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Lester Young "Tickle Toe"

Lango-DjangoLango-Django Niagara-On-The-Lake, ONModerator
Regular readers will know that although I'm fond of Django and gypsy jazz, my musical enthusiasms are somewhat flaky and prone to range from Johnny Smith to Jimi Hendrix to forgotten tin pan alley jazz classics.

I guess I'm sort of an odd duck at this website, but who knows? My postings occasionally ring a bell with the commentariat. (Full disclosure: you'll find my name at the top or bottom of an awful lot of dead threads around here... :oops: )

Anyway... I play in a trio featuring a kick-ass clarinetist and sax player, and this is one of his favourite tunes to play. Written by jazz legend Lester Young, this a toughie for me on guitar for several reasons:

- the sax player likes it a painfully slow tempo, approx 80 bpm
- the key is a pretty tough one: Bbm
- there's no rhythm guitar, so when it's my turn to solo, I'm accompanied only by the bass and my left foot.

FWIW, I'm enclosing a lead sheet and a BIAB track of this tune. It's the kind of tune that would probably be pretty cool for GJ bands that feature a sax. Unfortunately, I could only get BIAB to play the melody with a synthesized "vibe" sound, so you'll have to imagine it's being played by a sax....

Will



Paul Cezanne: "I could paint for a thousand years without stopping and I would still feel as though I knew nothing."

Edgar Degas: "Only when he no longer knows what he is doing does the painter do good things.... To draw, you must close your eyes and sing."

Georges Braque: "In art there is only one thing that counts: the bit that can’t be explained."

Comments

  • FarfisaFarfisa New
    Posts: 9
    Hi Lango-Django,

    Tickle Toe is a great song. I got to know it from my guitar master. It's quiet tricky, when played at a fast tempo.

    Here's an intimate version from my master : )

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cesnOOUhro4

    Greetings
  • Lango-DjangoLango-Django Niagara-On-The-Lake, ONModerator
    Posts: 1,855
    That's a cool version... the guitarist is your "master"? (Are you his "slave"? :wink: )
    Paul Cezanne: "I could paint for a thousand years without stopping and I would still feel as though I knew nothing."

    Edgar Degas: "Only when he no longer knows what he is doing does the painter do good things.... To draw, you must close your eyes and sing."

    Georges Braque: "In art there is only one thing that counts: the bit that can’t be explained."
  • Nice version...for those into it Prez's version with Basie is pretty cool too.
    The Magic really starts to happen when you can play it with your eyes closed
  • FarfisaFarfisa New
    Posts: 9
    no, i'm not his slave. But teacher sounds too lame ; )
  • Acolyte perhaps
    The Magic really starts to happen when you can play it with your eyes closed
  • MatteoMatteo Sweden✭✭✭✭ JWC Modele Jazz, Lottonen "Selmer-Maccaferri"
    Posts: 393
    There's a good recording with Charlie Christian on guitar which perhaps could be useful as inspiration? It's a live broadcast from 1941 with a Lester Young band. It starts with a nice hot trumpet solo, then Charlie comes in with a wonderful thick electric tone and very bouncy and swinging lines. Prez plays a beautiful solo and they all round it off with two choruses of heavy riffing and short eight measure solos by Charlie and the trumpeter. It's worth checking out in any case! :D
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