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Topic: Ten feet from Genius - Jerry Douglas Impressions |
Andy Volk
From:
Boston, MA
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Posted 15 May 2024 12:10 pm |
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While looking for something else completely different, I found this old Res-Nation post of mine from 2009 about sitting just a few feet away from Jerry Douglas at a workshop:
"Last night at the Music Emporium in Lexington, MA. Jerry played a bunch of tunes and talked about and demonstrated the new Aura pedal. Here are a few observations ...
The man is preternaturally talented (but we all knew that already) and one of the nicest, most down-to-earth musicians I've met. This is almost universally true of Dobro and steel players I've found but not necessarily true of guitar players.
A lot of Jerry's style is based on rolls played with incredible precision and consistency and very canny use of open strings. Those famous hammer/pull flurries were there in abundance and amazing to see and hear up close. I noticed that there was incredible economy of movement in his left hand for those. The bar barely lifted above the strings, just enough to clear the strings but not more. His right hand attack was very strong with the heel of his hand constantly down on the bass strings. The flurries were a little faster and more accurate when his right hand was braced through the strap. When he played the shop's guitar sans strap, they were a little less controlled.
Jerry played Vince Guaraldi's "Christmas Time is Here" almost solely in single notes. It was an object lesson in tone production, not rushing a melody and in many extremely subtle bar inflections and in moving in and out of vibrato to express feeling in single-note playing. He uses rip strokes with great power to inflect a line and his overall control of dynamics to express feeling was very cool.
A lot of JDs playing is built around set arrangements of his original tunes rather than wild improvisation but he performs them slightly differently each time adding improvisational elements along the way. He said that "If you can't play the melody well you can't improvise around it."
I asked if he picked or palm block. He said he did both but never realized it until it was pointed out to him in teaching situations at workshops.
JD is human! He flubbed a few times but powered through. Once he acknowledged it verbally, once he smiled to himself and once few people caught it but the clam was there and a sly indication caught JD's face for a fleeting moment.
When he gets in a rut he likes to go on vacation and NOT take the Dobro and everything's fresher two week's later. Also, when the ideas aren't flowing, he goes back to playing as simply as possible even doing things like going back to his roots trying to play a Josh Graves tune note-for-note to sound exactly like Josh.
Jerry said people have no idea how hard he practiced to acquire the skills he has.
The Aura sounded great and colored the sound in beautiful ways but interestingly, when Jerry played his Beard a bit before he was plugged in, my impression was that even in his hands, the instrument sounded about as good as my Benoit and any number of high-end Dobros I've heard - definitely not life-changingly better. So as Jerry Byrd once said, "If you can play, it doesn't matter what guitar you've got. If you can't play, it doesn't matter what guitar you've got." I had the same impression seated three feat away from Bernie Greenhouse (one of the world's great cello players) playing Bach on his Strad. We get so caught up in chasing instruments but ultimately it's the musician we want to hear and who really makes this inanimate object sing.
I showed him my Tribo-Tone bullet bar and jerry held it and regarded it as if it were some strange object from another planet. Guess he was and always will be a rail bar man.
He talked about how hard the road is and how it really destroys some people as does the grueling session work he used to do but he retains an obvious joy in making music and playing and talking about the Dobro. It was an incredible privilege to see and hear him play so beautifully and expressively. It was an inspiring evening all around. "
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Steel Guitar Books! Website: www.volkmediabooks.com |
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John Harmon
From:
Virginia, USA
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Posted 15 May 2024 1:14 pm
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| Can only imagine |
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Sebastian Müller
From:
Berlin / Germany
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Joe Burke
From:
Toronto, Canada
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Posted 16 May 2024 6:34 am
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| Thanks for (re)posting Andy! I attended an afternoon with Jerry Douglas at ResoSummit. I don’t think I got the time with him that you did, but found him so confident and generous and so interested in our questions. It was a treat. |
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Joe A. Roberts
From:
Seoul, South Korea
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Posted 16 May 2024 8:24 am
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Thanks for sharing!
"If you can't play the melody well you can't improvise around it." - A lesson for the ages 
I also appreciate your arrangement of Mike Auldridge's Carolina Palms, I don't check the tablature section too much so I almost missed it. That is some hot stuff!
https://bb.steelguitarforum.com/viewtopic.php?t=400561 |
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Andy Volk
From:
Boston, MA
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Rich Arnold
From:
Tennessee, USA
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Posted 2 Jun 2024 12:48 pm
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| Jerry Douglas is my mentor. My style of playing is based on his, even though it may not sound like it sometimes. |
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