Ok, since you asked, I will. What little bit of technique I have in this genre' I learned from Ron Hensley, another Erwin boy, when I was about your age. Ron was the great one. I am glad I was able to be around him a few times and soak up a little. RIP Ron. 🎸
@@lincolnhensley3501 Yep. Ron was something else. I was only able to visit and play with him 2 or 3 times over the years because of our work schedules. I knew him long after his pro days, he had come home to Erwin and was working at Nuclear Fuels in the 1980s and just playing as a hobby then. But he was such a powerful presence on the guitar, just those few times it influenced me in that style, seeing it up close from someone that really knew it.
@@lincolnhensley3501 Someone else that comes to mind from that time period that played in this style is Bill Riddle. He lived in Unicoi, played a Guild archtop acoustic with a DeArmond monkey stick, and used a foot bass synth. I only played with him twice, he was a formidable player just like Ron was. I don't know if he is still living or not. He would be pretty old if he is. Edison may know of him, not sure. I haven't seen him(Bill) since the 80s.
Well...at 69 you'd think I'd be familiar with all the 1000 chord shapes you just ran thru...yeah right!😬 I'm resisting the urge to give it up..but, I know we all got to play with the brain the Lord blessed us with.... right?😂 Seriously though...the area I grew up in was devoid of any knowledgeable players and even "guitar" books were written for piano.😵💫 So, that's my feeble excuse...that, and my first guitar came from the 5 & dime. I'm glad you're willing to share your knowledge Larry, it can certainly help any guitarist with a desire to learn! I'm enjoying your videos and please thank Don for running the camera! We'll keep pickin' 'till the Lord calls us home!😊
Hi Rick. Well, I try to keep it "close to the ground", as the solemn old judge used to say. I just play what I hear using common chords. Most of the jazz guitar players or wannabes play songs like these with a lot of fancy chords and it gets so far out, I dont know what they are playing, (and I dont think they know either.) Just a bunch of abstract sounds.. I never liked that type of playing much. I gotta hear the melody in there. I haven't played these songs in a long time...or I should say half-played.😄 Lots of goofs and mistakes! Oh well..Have a good Sunday. 🎸
@LarryOdham I agree my friend, some jazz players lose me quickly when they drop the melody...I don't know how some jazz trios stay together...maybe at that stage they're so "far out" they're "in"! Lol 😆 Have a good week!
Hi Charlina. Yes over the past 6 or 7 years or so, down to the bare frame. Theres several videos out here on the channel of some of the work. I have footage for 1 or 2 more videos on some of that work progress, that I haven't gotten around to posting yet, but will soon. The sanding and repainting work was done during the warm summer seasons. It is making pictures once again, but needs to be gone thru with a scope and fix every little circuit problem. I've fixed a lot of them, but there's still a lot that needs attention. It will be a very nice restored like new vtr when all finished.
Amazing work Larry! I worked in a large network station in Canada where we had seven quads. I swear they bought them one at a time. The only two "matched" models were two old VR1000B units built around the time I was born. Real antiques that here converted to highband. We also had a few RCAs and another Ampex. The older ones required constant fiddling when we put them to air. Add to RCA TCR cart machines and there was no lack of work for operators and techs. Just before I left many of the quads went out the door to be replaced by 1 inch and Betacam units. Management told me I could take whatever I wanted. Lol! My wife was having a difficult time with a Betamax and a VHS is our house. So Larry, where do you have all these units? Do you rent a warehouse? Or is this your home? I remember the huge air compressors we maintained to keep those beasts running. (I saw a TCR in the background at one point. I can still hear those things running and waiting for a noise to tell you something was failing!)
Hello Rod, all of the above. I built a commercial building in 1992. I leased that building out to another commercial entity in 2001. It has been leased out and occupied ever since. I moved in 2006 and built a home studio for quad work at that time. I been here at the home studio working ever since. I rent and maintain storage space at a local warehouse facility. I have 15 quad vtrs here at the home studio in operation on a daily basis including as you saw, a TCR-100/SP-100 and an ACR-25B. There is a back room workshop with the air and vacuum located in it. All the air and vacuum is piped into the studio room. And in the backyard I have a yardbarn full of spare misc quad stuff, parts, head cases, tape cases, etc.. And a bunch of video heads stacked up in out in the garage. 2" quad is what I do. All quad, all day. Heres more: ru-vid.com/group/PLJQg3rQJzoosbgyXSXE7AFEC_6U9dtKYj&si=qTjaQieGDL888nTl ru-vid.com/group/PLJQg3rQJzoovLIWQ1VcnDdhNkikwBF5Qb&si=n-uRzdkucm-fYMr- Have fun. 😁
@@LarryOdham Actually, I was thinking of "Only Another Boy and Girl," from '44 -- kind of an obscure side in comparison with the much-dissected stuff from the Charlie Christian years.
@@Trombonology No, I wasn't thinking Charlie Christian era. I was thinking later on in the 1950s, maybe a septet instead of the sextet version...too many songs ago...I can't remember now exactly, but I'm pretty sure I heard BG play it on clarinet sometime, somewhere. It caught my ear. I try to avoid other guitar players as much as possible because if I play something CC played, etc., listeners will recognize it immediately. I tend to drift toward singers, piano players, and clarinet players. I used to play the clarinet a little many years ago. Speaking of stealing licks...the opening vamp was inspired by an old dixieland side something like Matty Matlock or the NORK, or Firehouse Five would play. It seemed to fit.
@@LarryOdham Ah, OK -- going through my material, I found a couple of BG "Poor Butterfly" recordings with that coda. I do think it originated in the side I mentioned, but Benny must have liked it and filed it away for future use -- even the great Goodman could recycle. ... I'm with you: I steal more licks from other instrumentalists and vocalists than I do from guitar players.
It’s one thing to have an audience appreciate what you do but it’s somthing else to have other musicians respect it because they know what you’re doing. I’m a guitar player and I know how hard it is to play melodies with false harmonics. Having to move position with both hands and be clean with out messing up, takes alotve hard work. Chet’s arrangements are technical, complex and very time consuming to learn and it looks you did it and did it extremely well!
In 1981, my first job in silicon valley was working on quad head rebuilds at CMC Technology. I never did the RCA machines. Just the Ampex. That was a lot of fun for a green horn tech fresh out of the Air Force and community college. I love your videos because they take me back. I worked on A LOT of VTRs over the years. Now a chip smaller than a Wheat Thin holds 18 hours of 1080p. How times have changed.
I hear you, Richard. I am stuck in the past here. 😄 mainly because I don't know how to do anything else...and wouldn't even if I did. I was very lucky going to work in tv, the station I worked at had both RCA and Ampex vtrs, so I got to see both worlds side-by-side in day to day operation. My hope is that my videos may enlighten young teks on some of this stuff, and the older teks may revisit some of their younger days on the job....Keepin' it alive!
@@LarryOdham Thanks, Larry. It’s a wonderful piece, and a nice contribution. Just curious what the intro chords may be just prior to the start of the finger-picking.
I think that one chorus part I would get more questions about, how-to-do-it, over the years. Don was quizzing me that day about, "what are you doing right there?", 😄 I dont think I could even play it now, havent in years, couldn't really play it back then, either! Have a good Sunday. 🎸
Grazie x this Larry!!! Great touch, great unplugged sound, this is really a Chet Atkins Mood!!! Great 6122-59 anf thanks to Paul Yandell for reinvented this axe, 😊❤
@@paolospadaro yes. that is what this one is also. I bought it new in 2008. Paul Yandell was there at the CAAS that year demo'-ing one. I think that was 2008. I think he also had a PY split pickup that TV Jones had made that year. I played a Steve Wariner Gretsch that had the PY split pickup a few years after. It sounded very good- the pickup.
Hey Larry, did you use a spacer underneath the metal TK Smith pickup ring in order to match the contour of the top? I’m planning to drop a pickup into an acoustic archtop of mine and can only think of either using a contoured wood/plastic spacer/shim or actually contouring the pickup ring itself by filing it. -Bill
Hi Bill, no, I didnt need one for the TK Smith pickup. That trim ring is 1/8" aluminum sheet metal. It is easily bent into shape to match the top contour. I did some filing-rasping on the Gibson P-90 pickup spacer back at the bridge position, to get the spacer shaped to the top contour. That stuff dont want to bend much. I think theres video of that in one of the D'A videos, what I did.
Thanks Luigi, Im glad you like it. 🎸 Heres a how-to video: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-O9fIkEVJPWA.htmlsi=Qpma3UX6KItdMXlZ Now, go learn it and play it for me sometime. 😊
How much do you know about the history of Chet’s original sealed top 6120? Before the ray butts pickups I’ve seen it had Dynasonic pickups and even a Vibrola vibrato. I would love to know how it was originally set up
Hello Chris, the prototypes of the solid top 6120, the "Dark Eyes" black and the "Orange" were originally equipped with DeArmond pickups. As well as the hollow body 6120s in those early days. "Orange" was eventually equipped with Butts pickups and later with Butts split pickups. "Dark Eyes" had a row of round magnets inlaid in the fretboard up high on the bass side. I dont think I have ever seen Chet with the Vib-Rola on a 6120. By then Bigsby was making and selling tailpieces and Chet had a fixed arm Bigsby on his prototype solid top. Chet also had a jig from Bigsby that allowed him to bend his own arms for the Bigsby. I think what you are thinking about, or may have seen, is the predecessor of the first 6120, the Streamliner Special in 1954. Chet had a Rickenbacker Vib-Rola on that guitar.
@@LarryOdham if you watch “The Poor People of Paris Jeans Song” from 55’ it looks like he is definitely using a Vibrola. He pushes down on the vibrato arm and there is also a few clear shots of it. I found it odd as well!
@@ChrisHodge Well there you go. Yes. That is definitely a Rickenbacker Vib-Rola. And that is definitely a solid top. It looks like its before the Butts pickups, as far as my eyes can see. It probably is in that time period after the closed top prototypes were built and before Bigsby became available. Gretsch was putting beltbuckle tailpieces on at first. Of course you know Chets gonna take that thing off, first thing. Another little piece of guitar evolution captured on film.
@@LarryOdham thanks Larry. You are always such a wealth of knowledge. I would guess that the Sealed top prototype probably came with Dearmonds and a belt buckle. Chet was obviously always experimenting. On the 1954 Mr Sandman video Chet’s bigsby arm has a hook on the end instead of a cap.
@@ChrisHodge Yes. there was so much changes going on right in that time 1954-55, its hard to say anything for certain unless its wrote down or a picture exists. I'm sure Chet was experimenting daily, tinkering with the guitars. One other thing that happened right near that time in 1957 the neck of the sealed top got broke on the train to New York when he was playing on the NBC tv show. He had it re-necked at the Gretsch factory in Brooklyn right before going on the show and playing. Paul Yandell was a prime source of information on Chets guitar tinkering, but he is deceased now as well. And Dave Stewart and Sonny Thomas. Gone. No more eye-witnesses to ask. They're all gone now. I was lucky to know them for a few years. Tim Masters is the keeper of the Ray Butts legacy. He can tell you just about anything about Ray's work.
Did you learn this one from the Peggy Lee w/Dave Barbour record? That's where I got it. You really expose the improvisation-friendly quality of this great tune! Always love the distinctive Gretsch twang, too.
Hi Trom, no, I 've been an Andrews Sisters fan from wayback. Their version(s) have influenced me the most. And maybe Sylvia Froose to a degree. My simple little guitar arrangement doesn't really do it justice, there are so many possibilities, alternate voicings, substitute chords. Maybe some smart young picker will hear mine and get inspired to do it 'right'. That song really swings no matter who plays it! 🎸🎸😃😃
@LarryOdham I'm glad to hear that Larry! I've been watching a ton of videos from East Tenn and West NC and the flooding is a disaster for sure. My daughter and her family live in Newland, NC, and they're ok, but have been without utilities for a long time. Down here in Wadesboro, NC, we made out very well...lost power for only a few hours. Outlying areas were out much longer. We've been praying hard for everyone hit, sure glad you're ok!
@@rickcurtis2983 I used to drive over to Dave Calvert's Pickin Pig Bar-B-Q there in Newland on Tuesday nights and play guitar for a free dinner. That was 20 years ago. Dave and the Pig is still around. Banner Elk is cut off, bridges washed out, so I been told. Used to go there and play in the Woolly Worm Festival in October.
@LarryOdham Yep, guess it's gonna be a while before anybody can get in that area. I like your BBQ arrangement, I hope he's still around later on, maybe I could try out the menu!
Thanks Rick. That's from "Seeing Nellie Home" 1950s Opry solo. Somebody asked me about this, I don't remember who it was now. Maybe they will see it and be happy.
Hello Chad, that is my ~ 2008 version of the old folk song "John Henry". I titled it "John Henry's Other Brother". Here is a complete recording of it: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-BoDeO9sjZ5I.htmlsi=S97ixvGgZFNZhl4x Heres a how-to-play: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-yOA8RBiQY6s.htmlsi=PXgjPfG__Ql2fcYM
❤ Thanks Larry, I am really very very honored. Beautiful video and story behind this instrument. The figured top of this 6122 is beautiful, as is the sound. Very interesting your modifications. A useful video for all enthusiasts….; compared to our Gretsch 6122-59 reissue how does this cg sound? What are your impressions? The mahogany blocks you put inside, in our 59 reissues there is a trestle bracing inside. Please make more videos with this beauty!! Thanks again and greetings from Sicily. (Anyway today is Gretsch day, I just posted a tribute video to Chet and the 6122.)
Hi Paolo, I've always wanted to take the pickups out of this older CG and put them into the 6122 reissue. But I have resisted that temptation because I would be messing up this one. The old 1960s filtertrons are far better than the TV Jones copies in the reissue, to my ears anyway. Structurally, the reissue 6122 is made much better and stronger than the older 1960s CGs were, in my opinion. They fixed a lot of the construction and assembly problems. Ive had to go inside this old one and clamp & reglue some of the top supports, and replace the outer binding on this one. It decomposes and turns to dust after a few years. I have a problem with top resonance in the reissue 6122. The 5th string vibrates uncontrollably and in order to avoid fret rattles the bass side of the bridge must be raised up considerably for sufficient clearance. I need to make a sound post for it to stop that. It will be more difficult because the reissue doesnt have that access hole, will have to remove a pickup and work thru the pickup hole. I am not looking forward to doing that! That will make a good wintertime project.
Hello. I found a lot of quadruplex tapes, luckily not in such terrible condition - many in better condition, but a few were green. I managed to clean them, these tapes can actually withstand a lot. What country are you from? In Poland, where I come from, there are no functional 2-inch VCRs left.
Hello Daniel, I am in US here: www.quadtapetransfer.com I have actually digitized a 2 inch quad tape from Poland a few years ago. No, there are very few 2 inch machines that exist nowdays and even fewer that are 100% functional. I was a tape/op in TV in late 1970s thru about 1992. Seen it and done it all back in the day for about 9 years.(old tape guys are pretty scarce nowdays too!) 😁 Heres more: ru-vid.com/group/PLJQg3rQJzoosbgyXSXE7AFEC_6U9dtKYj&si=tcCk2KQpc4Roc58R Cheers.
