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  #31  
Old 02-11-2018, 10:12 AM
troggg troggg is offline
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Yeah, it aint that easy playing rock drums to acoustic music ... that is unless you're John Bonham playing "Babe I'm Gonna Leave You." And clearly Jimmy Page only steals from the best, one of the best being of course Jansch.
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  #32  
Old 02-11-2018, 12:01 PM
JonPR JonPR is offline
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Originally Posted by troggg View Post
Yeah, it aint that easy playing rock drums to acoustic music ... that is unless you're John Bonham playing "Babe I'm Gonna Leave You." And clearly Jimmy Page only steals from the best, one of the best being of course Jansch.
That's why Terry Cox was so good with Pentangle: he was a jazz drummer, not a rock drummer. Like Danny Thompson was a jazz bassist, not a rock bassist.
Obviously they still get in the way if you're just some poor guitarist trying to pick out Bert's patterns!
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  #33  
Old 02-11-2018, 08:33 PM
troggg troggg is offline
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That's why Terry Cox was so good with Pentangle: he was a jazz drummer, not a rock drummer. Like Danny Thompson was a jazz bassist, not a rock bassist.
Obviously they still get in the way if you're just some poor guitarist trying to pick out Bert's patterns!
I wasn't talking about how the excessive drum fills make it hard to learn the guitar part.

More specifically, if that's Terry Cox on "A Woman Like You," all I can say is he may have contributed some fine performances in his time -- but that isn't one of them. I'll take your word about him being good for Pentagle; alas I've always preferred Jansch or Renbourn solo to their Pentangle stuff. So I haven't listened to it enough.

Conversely, finding any part that wasn't rock solid by John Bonham including his additions to the more "down home" Zep material is a tall order.
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  #34  
Old 02-12-2018, 11:01 AM
JonPR JonPR is offline
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I wasn't talking about how the excessive drum fills make it hard to learn the guitar part.

More specifically, if that's Terry Cox on "A Woman Like You," all I can say is he may have contributed some fine performances in his time -- but that isn't one of them. I'll take your word about him being good for Pentagle; alas I've always preferred Jansch or Renbourn solo to their Pentangle stuff. So I haven't listened to it enough.
OK, we agree to disagree in that case! I can see that his drumming might be considered excessive on that track, but I like it personally. I love to hear inventive drumming, and I think it's sympathetic - and well played - if arguably over-enthusiastic.
Bizarrely, the version included on Pentangle's live 'Sweet Child' set - i.e. credited to the band - is a solo version with no drums or bass!
That definitely suggests that Bert liked it with Cox and Thompson doing their stuff, or that take wouldn't have ended up on his "solo" album.

There's just not enough ""jazz-folk" around...
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  #35  
Old 02-14-2018, 09:41 AM
troggg troggg is offline
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While Pentangle isn't my personal cup of tea, I have no problem giving them credit for blazing new ground and going for something different.
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  #36  
Old 02-15-2018, 03:15 AM
JonPR JonPR is offline
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While Pentangle isn't my personal cup of tea, I have no problem giving them credit for blazing new ground and going for something different.
TBH, when I used to see them every week at the Horseshoe club in London in 67/68, they got boring. Jacqui McShee's voice never did much for me (then), and the music seemed very inward-looking - like they were rehearsing rather than performing. It was a relief to see John Martyn, Stefan Grossman or Roy Harper instead.
But then I was only 18... I still needed an obvious wow factor from a performer.

I still don't like everything they did by any means, but when it worked it was great. Part of the problem was balancing the acoustic guitars with the bass and especially the drums. It seemed like Bert and John often had to overplay to make themselves heard. Bert Jansch strumming is not as interesting as Bert Jansch fingerpicking.
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  #37  
Old 02-15-2018, 11:47 AM
FrankHudson FrankHudson is offline
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No problem for me with Pentangle conceptually or on most of their original run of recordings. As a matter of fact, the sound on the their first couple of a albums is one of my personal touchstones.

Tastes differ I guess.

Yes mixing drums in with more complex acoustic guitar isn't easy, and that's part of why I like Pentangle. And bass and acoustic guitar is one of my favorite sonic combinations, so much so that I've had to take to playing bass so that I could hear more of that.
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  #38  
Old 02-15-2018, 01:39 PM
JonPR JonPR is offline
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No problem for me with Pentangle conceptually or on most of their original run of recordings. As a matter of fact, the sound on the their first couple of a albums is one of my personal touchstones.

Tastes differ I guess.

Yes mixing drums in with more complex acoustic guitar isn't easy, and that's part of why I like Pentangle. And bass and acoustic guitar is one of my favorite sonic combinations, so much so that I've had to take to playing bass so that I could hear more of that.
I agree. I love the sound of acoustic bass. I still remember the first Lonnie Donegan album I heard, a great production with a beautiful acoustic bass sound.
The first instrument I ever played in a band was the washtub bass! In later bands I always doubled on bass (especially in jazz), but mostly on a Fender - I could never quite summon the courage to go for stand-up bass. (First time I played one, I had blisters on my fingers after 10 minutes.)

I don't want to appear down on Pentangle. It was only my naive adolescent self that failed to appreciate what they were doing. As I said before, jazz-folk - or folk-jazz - is a well under-explored combination, capable of a lot more subtlety than folk-rock or jazz-rock. Van Morrison's Astral Weeks is a great example, and Joni Mitchell's probably taken it further than most. John Martyn too - and Nick Drake probably would have if he'd lived. But Pentangle were there first.

(BTW, if you'll excuse some name-dropping: while I never met Bert Jansch, I've played in bands with occasional Pentangle sidemen Mike Piggott and Nigel Portman-Smith. Seriously good musicians.)
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Last edited by JonPR; 02-15-2018 at 01:47 PM.
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  #39  
Old 12-23-2019, 09:01 PM
waterbuckit waterbuckit is offline
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Sorry to drag this thread out of the grave, but I am in love with Jansch's music, and simply can't get enough of playing it. I've noticed how his techniques are so easily absorbed and I find him truly inspirational.

Ordered the book but am looking for a tab of Yarrow, if anyone has one? Really like that one - I am a particular fan of the medieval-sounding folk tunes.
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  #40  
Old 12-24-2019, 06:38 AM
JonPR JonPR is offline
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Originally Posted by waterbuckit View Post
Sorry to drag this thread out of the grave, but I am in love with Jansch's music, and simply can't get enough of playing it. I've noticed how his techniques are so easily absorbed and I find him truly inspirational.

Ordered the book but am looking for a tab of Yarrow, if anyone has one? Really like that one - I am a particular fan of the medieval-sounding folk tunes.
I have a transcription of Bert's arrangement of Yarrow. PM me with an email.

It's not "medieval", btw . The original song is no older than the 17th century and probably more recent. It's from the Scottish borders, and was one of the most popular British folk songs of the 1950s/60s revival, normally known as The Dowie Dens of Yarrow (worth checking out other versions).

John Renbourn is your man if you want more of this kind of thing - he was a true historian of folk music (and not only British folk), much more than Jansch was.
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  #41  
Old 12-24-2019, 07:03 AM
waterbuckit waterbuckit is offline
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Originally Posted by JonPR View Post
I have a transcription of Bert's arrangement of Yarrow. PM me with an email.

It's not "medieval", btw . The original song is no older than the 17th century and probably more recent. It's from the Scottish borders, and was one of the most popular British folk songs of the 1950s/60s revival, normally known as The Dowie Dens of Yarrow (worth checking out other versions).

John Renbourn is your man if you want more of this kind of thing - he was a true historian of folk music (and not only British folk), much more than Jansch was.
Oh! I see, thanks for the context, will definitely check out Renbourn, I just assumed medieval based on the wind accompaniment which is the sort of thing I associate with that time period, and I suppose the nature of the tale, hah.
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  #42  
Old 12-24-2019, 08:02 AM
JonPR JonPR is offline
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Oh! I see, thanks for the context, will definitely check out Renbourn, I just assumed medieval based on the wind accompaniment which is the sort of thing I associate with that time period, and I suppose the nature of the tale, hah.
That's OK! It's a common assumption - mostly due to films etc - that music that sounds like that is "medieval", when in fact it's closer to Renaissance (at the earliest) or Baroque.
Medieval means Gregorian chant! No chords at all, just modes. (And that's just the church music, nobody knows what the folk music would have sounded like.)
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