| >My knowledge of Lenny is sketchy; he did a column for awhile for GP,
>played 7-string guitar at one point (I think?), died at an early age,
>and is frequently mentioned in interviews by other great players.
...Dan Gatton, to name but one. I'm afraid I can't tell you too much
about him, but you could probably do worse than check out old
interviews with DG in the various guitar magazines.
He must have been one hell of a player because, in addition to the
skills you mentioned, I recall Gatton waxing lyrical about his chord
playing ;-)
Dom
|
| I had a guitar teacher who met Lenny Breau a couple of times. After
Lenny's gig in Ottawa, they would go down to the teacher's house, with
Lenny coming along. All the top jazz guys in town would be over at the
teacher's house. About an hour into the get together, Lenny would ask
them if it was OK if he could play a few tunes. Of course, everyone
ther would say "no problem".
The teacher said he was a real genius on the guitar (he himself was
quite a player). The other interesting thing he mentioned about Lenny
is that he couldn't screw in a lightbulb if his life depended on it,
but could play guitar as well as he did (i.e. didn't have everyday
living skills). He was found dead in a swimming pool (suspicious
circumstances) and had a history of heroin addiction. I am pretty
sure he started out playing out of Winnipeg, Manitoba, CANADA and
Randy Bachman (BTO, Guess who) was one of his students. You can
here some of the jazz influence on Randy's playing on "She's
Come Undone" by the Guess Who (you won't here it on "Takin'
Care Of Business" by BTO). He was really adept at using artificial
harmonics in his playing. Anyway's, gotta go!
|
| I still have two examples of Lenny's collaboration work (both on LP....
*gasp!*):
1. On the LP "The Best Of Chet Atkins And Friends", he and Chet do
"Sweet Georgia Brown".....no one else, just the two of them with
electric guitars. Lenny does LOTS of his famous jazzy vamping +
melody work here. (BTW I have a photo in Chet's bio "Country
Gentleman" showing Chet and Lenny - Chet has a Country Gentleman and
Lenny has a Super Chet....*sigh*)
2. I have the Flying Fish LP "Minors Aloud" which he recorded (guess,
mid- to late 70's) with pedal steel guitarist Buddy Emmons. Some
very very nice jazz here - Lenny, Buddy, plus piano, drums and string
bass. Tracks include the title track, "Compared To What", "Killer
Joe", "A Long Way To Go" (which has Emmons playing steel with an E-Bow
at one point!), "Secret Love", "Scrapple From The Apple" and "Bach
Bouree". I especially love when Lenny and Buddy start trading licks
back and forth, as they do on "Secret Love" and "Scrapple" ... they
start to get really OUT there! ;^)
I'll hafta dig out the LP, fire up the turntable and listen again, I
guess ...
--Eric--
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| He was a disciple of Atkins and started his career playing very much in
that mode. I have his first two or three records and they show a strong
Chet influence. He did much nylon-string playing and often used a
7-string (with an added high string, unlike Van Eps).
Personal problems seemed to have derailed his career, though he was
starting to put it back together when he died (this sounds like a
familiar theme, doesn't it?).
Danny W.
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