, have been since the 50's.

[L5Larry]

Of course, I voted humbuckers on a hollowbody! The only thing better is a "floating" humbucker on a big ole jazzbox.

 

[milod]

Well... a lotta the old bebop guys going forward used the es175 in some variations.

 

But Joe Pass in his early years did use a Fender a bit.

 

I'd say a lot depends as "Cajunblues" noted, with what you're comfortable with. Then let the rest of the world jump in a lake.

 

Charlie Byrd played a classical guitar; Django played variations of flattops and after WWII, electrics. Only one of my "electric" guitars is not a humbucker and it's an mid 1950s "cheapie" jazz guitar I played a lotta country rock with. I think the 175 got used a lot 'cuz it's one of the first guitars designed for electric play, it's shaped like a guitar and it's awfully comfortable.

 

Yadayadayada.

 

Comfort and price tag. L5Larry is probably the best "regular' on the forum when it comes to jazz and, guess what, has a very nice L5. That's too big for my comfort, yet I doubt he'd agree.

 

I'm just an old country part time picker, but 99.9 percent of the time I use a 175 type, a Dot, a 14-fret nylon AE Ovation from the early AE days of the 1970s, off and on a full hollow small body 1950s Harmony archtop that was one of their better instruments (one pickup), and I just picked up a nice little Florentine cutaway Epi AE - and a 70s Guild S100c that's pretty much a solidbody SG clone from back when Guilds were American-made.

 

Each instrument makes me play and "feel" a little differently even when I'm doing what I think I normally do technically. A lotta that is at least partly a subconscious response to the actual physical shape of the guitar and how you hold it and the neck shape. Well, mostly subconscious if you've played 'em a lot and are just doing your typical "stuff." Otherwise you might think about that a lot.

 

"Jazz tone" is obviously an individual's preference just as anything else. I could play a solo gig as easily with any of the guitars I've mentioned, and have, but more or less the same "stuff" would sound different and I'd approach basically the same technique differently more because of the shape and each individual guitar's physical characteristics.

 

For what it's worth, it appears to me the best bargain for a jazz-looking guitar is the Epi version of the ES175 that runs around $500 street from MF, etc. It's humbuckers. I s'pose you could redo it with P94s or whatever, but I really have no idea why you'd want to. Although Joe Pass has an Epi model named for him, it appears he mostly played a 175. I personally happen to love the 175 size, shape and feel. But part of that's my body size and shape and my guitar-playing history.

 

If HenryJ offered my my choice of a new Gibbie, it'd probably be a variant of the 175, although there are certainly are more expensive "jazz boxes" in the stable.

 

But tone? No big deal one way or another. Roy Buchanan could do jazz on a Tele and make it sound "right." I couldn't, but he certainly could do his style that way.

 

Plenty of top jazz guitar players used a pick. Fewer used just fingers or thumb type of playing. But it does tend to be somewhat different style.

 

Oh, and some will holler you've gotta use heavy flatwound strings. Yeah, right. Again, you are your jazz instrument, not the other guy. I ain't used 'em in over 30 years, although I'm thinking about making up a light flatwound set just for giggles.

 

m

[damian]

I do my jazz on a Gibby LP Trad + with '57s.......And on my Epi P-3..........

 

And, yes, even my Tele......It works.......

 

That Dean should be just fine........

 

I'd prefer to use a 339 though, with '57s..............

[milod]

Damian...

 

Unless the Dean specs have changed the past six or seven years, and it looks much like a 175, I found the nut felt too narrow compared to a Gibbie style. It just wasn't comfortable.

 

That's why with a very similar shape, and similar price tags, and a neck/nut/fingerboard I far prefer, I'd personally go for the Epi version of the ES175. I'd accept the Dean as a gift, but not really to play.

 

m

[damian]

Damian...

 

Unless the Dean specs have changed the past six or seven years, and it looks much like a 175, I found the nut felt too narrow compared to a Gibbie style. It just wasn't comfortable.

 

That's why with a very similar shape, and similar price tags, and a neck/nut/fingerboard I far prefer, I'd personally go for the Epi version of the ES175. I'd accept the Dean as a gift, but not really to play.

 

m

 

Good points Milod.........That Dean is pretty; I own several Dean guitars, and I never play them because, well, they lack.............

 

Epi does indeed EXCEL at semi-hollows..........Thanks for the rescue post Milod.................. [thumbup] .....

[Versatile]

Possibly one of the great allrounders to cover jazz and R&R

 

The ES 335.....

 

V

 

[milod]

Vers...

 

Yupper. Or the Epi Dot depending on the original poster's checkbook.

 

The Dot feels quite different from the 175, though. It's a great and versatile guitar. I tend to prefer the 175 for more "fine" work in ways because somehow the neck feels shorter even though it's not! Then for more blues stuff, yeah, I actually prefer the 335 shape.

 

Bottom line, though, I think, is that L5Larry is absolutely correct when you're talking about a lotta traditional jazz players wanting a more traditional "jazz" guitar. The 175 works in either its Gibson or Epi form. But...

 

I think "jazz" is one's head, too. And the player is the instrument of that as much as the guitar.

 

m

[chase1410]

A Dean for Jazz....? Isn't that a oxy-moron?

[dem00n]

A Dean for Jazz....? Isn't that a oxy-moron?

Yeah it is.

But Dean has been putting out some great guitars lately.

[CajunBlues]

OK all you kiddies... grab a smore and a juice box and gather around the campfire... I have a story to tell....

 

Once upon a time there was this great jazz guitar player that was tired of the guitars of the day that lacked sustain and produced that annoying feedback when played loud... He was just completely sick of the dead lethargic sound these huge hollow bodied guitars were putting out...

 

So what did this jazz guitar legend do.. He inveted his own guitar... He designed it to be made of heavy solid mahogany with a maple cap and an ebony fretboard... And voila, he got all the sustain AND fat tones he was dreaming about... And hence the perfect jazz guitar was born...

 

They called this guitarist Les Paul..

 

But at the same time there was this other music that was just evolving... they called it rock and roll... Well the rockers found out that this incredible tone and sustain worked wonders with their music also... And so the rockers adopted this axe as one of their own...

 

So the jazzers had a dilemma... Go and play a guitar better suited for their craft and risk being labeled as one of those sinful rockers... Or just stick with what had always been played in jazz -- the hollowbody... Why think outside the box... change is never good ... right ?

 

Well we all know what happened...

 

And all of those rock and rollers lived happily ever after...

The jazz guitarists... Well... who knows...

[milod]

Dem...

 

I still think they'd best have a different neck for most jazz pickers...

 

m

[Riverside]

P-90's, hollow body. Dont use a pick, only fingers.

 

This.

[zigzag]

Once upon a time there was this great jazz guitar player that was tired of the guitars of the day that lacked sustain and produced that annoying feedback when played loud...

 

That's why more jazzers don't use LPs, 'cause they don't play loud or need/want sustain. That's why most jazzers still play hollow bodied boxes.

 

Nice story though...

[Jon S.]

Of course, I voted humbuckers on a hollowbody! The only thing better is a "floating" humbucker on a big ole jazzbox.

 

 

 

+1!!

[Californiaman]

I voted for the 57 Classics and the hollow body.

But I'm biassed.

[HarpBoy]

Among other things, I play in a Jazz quartet and use my Epi Nick Valensi with my Traynor YGM-3 RI. I just recently switched to flatwounds, D'adario Chrome Light Jazz. This setup gives a pretty sweet tone, without a lot of string noise. I tried my Les Paul a couple of times, but found the pickups too hot and unmanageable for the subtle stuff you have to pull off sometimes. I also have an SG with P90s, and I think that would do a pretty convincing job as well, although a red guitar with horns would probably scare off a lot of the older crowd we might play to. In general, I prefer a good set of single coils to humbuckers, and am moving in that direction with all of my guitars for blues and rock as well. The Valensi comes with P94s, of course, and I really like these pickups.

 

I vote for P90s, or P94s, or some other flavor of good single coil. Semis and hollow have less sustain in general than solids, and this might be preferable as well.

 

My $0.02...

 

Cheers

[milod]

Okay....

 

For what it's worth, I used the Guild version of the SG - S100c, the one with acorns and oak leaves handcarved into the top - as the backup for the 175 and it worked quite well. I'm obviously gray haired and thinning and so were a lotta folks listening. No problem. I don't think it would have been a problem if it were a red SG.

 

I personally prefer the humbuckers' sound.

 

Oh - why the solidbody backup for a full hollow jazz box? Easy, first in bad weather to protect the jazz box and second, weather changes make my full hollow reeeeeally easy to get outa tune.

 

To add to the fun discussion, btw, I normally wear 9-42 except on that Guild, and she has word 8-38 since new in the 1970s. But nobody seems bothered by fat chords from a skinny guitar. Granted, I'm using bare fingers so it's less... whatever... from a pick, although I think a really soft pick would do the job too if that's your pickin' style.

 

m