From bruce@ashbysolutions.com Fri Mar 29 13:58:35 2002
Subject:Re: Workin those pedals

John,

>Not a clonewheel post per se, but last night I caught Ron Levy in
>downtown Manhattan with his band - awesome Hammond player, funk -
>blues stuff, and he's honed his chops down pretty good. If you
>haven't heard of him, I suggest you do.
>
>Anyway, I was watching his footwork. He lays down left-hand bass
>lines, and works his feet also, but his feet are pretty sloppy. All
>he does is stomp the pedals to the groove, and I couldn't tell the
>difference if he was hitting chord tones or not. His left hand did
>all the talking, but the feet just gave that Hammond background bass
>buzz.

To some extent, that's how you pedal in a jazz context: The melodic lines are mostly handled by the LH, and the feet just add rhythmic hits. Often, the pedal notes are not necessarily related to the melody line. Granted, a heavy hitter like Jimmy S. or Joey D. is perfectly capable of playing the bass with his feet -- Joey D. is just plain astounding when his feet get going! -- but it's harder to keep a swing feel with the feet alone.

Regards,

-BW

--
Bruce Wahler
Ashby Solutions™ http://music.ashbysolutions.com
CloneWheel Support Group moderator
978.386.7389 voice/fax
bruce@ashbysolutions.com