Scalloped Neck Guitars: What Is It?

What is a scalloped neck guitar? 

Tonight at the bar I had the privilege of running into a guy who bought a Malmsteen scalloped neck guitar from a pawnshop. I asked to play it and I played it while he was on break from his performance, so I soundchecked it for him. And then later in his gig I asked for one song with the singer, who was also playing acoustic guitar. I played "Now I wanna be your Dog," with him on vocals and acoustic guitar and me on electric guitar. I took two long neoclassical/hendrixy blues solos [one in the middle of the song, and one at the end of the song] on this immaculate conception of an electric guitar. 

A scalloped neck guitar is a guitar where the neck has been 'scalloped,' meaning the wood under the frets has been shaved off and deeply cut, more like an acoustic violin, than an electric guitar. The most popular guitar player that uses, and has popularized scalloped neck guitars, is Yngwie Malmsteen, mostly known for his work in the 1980s with a short lived LA metal band called Steeler. 

Steeler was popular because of Malmsteen's fast fiery technical guitar work, using a scalloped neckboard. The guitar I played tonight at the bar, ironically, through a guy who bought it at a pawn shop for $800, was Malmsteen's guitar, probably one of his older models that was still in good condition. Enough to get him a decent amount of cash at a pawn shop. The guy might be going through some hard times or maybe he just needed some quick cash. But I digress, the guy is a living legend on the guitar. 

Moving on, so now you know what a scalloped neck guitar is. Think of it like a violin but as an electric guitar. That's it. 

Next, so if my electric guitar has a wooden fretboard like a violin, how do I play it, how does that change the sound? 

Well, for one thing, it makes the sound better in a more classical way, like a violin. 

Also, when you play chords, its way easier because the scalloped neck makes holding many notes easier, like a violin. 

However, when you play single notes, it makes playing solos harder, again because its more like a violin. 

Lastly, when you're playing it live onstage with another guitarist [on acoustic/and/or singing] the guitar is harder to hear when the sound is contrasted with other sounds [it sounds more acoustic even though its electric still] to play so you have to control the volume of the guitar more with either the volume control button knob or either by using your right hand more or less [palm muting/lighter touches and/or harder touches.

Live Jazz! 9/9/2022!

Listen to it or be square! 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kq57g1C2fWA&t=868s

Live Jazz Performance! 12/2/21!

Happy Friday ladies and gentlemen, 

Check out our live performance from yesterday https://www.facebook.com/orlando.figueroa.3150/videos/607302963652309

We didn't play during Thanksgiving week and here we are back at it again. Things to note on this particular performance, I was more feeling/thinking more in the realms of rhythm, trying to think of the guitar as more of a drum, rather than a guitar sometimes when I'm strumming chords. My solos still go off into Mars here a lot, but my main focus was keeping that steady pulse. 

Thanksgiving week was tiring at work but I managed to get a lot of sleep that week and even today. Life is good! Happy holidays to you and yours. 

God Bless

Your Most Humble Guitar Player, 

O. Figueroa 

Jazz jam session 11/4/21!

https://www.facebook.com/orlando.figueroa.3150/videos/474208377194713

Here's footage from my jam session today. Featuring Jason Thomas on alto saxophone and Orlando Figueroa on guitar. 

Jason and I have been jamming for about a year now. At the moment we've been playing on my balcony and attracting all the neighborhood with our duo instrumental straight ahead jazz sessions. We play once a week for an hour but its been consistent enough for us to develop together musically. 

My jazz guitar style has improved a lot, and I've learned a lot about chord voicings, taking solos, and how to tell a story with a solo. 

In addition, another aspect of the music that I've been adding is the nature of the feelings of the moment. The time of day is a factor, my mood or attitude is a factor, Jason and his feelings are another, these sorts of variables that have been added to the music is something I've learned from other kinds of improvisational music, like world music, especially Indian ragas. 

At this point in the pandemic things have become much more strict. At Starbucks today, I had to show my vaccination card to sit down and dine in. I've decided to quit playing video games and spend my time focused on guitar, reading, and writing. 

Gracias por eschuchar. Bonne Nuit.

Autumn Leaves [in the key of A major]

 

So this is what you call sushi?

Autumn is upon us! This is one of my favorite times of years because it represents the changing of the seasons, the Four Seasons, like the famous Vivaldi piece. This is a good time of year. It always reminds me of childhood and growing up in the Midwest. Memorial Day and this tie dye shirt I always wore. It represents to me schooling, learning, coldness, newer and more crisp air around me. It's also my birthday at the end of the month. 

At this point in the pandemic if you haven't become used to quarantine and haven't found a new way to live within this new paradigm, then you're very far behind. It's a time of healing, renewal, learning, growth, spiritually, mentally, physically, all of it, it's kind of a big deal! Get with the program if you haven't heard that the bird is the word.  

I've become entranced in my own activity. Although I have friends and hang out with them, it is really only within myself that I feel the Muse at its strongest and best. The muse is simply what keeps you going in your life. What do you really enjoy? Do that thing a lot. And find other things like it. And so on until you find what you find fulfilling in life. It could take 10,000 hours, it could take forever, or it might never happen if you don't search for your own meaning. 

I've been playing a lot of jazz guitar and have found some improvement in the jazz playing genre. A steep learning curve was simply just playing different chord voicings over the same chords as substitutions. Nothing fancy but it keeps the beat going and sounds super straight ahead. In a guitar/saxophone only duo it works really well and keeps us grounded within the saxophone solos. 

I've been reading a lot as well. My goal for this year on Goodreads [https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/56122996-og-space] was to read 50 books, but a las, it's getting nearer and nearer the end of the year and right now I'm only at 34 books. We'll see what happens. I recently finished reading Ulysses by James Joyce and right now I'm reading Plato Dialogues selections, an old copy from an old man, a customer I met at work. He gave me his copy of this Plato book [as well as my copy of Ulysses, which I specifically asked him for], it's from 1927, the Modern Student's Library, Philosophy Series. I've been getting a lot out of the book and I've been spending time ruminating on the various ideas within the dialogues. Sitting beneath the warmth of the fire.  

I've also been eating very well but also making sure to eat and live in a healthy way. Food has been one of the best things in the world to me [lol] and I've been very lucky to live in California where the cuisine is literally everything and anything I want, reasonably within affordable price ranges. 

Another great place for food was Chicago, I used to love Chicago hot dogs, polish sausages, hot Italian beef sandwiches, and pizza Chicago style with real bulk sausage instead of diced sausage. It makes a big difference folks. 

Last night I had a superb meal at our favorite Korean restaurant, I had the ginseng chicken in hot broth. You add salt to the broth for flavor or you can eat it as is, which is pretty bland, but very delicious. Not only that but a customer gave me a Persian dish the other day at work and I ate it for my lunch. It was small pastries with meat inside them, they reminded me of pate, which my great Aunt used to make when I was a youngster. The stories within food is incredible and it'll keep you inspired till the end of time. 

Keep hitting those high notes! 

Live Jazz Performance May 10, 2021!

Here's a livestream performance from this afternoon, featuring Jason Thomas on alto saxophone and Orlando Figueroa, yours truly on electric guitar and effects. It's mostly improv but we also added Miles Davis' Freddie Freeloader into the mix. Thanks for listening! Don't forget to like and subscribe to my YouTube Channel. Stay safe! 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BUi49tbbhRM&ab_channel=MegaFigueroa007

Balcony Concert #1

Guten tag, 

Here's a livestream from two days ago that I finally uploaded from Facebook to YouTube, where it will hopefully get more views. We performed some standards and improvisation. We did the standards Freddie Freeloader, Blue Monk, Footprints, and Body and Soul, as well as a minor blues improv and improv based on a diminished chord. Orlando Miguel Figueroa on guitar and Jason Tomas on alto saxophone. 

Thanks for listening. Don't forget to like and subscribe to my YouTube channel. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ifzXJhZ-55w

Live Performance 12/2/2020

This is a live performance from today, 12/2/2020, that took place from 430pm-530pm. Featuring myself, Orlando Miguel Figueroa on guitar and Jason Tomas on alto saxophone. We perform [in order], an untitled composition, Footprints, Freddie Freeloader, Blue Monk, a jam based on a diminished chord, and ending the set with Body and Soul. 

Watch the performance here, https://www.facebook.com/orlando.figueroa.3150/videos/1730748607096466

Thanks for listening and supporting our music. 

The modern improviser refuses to die! 

Blues Notes #1

Hello, 

I did another livestream today. We're going to make it a weekly performance. We'll continue to do standards and improv. Enjoy the music. Don't forget to like and subscribe to my YouTube channel. 

Thanks, enjoy 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ikzDWiTXHc 

King Crimson

Today was an interesting morning. As soon as I woke up I kept thinking about a certain King Crimson song. The song was Lament from their album Starless and Bible Black. It's a terrific record, as most of their early records and late records are. What makes that song in particular so interesting that I was reciting them in my head upon wake up?

Well, the song is, well, a lament of sorts. The song features some interesting lines. Here are some:

I guess I tried to show you how
I'd take the crowd with my guitar
And business men would clap their hands
And clip another fat cigar

 

But now it seems the bubble's burst
Although you know there was a time
When love songs gathered in my head
With poetry in every line

 

I like the way you look at me
You're laughing too down there inside
I took my chance and you took yours
You crewed my ship, we missed the tide

 

And strong men strove to hold the doors
While with my friends I passed the age
When people stomped on dirty floors
Before I trod the rock'n'roll stage

 

Those are all pretty damn good lines for vocals. Even in the 70s. And the music was topnotch art-rock with heavy feedback guitar and mellotron [a synth].  

So yeah those lines in particular really stood out to me. I guess what I'm trying to say is that I can't escape the influence of King Crimson on my life. When I was 19 years old I would sit in the freezing basement in Wisconsin. I would invite my friend David over and we would smoke a lot of weed and blast progressive rock. But it was always King Crimson that was our favorite progressive band from England. 

 

There's something about King Crimson that makes them stand out apart from the other English art-rock bands from the 1970s. Robert Fripp's guitar playing and lead role in forming and keeping the band going through many permutations made them a much better band than say, ELP, Genesis, and even Yes. Fripp was a art-rock guitar god. He knew how to play any chord for any feeling. He was like a jazz guitarist in a rock band. He knew many great 'noise chords,' as I would call it, but he could always mellow out and play something that a nice jazz guitarist could play. I credit him for this day for helping me develop my guitar sound. 

 

 

What's also interesting is the fact that when my friend and I were listening to King Crimson stoned all those years ago is that we are both black kids. I know this might be kind of arrogant to think, [but I definitely believe this is true] but I actually believe that David and I were probably the only black kids [or at least part of a very select few] in America in the mid 2000s that listened to and loved King Crimson. That's actually truly remarkable. 

 

King Crimson is one of my favorite bands. I listened to them more than any other band from England, including those four lads from Liverpool [who they were inspired by of course]. Their legacy lives on. Fripp was and still is a monster and I credit him [and countless others] for inspiring me to make noise on the guitar. The art-rock thing died but its influence will live forever through indie rock and its noise variants.

 

As Pete Townsend [the guitarist from The Who] said about the first album, the critically acclaimed In the Court of the Crimson King, "an uncanny masterpiece."

Eddie Van Halen

Eddie Van Halen died on October 6th, 2020. The music world has been deeply saddened by his death, as have I. 

Eddie was one of those quintessential guitar players. You might not like Van Halen or heavy metal but the fact remains that he was one of the pivotal guitar gods of the 1980's. He played on Michael Jackson's Thriller. Through his influence, there was a guitar boom during that time and everybody wanted to shred the guitar, leading to great players like Randy Rhoads. Eddie is the best guitar hero of the 80s, without a doubt. His influences, ironically, also my influences, the 1960s-1970s classic/blues rock, is evident in his playing, and helped develop his classic hard rock, "brown sound," if you will. 

What is the brown sound? Well, it's that most perfect hard rocking loud distorted guitar tone that every rock guitarist goes for without necessarily trying to because it's so good so why change things up? Eddie perfected it with his own hands, guitar modifications, and guitar effects like the phase 90 and tube screamer stomp boxes, guitar pedals, and electronics.

A guitarist named Ronn from a classic rock band from the 70s, called Lightning [find them on YouTube, he's a killer guitar player], also told me about Eddie, "He plays licks from outer space, from Mars." Well, that certainly makes sense considering how blazing fast, bluesy, and melodic Eddie was. There was something otherworldly there. His guitar playing had everything; heavy rocking riffs, decent vocals, blistering melodic solos, and a good band to keep everything going. Not to mention the intensity of a Van Halen stage show performance. Might as well jump! He had it all and did it all. 

His passing is especially sad during the middle of COVID, where some 200,000 Americans have died due to the novel virus. Although he died from cancer, we will never really know if perhaps his death was 'covid related,' as many deaths are these days. His death is personal for me because when I was a teenager I was obsessed with all things guitar. And when I discovered Van Halen, it changed my life for a while. 

I could see that although heavy metal wasn't the kind of music my kind of people listen to, the music resonated with me because of the power of Eddie's crushing guitar sound and melodic fast solos. It wasn't so much the anthems [Jump, Panama, Runnin' with the Devil, Jamie's Cryin', Hot for Teacher] rather it was just the fact of the matter; the heavy guitar riffing saved my teenage soul. After hearing Eruption I went on to learn parts of it. And even later I learned all the scales and modes so I could shred the fret-board like Eddie. It was a good time. It's good to be young. 

I also had a Van Halen disc golf that I cherished because I loved the band so much. I became a great Frisbee golfer back around 2011 and took great care to never lose my Van Halen disc golf, no matter how many trees were in the park, day or night.

Now that I'm older I see that people like Eddie Van Halen are rare. They won't come again. There will never be another Eddie Van Halen. There will be others similar to him but they will never be able to capture that intrinsic something, that epic guitar god status that is sorely lacking in today's musical environment because rap and pop have taken over and rock guitar has taken a back seat since then. 

But his legacy isn't over. Even someone like me, a guitarist in his 30s, has been influenced by Eddie, and his playing lives on through guitar players like me, who learned from him, honored, and respected him, loving the music and learning from it. 

Yeah, it's just heavy metal but it was MY heavy metal. 

"I know, it's only rock and roll but I like it."

*Rest In Peace*

The Quarantine Recordings pt. 2

Hello, good people of the internet. Here's part two of a series I'm calling the quarantine recordings. We did a bunch of jazz standards today in my backyard, just jamming out. A lot of people stopped by in the front yard to listen. It was cool. The songs are in the order they were performed live. Check them out below. Thanks for listening!

https://soundcloud.com/user-294063763/untitled-tune-qiuarantine
https://soundcloud.com/user-294063763/autumn-leaves-quarantine
https://soundcloud.com/user-294063763/airegin-quarantine
https://soundcloud.com/user-294063763/four-quarantine
https://soundcloud.com/user-294063763/all-the-things-you-are-quarantine-2
https://soundcloud.com/user-294063763/impressions-quarantine

Guitar/effects, Orlando Figueroa 
Alto Saxophone, Jason Thomas

Student becomes Le Better

So my buddy just got back from Coachella and said he had a blast. He said he spent a lot of time playing ukulele and when we jammed today with both of us on guitars he was significantly better. He can actually jam with me and improvise (albeit at a beginners level). The fact that he can keep playing and jam for extended periods of time without running out of ideas or getting hand cramps means he's made an important milestone in his guitar playing. I want him to work on songs too. He's been doing Sum 41's With You on uke and the first little short tune I showed him how to play on guitar was the Adventure Time Theme.

Pretty cool that he can jam out now. I was doing a lot of jazz stuff based around his improv. I also did a lot of chromatic stuff based on jazz harmony changes and it sounded really good. I think he underestimates the fact that he can jam a lot better now. Now we just need the bass player (our friend) to actually play the bass sometime. 

I've been talking to a drummer and and a guitar player about doing some collaboration. I also want to work with my former band's singer on stuff. He's in New York but I was thinking I could just send him tracks and have him do the production end of everything.

The good thing is that my friend is getting better which means I might have somebody to play music with. it also shows that my teaching has had good results. There's a chance that he could surpass me one day on the guitar. I better keep up my chops! Haha.

Exciting! 

Rock and Roll Legend Chuck Berry Dies at 90

So today when I went to work an old timer that I know told me that Chuck Berry died. The importance didn't really hit me until I got to relax and think about it. I actually just got into old school 50s rock and roll and found its importance in terms of guitar playing and its place in the history of music. It's important stuff and Chuck Berry was one of the most important musicians to come out of that era. Heck, he might as well have invented rock and roll.

His songs had that snare back-beat, that rock guitar rhythm, and country/blues twanging guitar licks that makes rock and roll rock and roll. One thing to take note of is the fact that there are certain guitar licks on the guitar that people still do to this day that are pretty much stock Chuck Berryisms-things he did back in the 50s that guitar players still do to this day. Mostly the double stops (which is popular in blues) and the bluesy power chord rhythms played with 8th notes in 4/4 time.

More important than his guitar playing (as great as it was) was his songwriting craft. He brought the rock and roll narrative to the forefront where previously blues and country dominated and had a different story to tell. Fast cars, girls, wild parties, etc. This is what rock and roll was originally about. Later the Beatles and The Stones expanded on this and added their own stories to fit the lyrics of the music.

Personally, he's a pretty big inspiration. He's a black guy that can really play the guitar, he's a great songwriter, and he sings pretty well too. He's a great musician. Probably the perfect rock musician. Not every rock musician is good at songwriting, playing their instrument, and singing. He was one of the best.

He lived a long life and probably had a lot of fun. He was about to release an album of all new material but he didn't finish it in time. Oh, well as one of his songs go c'est la vie. 

Play the guitar just like a-ringin' a bell!