Arranging breakthrough! Sometimes less is indeed more.

[Andy Volk]

Man, It's been a long time since I've had a lap steel epiphany. For a few weeks, I've been struggling with an arrangement in DBGDBE (hi-low) of the old Dusty Springfield hit (also covered by everyone and their Grandma) Just a Little Lovin' Early in the Mornin'. I was inspired by Ted Green's cool version on Youtube.

The A section came to me instantly by ear - full blown, works great. The B section was a nightmare. I went to the sheet music, transcriptions of Ted's arrangement, online chord calculators, etc. and tied myself in knots trying to get all these full major 7th chords in the tune's bridge that don't really lie naturally in the tuning.

Then I finally remembered a nugget from my time studying online with jazz guitarist Martin Taylor ... to break things down to just the melody and baseline and then build from there. Suddenly, I didn't need full chords but just a few well placed bass notes and arpeggios to fill in. The whole thing came together in an hour. Sometimes I forget to not let the tuning play me. This was a good reminder to jettison my preconceived notions to find another way to the same end.

[Erv Niehaus]

Andy,
How very true. Usually those "fancy" jazz chords can be reduced to something simplier. After all, we're usually not playing all the notes in those chords, anyway, so reduce them to something managable.

[Ken Campbell]

For me, elegance is always minimalistic.

[Rusty Smith]

Man, It's been a long time since I've had a lap steel epiphany. For a few weeks, I've been struggling with an arrangement in DBGDBE (hi-low) of the old Dusty Springfield hit (also covered by everyone and their Grandma) Just a Little Lovin' Early in the Mornin'. I was inspired by Ted Green's cool version on Youtube.

The A section came to me instantly by ear - full blown, works great. The B section was a nightmare. I went to the sheet music, transcriptions of Ted's arrangement, online chord calculators, etc. and tied myself in knots trying to get all these full major 7th chords in the tune's bridge that don't really lie naturally in the tuning.

Then I finally remembered a nugget from my time studying online with jazz guitarist Martin Taylor ... to break things down to just the melody and baseline and then build from there. Suddenly, I didn't need full chords but just a few well placed bass notes and arpeggios to fill in. The whole thing came together in an hour. Sometimes I forget to not let the tuning play me. This was a good reminder to jettison my preconceived notions to find another way to the same end.

Funny how we all get these breakthroughs, sometimes even indirectly. I've been mainly an acoustic guitar player for decades. I saw Ted at McCabes in Santa Monica in the 70's. Took one look at his book Chord Chemistry and knew it was not for me. Decades later I noticed a used copy in a book store and picked it up. Figured after all those years I had a much better handle on theory and could work through it. Gave it away and figured jazz wasn't going to work for me. Another decade goes by and I'm back looking at jazz standards. This time from a gypsy jazz approach ala Django. I could understand 3 and 4 note and partial chords. It opened up the whole world of jazz in a new light. Full and big jazz chords may sound good but they are out for me. I still have a pamplet about the Freddie Green approach and one note chords. Now I am working on applying all of this to E9 pedal steel. I know C6 is the jazz neck but a double neck is too heavy and a universal more than I want to tackle right now. I've got an 8 string lapsteel in C6 and tune my reso to G6 for working on jazzier tunes. So the less is more has brought me many breakthroughs too and I expect more.