Scott Myers

11-28-11

Wes Montgomery

Wes Montgomery, perhaps more than any other guitar player in the history of jazz, left an

indelible and personal mark on the tradition and lineage of jazz guitar. Beside influencing his

contemporaries, he influenced and inspired countless great guitar players and musicians since, and

continues to be an important study in the tradition of jazz guitar. His lyrical melodic sensibility,

swinging, rock solid time feel and technical facility and innovations combined to make a musician

that both the general public and other musicians revered. It is testament to both his innate talent

and driving work ethic that a self-taught and relatively late-blooming musician was able to rise to

the highest levels of the jazz and pop world in a recording career that lasted barely more than a

decade. While his single-note work was exciting on its own, Montgomery's most obvious musical

contribution was the advancement of the technical vocabulary of jazz guitar through his mastery of

octaves and harmonized block-chord style improvisations. His unique and personal approach to

the guitar, which was largely a product of his self-informed learning and unorthodox technique,

formed a inseperable bond with his warm personality and projected a relaxed, inviting yet

sophisticated and interesting musical style that musicians and non-musicians both gravitated

towards. In addition, his technique of playing with his thumb lent a warm, rhythmic, unique and

huge sound to his guitar, something that guitarists have been attempting to reproduce ever since, It

would be fair to say that his tone alone influenced the sound of jazz guitar permanently.
 Background

Wes Montgomery was born March 6th, 1923, Indianapolis, Indiana, and minus a brief stint

in California, would live there until his death of a heart attack in 1968. He married early, and

would eventually go on to have 7 children with his wife Serene. Montgomery was a hard working

family man, and for much of his life he held down a day job while learning and performing music.

He was also known to be fairly straight laced, particularly for a jazz musician, so much so that his

his band mates on the Lionel Hampton band nicknamed him Rev (or Reverend). His was a

musical family, and three of the Montgomery brothers went on to be professional musicians: Wes

himself, Monk on bass (who would become known as one of the first jazz bassists to focus solely

on electric bass), and Buddy (vibes and piano). His earliest experience with a guitar was at the age

of 12 or 13, when his brother Monk bought him a 4-string tenor guitar (a slightly smaller guitar

with only four strings). By all accounts, Montgomery enjoyed playing with the guitar, but didn't

take it extremely seriously. Popular folklore holds that he first picked up the guitar at the age of

19 or 20, but he already had some formative experience on the tenor guitar at that point. It was

about that time that Wes heard Charlie Christian on record, and decided that he wanted to purchase

a 6 string guitar and amplifier. In the liner notes to the box set The Genius of Wes

Montgomery, he describes buying his first electric guitar after hearing Christian: Christian got

me all messed up. I didn't play at all then so he got me into it. I liked his sound and approach so

well that I said I'll buy me a brand new guitar and amplifier and I can do it, because he's

probably playing an old one. I thought all you had to do was get an instrument, put your hands on

it and it would come out right. I didn't know about any of the fundamentals or nothing. As he

freely admits, he was hired for his first professional gig solely to play Charlie Christian's solos
note-for-note at a local club in Indianapolis. According to him, he would play the solos, then lay

out for the rest of the song. He also mentioned that it was then that he began to learn about song

structure, harmony, and musical conventions, with the guidance of the other musicians in the band,

who no doubt recognized his talent and desire to learn. During the early 40's, he played a variety

of local gigs and some small tours, but nothing that really panned out financially or allowed him to

play music for a full-time living. In 1948, Lionel Hampton hired him to go on tour with him, in a

band that also included well known musicians Fats Navarro and Charles Mingus. Unfortunately,

Montgomery left the band after two years because he wanted to spend more time with his growing

family. In his words: what I wanted to do didn't matter as much as what I had to do, a statement

that nicely illustrates that he thought of himself first as a father, husband and man and second as a

musician, something that is definitely somewhat of a rarity in the universe of stellar musicians. In

later interviews, Montgomery said that he felt that a some of his best playing was done during the

period he spent Lionel Hampton and the years immediately following. When he returned to

Indianapolis, he embarked on an incredibly grueling work and gig schedule that had him working a

day job in the factory in the early morning and playing two gigs per night at two well known

Indianapolis nightspots first the Turf Bar and then Missile Room. Incredibly, he kept that

schedule going for approximately 6 years. It was at the Missile Room, an not-entirely legal after-

hours night spot in an African-American neighborhood in Indianapolis that Nat and Cannonball

Adderly first heard him perform, sparking the beginning of his fruitful recording career with

Riverside Records. Nat and Cannonball were in town on tour with George Shearing, and had

heard over and over that they had to go check out the amazing guitar player in town. They were so

struck by Montgomery's playing that they returned to New York and practically demanded that

Riverside producer Orrin Keepnews sign Montgomery. Apparently, they were so excited about his

playing that they walked to a gas station to call Keepnews at 3 or 4am, but were stopped because it
was all locked up and no phone was available. Keepnews heeded their advice, flew to

Indianapolis, and signed Montgomery on the spot, after hearing him play his usual two late night

gigs. Montgomery's first album as a leader with Riverside was The Wes Montgomery Trio, a

Dynamic New Sound: Guitar, Organ, Drums, released 1959 and featuring Wes and his working

trio from Indianapolis, drummer Paul Parker and organist Mel Rhyne. It was an immediate hit

among jazz musicians and critics, and was followed by a second album entitled The Incredible

Jazz Guitar of Wes Montgomery, earning him Down Beat's New Star award in 1960. He would

go on to win Down Beat's award for best jazz guitarist 6 times between 1960-67. He had an

incredibly productive and fruitful recording career with Riverside, generally agreed to be some of

his strongest recorded musical outings, but Riverside was forced to go out of business in 1964.

During his time at Riverside, he recorded with Tommy Flanagan, Tootie and Percy heath, Sam

Jones, Bobby Timmons, Nat and Cannonball Adderly, Victor Feldman, Harlold Land, Ray Brown,

his brothers Buddy and Monk, Ron Carter, George Shearing, Milt Jackson, Wynton Kelly Johhny

Griffin, Jimmy Cobb and countless others. Quite an admirable list for a self-taught musician who

didn't release an album as a leader until the age of 37.

Following the demise of Riverside records, Montgomery entered into what could be called

his commercial period, starting with a two year stint with Verve records, where he mostly

recorded albums that featured his guitar playing layered on top of brass and string orchestras. Jazz

critics lambasted him pretty fiercely for the more pop-oriented direction of the records, but

Montgomery was defiant. In an interview with Bill Quinn, published in Down Beat in 1968, he

had this to say: Those who criticize me for playing jazz too simply and such are missing the point.

When I first came up big on the Billboard charts they couldn't decide whether to call me a a jazz

artist or a pop artist. I think I originated a new category, something like 'Jazz-Pop' artist. There is

a different direction on my records these days; there is a jazz concept to what I'm doing, but I'm
playing popular music and it should be regarded as such. Of utmost importance as well is the

fact that Montgomery was by that point a full-time musician supporting a family of 8, and while

his straight-ahead jazz records were well received and critically acclaimed, they were not making a

lot of money. He was righteously defensive about his right to do what he needed to do to make a

good living and provide for his family. During this period he continued to play straight ahead jazz

with his small groups, and put out several jazz albums, including two with the famous organ player

Jimmy Smith, and infamous Smokin' at the Half Note, one of the acclaimed and well known jazz

guitar records ever. Smokin' at the Half Note included Wynton Kelly on piano, Paul Chambers

on bass and Jimmy Cobb on drums, and was partially recorded live at the Half Note club in NYC,

and partially in a studio. It is regarded by many as the best recorded example of his explosive and

captivating live playing. In an an interview with Jim Ferguson published in JazzTimes in 1995, Pat

Metheny described his feelings about the album: One of my pet peeves is that people say Wes sold

out, but his later records are some of my favoites. The one I recommend most highly is Smokin' At

the Half Note. I can sing every note played by Wes, Wynton Kelly, Paul Chambers, and Jimmy

Cobb. If You Could See Me Now is the greatest guitar solo ever played, including anything by

Jimi Hendrix, Robert Johnson or anybody else....

The right place, the right time, the right sound.

The mid 1950's and early 1960's was a particularly fertile time for jazz guitar. A strong

wave of guitarists following in the footsteps of Charlie Christian were bringing the guitar to a more

prominent and acknowledged role in the jazz world. Among others, Tal Farlow, Jimmy Raney, Jim

Hall, Barney Kessel, Herb Ellis, Joe Pass, Johhny Smith and Kenny Burrel were well known

players who were elaborating and improving on Charlie Christian's innovations and propelling the

guitar into a legitimate vehicle for bebop and post-bebop improvisation. It was into this already
crowded field that Montgomery was propelled with his Riverside recordings. Great company

indeed, yet Montgomery managed to rise to the top and is almost universally recognized as one of

the most influential jazz guitarists of all time. While his contemporaries clearly had their own

personal style and approach, his sound, innovative technique and prowess was something

altogether new, exciting and totally different. That uniqueness, his undeniable talent, and the

progress his talented contemporaries were making to put jazz guitar on the map and in the

consciousness of jazz listeners combined to make him the right person, in the right place, with the

right sound to create an instantaneous and lasting impression on the music world.

Technical Innovations:

The Thumb

While Wes Montgomery was probably not the first person to play guitar solely with his

thumb, and while a handful of well known jazz guitarists since play with a combination of fingers

and thumb, his technical facility was incredible. Generally speaking, guitarists that don't use a

pick play with a combination of their fingers and one or more fingers, allowing them to alternate

fingers and play more rapidly. Montgomery did not; rather, he relied on an almost impossibly

rapid down-stroke with his thumb, some (less powerful) upstrokes and a combination of slurs with

his left hand to play very cleanly. Orrin Keepnews described seeing the thumb in action during

that first visit to Indianapolis to hear Montgomery: I was able to get a bar stool almost directly in

front of Wes, and it was really only a matter os seconds before I realized that I was listening to

something truly different. Physically, my still-vivid recollection is of the thumb, moving so fast on

the first uptempo number that (despite the fact that my vision tested at 20/20 in those days) it

literally blurred before my eyes. His unorthodox technique was somewhat of and somewhat due

to his innocence as to what was normal technique. As the story goes, Montgomery started out

playing with a pick at the same time he bought his first amplifier and guitar, around the age of 20,
but the sound of his practicing was annoying his neighbors and wife, so he switched to using his

thumb. In his own words, from an interview with Valerie Wilmer published in Jazz Monthly in

1965: ...After two months my wife came to the door and asked me would I kindly turn that thing

off... ..So I laid my pick down on the amplifier and just fiddled around with the thumb. I said is

that better? Oh yes, she says, that's better.. Of course there is the possibility that the story was

embellished or even invented, but he never went back to playing with a pick, feeling more natural

playing with his thumb. This is one of the resounding and important aspects of Montgomery's

story: his sound, his fame and his music were a unique product of a highly talented musical

mind and a complete lack of preconception about what technique and music should be.

Montgomery himself said as much: ..I didn't really select the thumb. That just came

accidentally. You see, at the time, after I had accepted the fact that I was going to play with my

thumb, it was still for my own amusement. If I had decided to be a professional musician, I'd have

gone right to the pick. Though the use of his thumb was certainly not the single most important

aspect of his sound it gave him a unique and instantly identifiable sound, helping to propel him out

of the nucleus of other fine jazz guitarists that were his contemporaries. Imagine, if he had taken

lessons from a young age or been more exposed to proper technique, he would have in all

likelihood played with a pick. Had he played with a pick, would he have developed his octaves

and chord melody technique to the extent he did and would he have been unique enough to create

the buzz that he did? It is highly likely that he would not have. Perhaps the most important aspect

of his unique picking technique was the warm, resonant sound that he achieved with his thumb.

When compared to recordings of his contemporaries, it is immediately apparent how different and

big his sound was. Using the flesh of the thumb allows the guitar to sound both mellow and

clear. Without the harsh attack of a hard material against the string, the listener hears the metallic

brightness of the string, but the overall timbre of the instrument is much more mellow than a guitar
played with a pick. Jazz guitarists ever since have been influenced by his warm sound, and the

somewhat muted sound of guitarists like Pat Metheny definitely owes a great deal to the search for

a way to imitate that sound while playing with a pick.

Octaves

While other guitar players, most notably Django Reinhardt had used octaves in their playing

before Montgomery, he took his mastery of it to a new level of technical skill. Octaves, though not

hard in and of themselves to finger, are notoriously hard to move around cleanly and quickly. They

require the guitarist to move the left hand much, much more than usual, and keep the fingers that

are fretting the notes of the octave locked in place while doing so. The sound is at once more

exciting and mellow, lending an added lyrical quality to the music, probably in part due to the fact

that it is hard to play too fast! Countless guitarists have imitated his octave style, and it is really a

part of jazz guitar vernacular at this point. Unfortunately and erroneously, many people associate

the sound of a octaves with smooth jazz. It's definitely worth noting that even a man of Wes'

natural talent had to spend countless hours working on his technique here is an excerpt from an

interview with Ralph J. Gleason that was published in Guitar Player Magazine: ...like I said it

takes so much time to develop all your technique. Say if you wanted to play a chord like you

would a melodic phrase, there's no telling how long it would take you to do it. I used to have

headaches every time I played octaves, because it was extra strain, but the minute I'd quit I'd be all

right..

Chord Soloing:

In much the same way that he took playing octaves to a new level, Montgomery's approach

to chord melody soloing was above and beyond what his contemporaries were doing. Like

playing melodies in octaves, improvising solos with block style chords on the guitar is technically

very demanding, requiring the left hand to not only move rapidly and accurately but to change
fingering as well. Of course, other guitarists were using similar techniques in their recordings, but

for the most part that was confined to the melody statement of tunes, with single-note solos taking

over for the improvising. It is very interesting to note that for the most part, he stuck with fairly

stock chord voicings, and created musical interest with a combination of clear and catchy melodic

lines on top of the chords and an incredibly advanced sense of rhythm. As with all jazz

musicians, he used and reused similar phrases when improvising with chords, but his innate sense

of melody and swing, nothing sounded recycled or tired.

Incredible Musicality:

It is an interesting question to ask what set Wes Montgomery apart from other guitarists and

made him so popular among both musicians and non-musicians alike. While his technical

innovations of playing octaves and chord melody solos definitely separated him from the pack, he

was still playing the same old six-string electric guitar as everyone else, limited to the same notes

and five fingers in the left hand... The answer is not a technical one, or anything rooted in music

theory or analysis, but rather that he played and improvised in a very natural, non-contrived, lively

way that instantly connected to the listener, whether the listener was a jazz critic, musician or

average Joe. Several elements of that natural musicality can be extracted: his melodic lyricism,

unique time feel, percussive rhythmic sense, his call-and-response with himself in his

improvisations, and his technique of building his solos in three tiers (single notes, octaves,

chords). It is of huge importance to note and understand that his unusual development,

technique and ultimately, his personality played pivotal roles in his musicality had he not been

self taught, had he played with a pick, and had his personality not been so warm and generous

as a person, his music would not have had that same connection with both musician and

layman.

Melodic Lyricism
 Wes Montgomery's improvisations and original compositions have a unique sing-song

quality to them. Not in the sense that they are simple or rudimentary, but in the sense that they feel

easy to sing along with and listen to. They engage the listener, and draw him into a feeling that he

is participating with the music, rather than just passively listening. While these qualities can be

hard to define and describe, there is a definite feel when listening to Montgomery, that every note

is what you wanted to hear, even the surprises. The shape and contour of his melodic lines, the

places where he rests and of course the physical technique the he employed his thumb picking

plus a lot of slurs and ghosted notes from his left hand all combine to make a personal style that is

instantly recognizable and accessible. A similar melodic lyricism can be found in the playing of

many musicians who are recognized as innovators on their instrument and gained popularity with

the general public Charlie Parker, Miles Davis, John Coltrane in his earlier years, and of course

Montgomery's biggest influence, Charlie Christian.

The guitar is not an instrument that lends itself to that melodic, vocal-like quality that

Montgomery possessed. It is an instrument that CAN be played rapidly, but GENERALLY

SPEAKNG only after many years of practicing technical and scalar exercises, something that tends

to creep into many guitarists personal style. Most guitar players occasionally play things that they

don't necessarily hear, but rather are conveniently available in muscle memory, and when a

musician is trained formally, a lot of those convenient phrases and idiosyncracies tend to sound

somewhat forced compared to a complete ear player like Montgomery. When you compare

Montgomery's recordings to those of his guitar contemporaries, that sense that he is hearing and

mentally singing everything he is playing is very obvious and clear. While Montgomery probably

did spend some time practicing scales and other technical exercises, the vast majority of his

practice and experience came on the bandstand.

Fascinating Rhythm
 In equal measure to his incredible melodic sense, Montgomery possessed an infectious and

swinging rhythmic sense. When listening to his recordings it seems like every note is right where

he wants it to be; right in the pocket. Even the up-tempo recordings, where he was playing right at

the limit of his technical ability are clean, swinging and fun to listen to. Very occasionally flubbed

notes might come out, but the listener never gets the feeling that he is struggling technically or that

he is not perfectly aware of where the time is; something that is somewhat rare in guitarists.

Guitarists often suffer from sloppy or awkward time, mainly because of the technical reality of the

guitar in order for one note to be played, both the fretting hand (that holds down the strings) and

the picking hand need to be perfectly coordinated and working together. As the tempo speeds up,

small errors in coordination get compounded and the time feel tends to get shaky. Montgomery

didn't seem to be at all affected by that common ailment, but stayed rock-solid seemingly 100% of

the time. Perhaps he did struggle with that issue during the early years of his playing experience,

but the combination of a innate sense of time and his years of playing multiple gigs per night

combined to give him one of the most solid, swinging time feels in the history of the instrument.

In addition to his incredible time feel, Montgomery had a unique technique of inserting ghosted

notes and percussive effects (via slurs with his left hand and strumming with his right hand while

muting the strings) into his playing, which both added interest to his playing and made his style

even more instantly recognizable.

Call-and-response and the one-man-big-band

While Wes shouldn't be classified as a blues-based player, he certainly had a natural blues

element to his playing, particularly in the way that he often set up repeated motifs and answered

himself in his improvisations. In much in the same way, the lyrics and melodies of blues tunes

often repeat one phrase several times before answering it. He was particularly adept at using

octaves and chord stabs to accompany himself while improvising, often using a repeated rhythm or
melodic fragment. Again, this is something that immediately grabs the listener and invites them in

to the music to participate in the music and the experience, rather than just passively allowing the

music to wash over them. The importance of this concept in Montgomery's music can't be

overstated.

Montgomery's first touring job with a well known musician was with Lionel Hampton's big

band, and he was known to say that he thought some of his best playing was done in that setting.

The experience of playing in that big band must have really soaked into his musical personality,

because he could sound like a one-man big band at times. He punctuated his solos with chordal

stabs and repeated riffs, much like a brass section would in a big band, and often structured his

solos in a progressively more exciting three-tiered progression of single-notes, octaves and finally

block chords; much like a big band arrangement builds tension and excitement. As with his octave

and block chord techniques, this was another totally innovative and original concept of his, and yet

another reason why he stood out so exceptionally amongst a strong crop of jazz guitarists working

at that time.

Parting words:

Wes Montgomery's all-too-short time on this earth was a watershed moment for jazz guitar.

In the same sense that Django Reinhardt and Charlie Christian advanced the status and technique

of jazz guitar, Wes Montgomery . In a particularly fertile moment in the time line of jazz guitar,

already crowded field of jazz guitarists that are still recognized as greats today, Wes Montgomery

brought an entirely fresh and innovative approach to the guitar and pushed it's technical

possibilities further than anyone thought possible. During his recording career as a leader, which

encompassed less than a decade, Montgomery made a collection of recordings that changed the

nature of jazz guitar permanently. His technical innovations his thumb technique, octaves and

improvised chord solos completely changed people's idea about what was possible on the guitar.
His work in both straight ahead and the pop-jazz idioms is still referred to as a almost requisite

study, and he could practically be called the father of modern jazz guitar and (inadvertently)

smooth jazz. Perhaps equally as important, he was a man who put his family first, a man who was

revered and loved by friends, family and fellow musicians for being humble and affable, and those

qualities are reflected in his music. All too often musical genius seems to go hand in hand with

personal narcissism, addiction and psychological instability, but Montgomery was one of the rare

people that was able to be a good human being and a good musician at the same time.