Named
after the uptown Manhattan neighborhood where he lives, Greg Skaff’s
East Harlem Skyline takes the best of ‘60s instrumental
guitar jazz and brings it up to date with style. Skaff sounds clearly
influenced by the best guitarists in jazz, namely cats like Wes Montgomery
and George Benson and on East Harlem Skyline he’s got
the guitars, the sound and the band to help him realize his modern
jazz vision. Skaff made a lot of guitar fans happy with his 2004 Zoho
CD, Ellington Boulevard, and on his 2009 album East Harlem
Skyline he brings it up a notch. Featured along with the six Skaff
originals are fresh takes on classic originals by jazz giants Wayne
Shorter and Billy Strayhorn. And although his background is guitar
jazz, Skaff’s not afraid to add in a left field cover, like the
set closing “Fast As You Can,” written by pop chanteuse
Fiona Apple. Full liner notes, great cover art (complete with 3-D
insert) and track by track notes by the guitarist add much to the
great studio sound of the CD. Take the A train uptown and be prepared
to groove along with Greg Skaff’s East Harlem Skyline. www.GregSkaff.com
/ www.ZohoMusic.com
MUSIC
WEB EXPRESS 3000 presents Guitars Center Stage with Greg Skaff
Guitarists making waves in the music world, their new recordings and
gear!
Musical Background
I’ve
been playing about 35 years. I started in high school when I was fascinated
with the British rock groups, i.e., Led Zeppelin, and also with blues
and soul music. I liked what the guitar was doing in those contexts
and that was the kind of music my first band played. I didn’t
know anything about jazz at the time. I first heard jazz because the
keyboard player’s father had a record collection and we would
listen to some of his records. I remember hearing Charlie Parker’s
“She Rote” and thinking it must be Dixieland music because
it sounded so happy. That’s how little I knew about jazz. A little
while later I was turned on to the George Benson recording “It’s
Uptown” by organist Mike Finnigan, who was somewhat of a mentor
to my first band. Mike had been to New York and had recorded Electric
Ladyland with Jimi Hendrix. When I first heard George Benson I
didn’t know you could do anything like that with a guitar. About
this time I heard Lou Donaldson’s group with Lonnie Smith, and
Jack McDuff’s group. There was a club in town that used to bring
in those groups and others like the Three Sounds w/ Gene Harris. This
was happening in Wichita, Kansas. I also used to go hang out with
a girlfriend at a little roadside cocktail bar where a guy named Jay
McShann played and sang. We had no idea of his historical significance
at the time. We were simply fascinated by his playing and singing.
Sometimes he would sing country songs. That’s what it was like
when I started playing guitar. I started learning jazz by dropping
the needle over and over again on records, (yes, records).
New
CD
My new CD is titled East Harlem Skyline.
That’s the neighborhood where I live and the cover photo was
taken on the roof of my apartment building. I recorded it in November
2007 and March 2008 at Avatar Studios and One East Recording here
in New York. Nine out of the ten songs were done the first day. Most
of it is an organ trio, one of my favorite instrumental configurations,
with George Colligan playing B3 and E.J. Strickland playing drums.
There’s one cut featuring a different group made up of George
Laks on organ, Darryl Jones on bass, and Charley Drayton on drums.
There is also a solo guitar version of Billy Strayhorn’s “Lotus
Blossom.” I think this recording shows different sides of my
playing without being incongruous. Besides the solo guitar piece,
there are six songs of my own, one by George Colligan, one by Wayne
Shorter, and a Fiona Apple song. I play straight into the amp for
most of the recording, but on a couple of tracks there’s a more
overdriven sound.
Favorite
Guitars
I don’t really have a favorite guitar.
If my house, or rather apartment, was burning down and I had to grab
one guitar I would probably wind up getting barbecued. Because first
I would grab my Byrdland, and then I would remember my Sergio Abreu
nylon string, then I would remember that I have a 1962 Fender Stratocaster
in the closet, and by then it probably wouldn’t matter anyway.
Anyway, I played mostly my Byrdland on the recording. It’s only
about six years old but it’s pretty much my “go to”
guitar. It has an L5 neck so the neck is 24 3/4 scale instead of the
shorter scale that a Byrdland usually has. On a couple of cuts I played
a recently made D’Angelico guitar called a Limited Edition DC.
That’s one of the Japanese D’Angelico’s that were made
by Vestax in recent years. It’s kind of like a 335 except that
the fingerboard is ebony and the top is spruce. For amps I used a
1963 Fender Deluxe reverb and a Divided by 13 combo amp called a 13/29.
I set my guitars up with .12 gauge Thomastik-Infeld strings, flat-wound
on the Byrdland and round-wound on the D’Angelico. I have a Gibson
ES-355 also that I use a lot. I like comfortable action but not too
low. That way when you get warmed up and you start playing a little
harder the strings don’t fret out. I also feel that with a little
higher action you can get more nuance and dynamics. There are a couple
of pedals I use when I want some dirt. One is an Xotic Effects AC
Plus. The other is called a Power Screamer, which is made by a company
called Home Brew Electronics.
Musical
Influences
There are so many people that have picked up
a guitar and done something phenomenal with it that I could never
pick a favorite. That being said, my biggest influence on guitar is
without a doubt Wes Montgomery. His playing is like a suit that never
goes out of style (even though I only own one suit) and it’s
hard for me to single out one recording of his. Right now on my night
stand there’s an Art Blakey recording called Free For All,
which has been one of my favorites for years. There’s also Alice
Coltrane’s Translinear Light, Fiona Apple’s When
The Pawn…, and a recording of the guitar works of Heitor
Villa-Lobos by a guitarist named Turibio Santos. I’m really into
the guitar etudes of Villa-Lobos right now.
Web Site
My
web site address is: www.gregskaff.com
Email is: greg@gregskaff.com
National Media Contact: www.jazzpromoservices.com
