Pat Martino Solo Jazz Guitar Transcription
Pat Martino is a legend of jazz guitar and one of the most influential musicians of the last century. As a young prodigy, he was highly influenced by the music of Wes Montgomery but soon forged his own distinctive style. His career took a major setback when at the height of his popularity, he suffered a brain aneurysm and a surgery which caused total memory loss. But in the ensuing years, he relearned the guitar and developed an even stronger and more personal style. Although largely known for his extremely articulate, long and winding linear improvisations, his more subtle and introspective solo chordal work should not be overlooked. They have long fascinated me and I’ve been fortunate to sit at the feet of the master and witness him spin off seemingly endless chordal explorations. This Pat Martino solo jazz guitar piece was used in a video to promote his autobiography Here and Now! Here, Pat plays an improvised version of his original composition “Tradia” (copyright Kitai Music, A.S.C.A.P. 2012). Notice the beautiful and unexpected twists, turns and modulations he takes while playing what are mostly simple triads, seventh chords and inversions. This is a gorgeous piece of music and well worth investing some quality time to learn!
Pat Martino “Tradia”
About Soundslice Notation
A little while back I met Adrian Holovaty online. Adrian is an excellent Gypsy Jazz guitarist from Chicago and also an brilliant computer programmer. He was one of the original developers of the web framework Django which is now used by sites like Pinterest, Instagram, Mozilla, The Washington Times, Disqus, and many others. His most recent creation Soundslice allows music notation to be synced with online videos.
To truly appreciate everything you can do with Soundslice, click on the gear in the lower right corner and explore the settings panel. You can then easily navigate the notation, slow it down, loop sections, etc., all the while watching the original video! It’s really an amazing tool for teaching and learning music.
How I created this Transcription
First I loaded the video into Transcribe!, then notated everything in GuitarPro 6 (for more on my transcription process, read my article Some Tips on Transcribing). Finally I uploaded the notation to Soundslice where I added the URL to the original Youtube video, and created the sync points.
Many Thanks
Many thanks to the great Pat Martino for his permission to post his work here. I sincerely hope you will enjoy learning this wonderful piece of music.
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Thanks.
Musically Yours,
Absolutely gorgeous! Thanks so much Rick for transcribing and posting it (and to Pat Martino for granting permission!), I think I will try and learn this piece next (I love Pat Martino but dont quite know where to begin since his music is a bit advanced for me but this one sounds like it may be a bit easier for me to work on), I love your site Rick, please keep it up!
Thanks David, Glad you’re enjoying it. Be sure to check out Pat’s book (linked in the article) if you haven’t already. Pat is a master musician and also a great human being! You might also want to check out his book Linear Expressions http://www.amazon.com/LINEAR-EXPRESSIONS-BOOK-Pat-Martino/dp/1423460898 I got that one over 30 years ago and it really shaped a lot of my own musical thinking.
Thanks for the recommendation Rick, yes I have linear expressions, I have to work through it though 🙂 I’ll check out the other book as well. Thanks again!
Rick, thank you for this piece. I’m signed up for sound slice .
Is there a pdf file that I can print of of the tabs for Tradia?
Glad you’re enjoying the trancription. You can actually print the notation directly from the embedded Soundslice player. Click on the gear on the right and you’ll see a number of options, one of which is to print.
Hi Rick,
I contacted you a few years ago about if you had played at the Deer Head Inn here in the poconos. I do love your playing and enjoy your instructional videos as well, I hope to be in contact with you in the New Year, and maybe set something up, and take lessons with you. I went to see Pat Martino last year for a lesson.(it was on my Bucket List). Acolades are not enough for him, not only is he a great Musician, he is one of the warmest people I have ever met;you wouldn’t figure that, but he is genuinly a nice person. I wish you a Merry Christmas and a Happy new Year and hope to see you in 2016, O, an you have one of the best websites I have ever seen
Hi Joe,
Nice to hear from you and thanks for the kind words! It’s funny, I was just here at Hofstra giving juries today with Dave Lalama, and he had his Deer Head Inn shirt on. I’d love to play out there. Maybe we can make it happen in 2016.
Yes, besides being one of the greatest guitarists of our time, Pat is a really wonderful human being. Somebody I’d certainly like to emulate in every way.
Have a very Merry Christmas and Happy New Year. Hope to see you soon.
Musically Yours,
~ Rick Stone
hi rick, thanks so much for this, its wonderful,:)
It seems as if pat plays this with all down strokes?, as far as i can tell from the video, very tricky!
est wishes,
pat
You’re welcome Patrick. So glad you’re enjoying it. Hmmm, I’ve been practicing it myself but hadn’t thought about the “down stroke” thing. Pat doesn’t think about his right-hand much. He’s quick to tell you that his “left hand is the graduate” and his “right hand is the drop out” (I’ve also heard him refer to his right hand as “the brute”). Since most of these arpeggios lie across the strings, it does make sense that once you’re moving in a direction, you’d keep moving in the same direction as you cross strings (you might want to see my article on “Sweep Picking vs. Economy Picking“). I’ll have to pay attention to it next time I practice the piece and see what I’m doing as well.
Hi Rick, thanks for the reply and the link to the lesson:)
I have always thought of pat as a alternate picker mostly, sweepin/economy occasionally , do you think he plays this piece with down strokes for sonic reasons ? To give each note the same attack/sound? I think it must be an aesthetic choice on his part?:)
Thanks again Rick,
All the best,
Pat
Patrick,
I doubt that Pat really “thinks” about this at all when he plays, but does what “feels” best. And yes, when we talk about music everything is for sonic reasons. Feeling, sound, aesthetics are all part of the same thing. I don’t think you can really separate them.
I have practiced a few picking techniques over the years (alternate, economy, picking all new strings on downstrokes, etc.) and they certainly helped my playing. But after I learned them, I never thought about them again, just used whichever felt best in a particular situation. I tend to focus on the sound I’m trying to produce, and the technique to produce that sound becomes intuitive. In fact, usually if a student asks me how I’m picking something, I often have no idea and have to play it paying attention to what my hand is doing, so that I can describe it after the fact.
I think if you concentrate on sound, you’ll find the right technique.
~ Rick
Hi,thanks to you I just discovered a very nice website and the soundslice tool is greta too.
Stef
great, not greta 😉
I was going to ask you about who “Greta” was . . . . 😉