Grant Green Day

ALR

I'm on the sofa for the whole day (possibly two) recovering from a minor hospital procedure, and to pass the time I've decided to listen to all 14 of my Grant Green records.

I got into Green about 10 years ago quite randomly. I'd seen an ES330 for sale in my local guitar shop and considered buying it. While researching who else had played this guitar, Green's name kept cropping up so I gave 'Idle Moments' a try. I liked it and then got boxed set on CD of some of his other records. I'd never listened to Jazz before but it opened up a whole new world for me and has led my to getting into a lot of the Blue Note stuff from the 1960s including Herbie Hancock, Lee Morgan and Kenny Burrel as well as Miles Davis and a few others.

I keep coming back to Grant Green and I've decided to try and get all his albums as a band leader on Blue Note vinyl (doesn't matter if they're original or represses, they've just got to have the blue note label) as well as some where he's a sideman.

Just wondering who else on the forum is a fan?

DrCornelius

Big fan but only have a couple of albums - nowhere near your level !  I have always been a fan of George Bensons playing too, long before I discovered GG.  It makes sense as I read recently that GG was George's biggest influence guitar wise.

digitalkettle

Damn, thought this was a bebop/pop-punk collab ;-/

It's definitely the answer to an Only Connect 'missing vowels' question.

jdgm

Me. 

Grant Green was a truly excellent player; Blue Note kept recording him and other leaders kept booking him for their sessions.  Have you heard (for instance) "Search For The New Land" by Lee Morgan? 

I don't have as many as you.  "The Latin Bit" is great, "Grantstand" and "Solid" too - there are lots but I think my favourite is "Street Of Dreams".

ALR

I've just finished "Solid" and now I've got "Alive!" on. Well funky.

jdgm said:

  Have you heard (for instance) "Search For The New Land" by Lee Morgan?  

I bought it three years ago to and to my shame it's not been played. I think I was intending to save it for a special occasion because it's got both Herbie Hancock and Grant Green on it, as well as obviously Lee Morgan who is one of my other favourite guys. I may as well put it on tomorrow when I move onto Herbie and Lee Morgan.I don't know if you've ever heard Cornbread, but the title track is one of my favourite Jazz tunes.

I tend to prefer his earlier stuff, but now I've put a few of the funkier ones from the late 60s/early 70s on it can't be denied!

I got The Latin Bit a couple of weeks ago as it's been redone as a Tone Poet (blue notes higher end reissue series) and gave it the first proper listen for a long time. I'd dismissed it in the past, but giving it a few real hard listens its up there with one of my favourites - there's places in that where the band is swinging really hard.

Jalapeno

Big fan !  Thanks for the reminder.

My fave is the Grant Green / Sonny Clark Quartet stuff

mikeyrob73

had a wee listen whilst working on a spreadsheet 
Future Feature is cracking 

Whistler

I too came in through the Idle Moments door.

joeW

Love GG - pretty much all of it from straight ahead to funk. Am transcribing his All the things you are solo off ‘standards’ - it’s brilliant. 

lukedlb

jdgm said:

Me. 

Grant Green was a truly excellent player; Blue Note kept recording him and other leaders kept booking him for their sessions.  Have you heard (for instance) "Search For The New Land" by Lee Morgan? 

I don't have as many as you.  "The Latin Bit" is great, "Grantstand" and "Solid" too - there are lots but I think my favourite is "Street Of Dreams".

Search for the new land is incredible. My entry for GG was his take on Ain’t it Funky Now. 

With the blue note recordings, if there was a Hammond player and a guitarist, then it was bound to be funky or what they call Soul Jazz. 

The early Benson albums with Lonnie Smith are great too. 

Hootsmon

I listen to a LOT of jazz and when I try to turn someone on tae jazz I choose Kind of Blue or anything by Grant Green

He's very cool and tasty with sparse lines and no desire tae show off chops. Nice

EvansDrD

Big fan - 

one could even claim he created acid jazz

i enjoyed his forays into funk and I didn’t even mind hia slightly awkward gospel album 

gear wise…I favour the tone he had later in his career over the 330 years. I think it was an L7 with a floating pup 

ALR

Really good to hear other people talking about him, apart from one hip non musician cat I know who got into him through the Jazz/Funk route, I've never come across anyone else who's heard of him. A few albums mentioned above - Street of Dreams being one - that I've not heard, but I'm sure I will as I find them - some are a lot more available than others.

I've quite enjoyed doing the funkier albums over the last day, I'd listened to Alive! a lot, but I gave Carryin' On the first spin in a few years and loved it. Best of all was Green Is Beautiful which only got reissued on 1st Feb and which I got immediately - sounded brilliant.

I didn't get them all done yesterday, so today I'm doing Born To Be Blue, Feelin' The Spirit, The Latin Bit and finally back to where it all started for me with Idle Moments.

As well as Lee Morgan's Search For The New Land mentioned above I do also have Let Em Roll by Big John Patton where GG is a sideman. I've had that years and again, it's excellent. (To be honest, I think it's all excellent :-).

jdgm

"Street Of Dreams" - Elvin Jones, Larry Young and Bobby Hutcherson .

Jones and Young are also on "I Want To Hold Your Hand" and "Talkin' About".

Green and Jones are on Young's "Into Something" which is another highly rated Blue Note (must get that one!).

Edit - I just ordered a s/h CD of "Talkin' About" online, £7.55 good price...due to this thread! 

The Penguin Guide to Jazz on CD says "We've always loved the sound on this record, like fudge ice-cream sitting on ice cubes." 

Guitarist Joshua Breakstone recorded a superb tribute CD which is well worth hearing.

https://www.allmusic.com/album/remembering-grant-green-mw0000648476

guitars4you

@ALR - hope recovery is/has gone well - Not a bad way to chill out listening to Grant Green - I only have 4-5 albums, but place him, with Kenny Burrell and Wes Montgomery as my 3 favourites - Whilst I've never tried to copy him as such I find there are many ideas you can take from him to 'jazz up your blues' with 'enriched notes' to add to your pentatonic base 

Very under ratted as many do not know who he is 

Nitefly

ALR said:

I'm on the sofa for the whole day (possibly two) recovering from a minor hospital procedure, and to pass the time I've decided to listen to all 14 of my Grant Green records.

I got into Green about 10 years ago quite randomly. I'd seen an ES330 for sale in my local guitar shop and considered buying it. While researching who else had played this guitar, Green's name kept cropping up so I gave 'Idle Moments' a try. I liked it and then got boxed set on CD of some of his other records. I'd never listened to Jazz before but it opened up a whole new world for me and has led my to getting into a lot of the Blue Note stuff from the 1960s including Herbie Hancock, Lee Morgan and Kenny Burrel as well as Miles Davis and a few others.

I keep coming back to Grant Green and I've decided to try and get all his albums as a band leader on Blue Note vinyl (doesn't matter if they're original or represses, they've just got to have the blue note label) as well as some where he's a sideman.

Just wondering who else on the forum is a fan?

Yes yes yes, but - DID YOU BUY THE 330?

ALR

Nitefly said:

Yes yes yes, but - DID YOU BUY THE 330?

Alas I did not, and I often wished I had as it was a nice cherry red long neck model for £1600 (in 2013). I tried to scratch the itch a few years later with an MIC Gary Clark Casino but I just didn't like the way it felt. I've got a Les Paul Deluxe with P90s in it, so I think that's close enough for me in terms of feel and sound if I ever feel like I want to try and get that sound along with my 68 Custom Deluxe Reverb (plenty of folks have played jazz on a Les Paul).

ES330 is still the only other guitar I'd like to get one day, I sometimes wished I'd got one of the long neck humbucker models that were around about 8-9 years ago.

guitars4you said:

@ALR - hope recovery is/has gone well - Not a bad way to chill out listening to Grant Green - I only have 4-5 albums, but place him, with Kenny Burrell and Wes Montgomery as my 3 favourites - Whilst I've never tried to copy him as such I find there are many ideas you can take from him to 'jazz up your blues' with 'enriched notes' to add to your pentatonic base 

Very under ratted as many do not know who he is 

During lockdown I buried myself in Hal Leonard's Jazzin' The Blue book, I went through the whole thing and really enjoyed it - it really opened a lot of doors for my playing. Thanks Grant Green!

Nitefly

^^ Aha, one that got away! 

I managed to grab one in 2009 (cherry red, long neck, P90's) for my 60th birthday.  It's probably the only one I won't let go.