[Dixielandjazz] Why guitar and not banjo?

Tue Dec 26 12:30:42 PST 2006

Quite a few of my recent jobs have been strolling up and down a shopping 
mall.  Volume of the instruments in such a setting is really important. 
Even though while I had a lot of volume on clarinet I have a whole bunch 
more on soprano sax.  I find myself overplaying the brass a lot of the time 
and have to back off but outside it's doubtful if guitar or upright bass 
would be heard very far.   In most indoor settings the soprano sax has too 
much power and I find myself backing off most of the time.

 A lot of the bands used arch top guitars which I never found to have a lot 
of volume as compared to the Grand Concert Jumbo flat top guitar.  In either 
case neither has the punch.  It's interesting to see the rise of the guitar 
and demise of the banjo as amplification came on the scene and as it got 
better and speakers improved the Bass Guitar came on the scene.  This was 
happening about the time of early Elvis Presley recordings which still 
featured upright bass.  After Elvis, Guitar bass started becoming standard 
for the new rock bands.  I don't want to argue the merits of Bass Guitar vs 
Upright bass except to say in the hands of the garden variety player the 
Upright bass or worse still the fretless Guitar bass is something to be 
feared.

Today, as I think it happened 75-100 years ago, musicians and leaders made a 
choice of instrumentation for different kinds of gigs.  Crowd size, 
availability of amplification, venue and occasion all are factors in 
instrument choice.  A quiet jazz gig with piano bass and drums would call 
for an upright bass where as a wedding reception a Guitar Bass would be 
indicated and outside in a strolling gig a sousaphone might be appropriate. 
The same had to be true for banjo / guitar choices.

If smooth jazz sound is wanted I think most of us would select an upright 
string bass over the guitar bass and clarinet over the soprano sax, guitar 
over banjo and so on down the line.

I guess it depends on what you want.  I think of the Dixie band as an 
outside group even if it happens to be playing inside.

Some months ago I played a gig in a large ballroom of a downtown hotel.  The 
instrumentation was Tuba, Cornet, Trombone, Banjo, Soprano Sax.  The crowd 
was large and we were on a 4 foot stage.  We had no trouble playing un 
amplified in that room.  There were mikes and a system available but we 
didn't use it because the host couldn't figure out how to turn it on.  These 
were all good players who had a very solid  sound.  This kind of band really 
doesn't need the amplification that other groups need.
Larry Walton
St. Louis -

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Ministry of Jazz" <jazzmin at actcom.net.il>
To: <dixielandjazz at ml.islandnet.com>
Sent: Tuesday, December 26, 2006 12:27 AM
Subject: Re: [Dixielandjazz] Why guitar and not banjo?

> Shalom Larry, Bob, Steve, Tom and the rest of you jazz fans,
>
> I see two issues going on here that are often not separated from one 
> another
> in discussions on this list:
>
> 1. The historical development of the Dixieland style and band composition;
> and
> 2. The process of selecting from the options we have today to get the 
> sound
> that we and our audiences enjoy hearing (and are willing to pay for).
>
> What happened 100 years ago in New Orleans is fascinating. I love history,
> and it is both important and fun to know the story of how our music came 
> to
> be. However, today we have choices they didn't have then, and a whole
> different audience and social context in which we try to present that
> classic jazz for fun and profit and posterity. Unless we are doing 
> research
> or presenting a show about the history of the music, seems to me we can 
> and
> should work with what works best in today's situation without being too
> stuck in the supposed "original" mode. After all, how many of us actually
> play like ODJB or the early Louis unless we are specifically doing a
> historical re-creation of their sound?
>
> Being the young fellow that I am, I have no memory of the early jazz. I 
> was
> only born in 1952. I grew up occasionally hearing Louis or some of the big
> bands on TV or in the movies, who were still performing in the 60s. I
> remember Firehouse Five and the Dukes of Dixieland and Shakey's (usually
> only banjo and piano). My childhood recollections are of what many on this
> list would call commercialized rehashing of the original music. But for my
> generation, that version is more exciting and alive than many recordings
> I've heard of the original stuff, albeit I'm sure that was innovative and
> probably shocking for their generation.
>
> Trying to offer a competitive sound in today's world of synthesized and
> overamplified musical noise, where kids come and look for the power cord 
> on
> my trumpet and ask how many voices it has, doing ODJB is not likely to get
> us very far among audiences younger than 90 or so who want the nostalgia. 
> In
> a day where guitars and electrified string basses are commonplace and
> acoustic street bands are not, the banjo and tuba are a serious draw for
> both their appearance and their sound. And for the practical reasons of
> volume and punch mentioned by Larry W., they work nicely in the 
> unamplified
> setting.
>
> My band does fine with banjo and tuba as the rhythm section, without piano
> or drums, sometimes with a washboard. You can hear our 4 piece 
> configuration
> on You Tube -- links on my website. At this point we don't even want a 
> piano
> or drums. I do wish we could play more with a full front line (currently I
> double on trumpet and bone most of the time), and also a full time
> washboard/light percussion player, so we're not dependent on volunteers 
> from
> the audience, or on my putting down the horns and playing it for a solo
> myself. That would give us a 6 piece set-up, all unplugged and mobile, 
> that
> could handle just about any gig that we are likely to get.
>
> There is another band that I frequently play with called the Stompers, who
> have been around for 25 years or so, and are larger and more established
> than we are. They use piano and drums and bass (stand-up or tuba), and 
> banjo
> or guitar, sometimes both, and they have a full front line, sometimes even 
> 2
> clarinets or clarinet and soprano sax. For my money, the guitar doesn't 
> add
> that much to Dixieland, but it sounds great and is probably essential for
> swing. Each adds its own character to the mix -- sort of like salt and
> pepper (no racial overtones intended). A band who has both, or one player
> who plays both, will be able to produce a wider variety of jazz styles.
>
> So my thinking is that we need to find ways to bridge the gap between the
> classic style and our current audiences by giving due place to the
> contributions of the various revivals of Dixieland jazz, and making use of
> all the tools available to us today that weren't around then. Maybe we'll
> even generate our own revival for future generations of DJMLers to argue
> about in years to come.
>
> Happy New Year!
>
> Elazar
> Dr. Jazz Dixieland Band
> Tekiya Trumpet Ensemble
> Jerusalem, Israel
> www.israel.net/ministry-of-jazz
> +972-2-679-2537
>
>
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Larry Walton Entertainment - St. Louis
> [mailto:larrys.bands at charter.net]
> Sent: Friday, December 26, 2008 1:57 AM
> To: Steve Barbone; Bob Romans; dixielandjazz at ml.islandnet.com
> Subject: Re: [Dixielandjazz] Why guitar and not banjo?
>
>
> I really don't think you are entirely wrong Bob. IMHO I think it has
> everything to do with volume and money.  The larger the crowd and if you 
> are
> outside or not determines the volume you need.  Non amplified instruments
> have a limit and certain instruments have the ability to punch through
> naturally.   Each instrument commonly used has a lot of punch. 
> Instruments
> with no punch, like the flute, are never used.  As crowds got larger the
> guitar and upright bass couldn't compete outdoors and of course didn't fit
> into street bands very well.
>
> There is another factor that still plays a part today and that's economic.
> As things got tighter with a banjo player you could drop off the drummer 
> and
> you could lose the piano too especially outdoors.  Two fewer people in a
> band even makes a difference today.
>
> I think it made a lot of difference if the band was a street band or a 
> dance
> band as to what they used.  I tend to think more street band when I think
> Dixieland Band.
>
> Larry
> St. Louis
>
>
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