Allan Holdsworth - Guitar Techniques

8/20/2019 Allan Holdsworth - Guitar Techniques

http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/allan-holdsworth-guitar-techniques 1/682 December 2015

LESSON } JAZZ

Zappa and Shawn Lane loved him. Frank

Gambale calls him the ‘Grandmaster’

and other famous guitarist fans include

Eddie Van Halen, Kurt Rosenwinkel,

John McLaughlin, Greg Howe, Joe Satriani

and Yngwie Malmsteen. Holdsworth is a

special artist, with a unique approach to

music and one of the most recognisable

sounds from the late 60s to the present day.

Born in 1946 in Bradford, Yorkshire,

Holdsworth’s pianist father encouraged him

to practise and, with remarkable discipline, he

set about learning to play entirely by himself.

Inuenced by artists such as saxophonist

John Coltrane, he determined to sound

entirely like himself and worked out a

personal approach to creating music, with

improvisation and harmony at the core.

Allan’s illustrious career began with jazz

crossover groups such Tempest,

Igginbottom’s Wrench, Gong, Soft Machine,

Jean-Luc Ponty, Bill Bruford and Tony

Williams’ Lifetime. This led to a career as a

bandleader; each new release awaited by his

fans and live performances attaining almost

mythical status.

Holdsworth has access to a sophisticated

vocabulary that is steeped in the tradition of

jazz but is undeniably his own. We’re looking

at his soloing style here; we’ll leave the other

huge components of his playing to a later date.

Our nine examples should form the basis

of your research into his style. They are mostlyin common time signatures and based around

relatively conventional sequences. His

compositions are often hugely polyrhythmic,

so removing this aspect from our studies

allows us to concentrate on note selection,

their groupings and the articulation required

to execute them cleanly. Your challenges are

timing, projection and intonation. Allan

employs a largely legato approach, so avoid

rushing and any sloppy rhythms, especially at

fast tempo. As his technique employs lots of

hammer-ons and pull-offs, you’ll need to

balance the volume of picked and slurred

notes. You might need to de-emphasise the

pick volume, although Holdsworth has

developed this skill to a degree that he canplace an accent at any point, on any nger

within a urry of notes. The nal

consideration is intonation, especially with

regard to the use of light strings and

performing pull-offs. Make sure you’re not

unintentionally bending as you pull, as this

will drag the notes undesirably sharp.

IT TAKES MAYBE

A COUPLE OF YEARS

BEFORE SOMETHING

I’M WORKING ON NOW

WILL FIND ITS WAY

OUT NATURALLY

Allan Holdsworth

Allan HoldsworthJohn Wheatcroft looks at the soloing styleof a legendary and totally unique guitarist: the phenomenal Yorkshireman, Allan Holdsworth.

Allan Holdsworthwith his CarvinFatboy signature

TRACK RECORD Tales From The Vault, a compilation of unreleased tracks funded by an online Pledge campaign is awaited with baitedbreath. I.O.U (Enigma 1985) features breathtaking playing and beautiful compositions; The DVD, Allan Holdsworth and Alan Pasqua – LiveAt Yoshi’s (Wienerworld 2008), featuring Jimmy Haslip and Chad Wackerman, is great too, as are Sand, Metal Fatigue and.

Holdsworth’s overdriven lead tone is full

bodied, with a smattering of reverb, more

recently delay, and with a pronounced

mid-range bias. Go easy on the gain, as the

fluidity of his tone is a product of his accurate

legato technique and too much distortion

adversely affects both dynamics and changes

the vowel sound of a sustaining note.

GAIN BASS MIDDLE TREBLE REVERB

76 5 5

4

ABILITY RATING

Advanced

Key: VariousTempo: VariousCD: TRACKS 73-90

Info Fluency and articulation Technique and timing Melodic sophistication

Will improve your…

✪✪✪✪✪

NEXT MONTH John looks at the jazz playing of

another legato master,Tim Miller

C L A Y T O N C A L L / G E T T Y I M A G E S


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SUBSCRIBE TO THEDIGITAL EDITION OF

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LLAN HOLDSWORTH LEARNINGZONE

EXAMPLE 9 STRAIGHT 16THS OVER A SWING GROOVE

Another Eb9 chord backing but this time some snakey 16th-note action on the top two strings (bars 4-5 especially). With harmonically varied playing like this, see

what ‘inside’ and ‘outside’ notes tie in with the Eb9 chord. Most interesting!

ON THE CD TRACKS 73-90

CD TRACK 89

Allan Holdsworth - Guitar Techniques

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