As you all may know, I attended the national bluegrass fiddle championship this last weekend and I must say that it was a lot of fun. I didn’t go to play old time fiddle tunes or bluegrass. I actually went to meet and play with all the jazz musicians that show up there every year. Among them were gypsy jazz musicians Larry Wyatt from Hood River, Oregon, Paul Anastasio from the early Pearl Django days and also Michael Valentiner from Minneapolis, Minnesota.
There were about 30 jazz guitarists between the ages of 30 and 60 at the event this year. I had a lot of fun jamming with some of these guys when they gave me a chance. Since most of them have been attending the fiddle contest for years they all have learned how to jam with each other in an almost magical way. They draw from a pool of around 200-400 jazz standards and every one of these guys can deduce the chords of a song merely by knowing the key and part of the melody. Its magical and its inspiring to me.
In watching this I think I have learned something very very important: Its not enough to just merely memorize songs, you also need to understand them from a jazz point of view and see and hear the patterns that occur in the songs that you play.
This is where I preach the importance of knowing and recognizing the ii – V – I and the ii – vi – V – I patterns, among others. I watched these guys use their knowledge of these patterns as a tool to adapt to ANY song. They were able to jump right in on the gypsy jazz tunes that I played and expand upon them greatly. It still leaves me in awe.