How to use this section
Guitar, as most every musician and student knows, dominates the jazz world as well as most other genres of music. As a result, there is intense interest in guitar performance, its players and their recordings. Recognizing this trend back in the 1990s, Dave designed a jazz guitar performance resource list that is an outline of appropriate recordings to serve as a developmental guide for guitar students, emerging players (and avid listeners).
Vital to getting the most out of this guide is the one’s willingness to discover:
- Stylistic techniques
- Repertoire possibilities (introduction to new songs and forms)
Historical focus
Interested listeners should note that this resource doesn’t span the entire history of jazz guitar because:
- The earliest recordings were documented under adverse audio conditions and it’s next to impossible to comfortably hear many of the technical subtleties that are of personal interest.
- Many very recent guitar releases are by artists who have amassed all kinds of technical abilities, but they have little to say artistically that hasn’t been previously stated in superior performance circumstances.
CD versus LP
Unfortunately, not all the great music originally released on 78s and LPs has been reissued on CDs. Will that eventually happen? Not likely, because individuals with financial means release what they personally desire and not what might be best for the sake of posterity. The result is that digging into the nuances of jazz guitar performance will inevitably involve acquiring and analyzing occasional LPs, and a quality turntable remains an essential audio equipment necessity.
Your internet connections
Also, like every other current subject in the universe, the internet becomes your primary source for locating desirable recordings. By all means, though, pick up what you can through local retailers who still believe in stocking as full a catalog as possible.
Unknown performers
For a more complete grasp of historical perspective, there are recordings by artists who are judged to be first-rate performers but who lack wide-ranging appeal. Don’t ignore Howard Roberts, Billy Bauer, Les Spann, René Thomas, Dennis Budimir and Jack Wilkins. They have a lot to offer, if only to diversify the styles you draw upon.
That said, here are the artists, recordings and tracks that might give you extra impetus to develop.