I was listening to the Los Angeles Guitar Quartet today, and it got me thinking about how great guitars can sound together with no accompaniment by other types of instruments. There is an organic sound to a band of guitars. It creates a natural and pleasant collection of tones that would be impossible to replicate any other way.
So why don’t we have more guitar orchestras? Or, as I shall now call them, gorchestras?
I mean, think about it… 90% of all the musicians I know are guitarists. So why is it that we spend our time fighting over the few drummers and bassists in town and don’t just go make something happen on our own? And when we do participate in guitar-only jams, it becomes quickly clear that we don’t really know how guitars should support one another. Generally it is two guitarists playing the same chords, sometimes in different positions if they are especially creative, and one or the other occasionally ripping out a solo. Not that there’s anything wrong with that – Lord knows I’ve spent many a happy hour jamming in just that fashion – but there is so much more possible.
I think the problem here is a lack of education. Trumpet players are taught how to play together. Violinists understand the ways their parts of piece relate to the whole.
As guitarists, we don’t get that education. Most of us are literally too cool for school and don’t have any formal musical education at all, let alone orchestral training. Maybe that is why we sometimes put our part in the song above the song itself.
The whole essence of an orchestra is to use multiple instruments to build something grander that any one instrument could accomplish on its own. I want to figure out how to do that with my fellow guitarists. I want to do more than just double my buddy’s part in a higher octave and count the bars until my next lead. I want to learn how to fuse guitar parts together in a new and interesting way. But I am not sure where or how to begin my journey.
Any suggested listening of bands that really do something interesting with multiple guitars?
Until next week, who wants to start a gorchestra?
Bliss out.
- PT
4 comments:
They're not really a gorchestra, but there's a band out of Birmingham called Maylene and the Sons of Disaster that rocks 3 guitars. They're a "southern metalcore" band, but they have a pretty interesting way of layering their 3 guitars to acheive massive chords with noodling on top. The way they layer their sound just makes it sound huge as opposed to all three guys beating out exactly the same thing... Check out their albums II and III.
There's plenty of good multi-guitar music out there. Rodrigo y Gabriella have contrasting styles that fill out the sound. Not pure guitar, but the Fripp/Belew combination in King Crimson blow my mind.
Robert Fripp formed the League of Crafty Guitarists based on courses he ran using his own tuning, but I've not heard much of their work.
Maybe some guitarists are egotists who don't like to share the limelight. I'm more interested in finding some sort of ensemble to work on interesting arrangements.
It's shocking just how much space is filled in Rodrigo Y Gabriella. It's awesome stuff, stuff I could never imagine playing!
I don't know about the whole "education" thing... I think it's just the way a guitar sounds. Sometimes it's nice and refreshing to hear an acoustic guitar version of a song, but I think over time a band with only a couple guitars would get really obnoxious. This one time I saw this "band" play a few songs and they only had an electric guitar and a singer....and it was god awful. Bass and drums frame the guitar really nicely. Violins and trumpets have a different quality of sound.
Post a Comment