Allan Holdsworth - Blue Note Clinic 2005 Part One

Allan Holdsworth doing a clinic at the Blue Note in N.Y.C. January 2005 part 1. With Ernest Tibbs and Joel Taylor accompanying him.

[@MaxLamboy]

I was there up front asking dumb questions, later he signed “Road Games.” Wow he was fun So glad I spent the $ to attend. Didn’t know it was being filmed.

[@N0B0DY_SP3C14L]

Such a gentle genius, agonizingly humble, awkwardly introverted, with a truly visceral connection to music. Unreal.

[@sseltrek1a2b]

yeah- blown away by how inventive and talented he was, but equally so his humility...

[@rlm4471]

Humble, yes, but I'm not sure how introverted he was. Several who knew him well have said that he loved to sit around drinking beer and chatting with people.

[@N0B0DY_SP3C14L]

@@rlm4471 Quietly chatting at a pub was no more than a few people at a time is textbook introvert behavior. Introvert does mean anti-social, we just handle social interaction differently than extroverts.

[@rlm4471]

@@N0B0DY_SP3C14L There isn't really such a thing as textbook introvert behavior. As you said, introversion has more to do with how a person responds to social interaction internally than with the social behavior itself. My point was just that he was known to be very sociable. Whether he was a true introvert or not would be up to him to judge.

[@N0B0DY_SP3C14L]

@@rlm4471 I know folks who knew him pretty well. They say he needed time alone to recharge and create. That's introvert stuff. Out of respect for Mr. Holdsworth and everyone else, I'm not going to discuss more of his personal life.

[@kozovoi1975]

Holdsworth, the king of one liners.

[@brettgarsed]

@4.30 "I wanted a horn but I ended up with all this shit". Pretty much sums it up. If only Allan could've just got on with the music but in the process he transformed an instrument from what it was to what it could be. As Dave Chapelle said, "The mark of greatness is that everything before you is obsolete, and everything after you bears your mark".

[@svenjansen2134]

Guthrie Govan said about Holdsworth that you can't hear where he came from. When I hear myself play I hear influences but with Allen it's like as if he just came here. Like an alien.

[@supahsekzy]

11:33 "Do you know somebody who likes their own sound? He's LYING to you!" So damn true.

[@sseltrek1a2b]

yep...(otherwise, we wouldn't be constantly tinkering with it...)...

[@mostresticator5]

just awful questions... someone asked him to play a few lines from proto cosmos, what a joke....have some respect

[@mikebozik]

Probably his best interview, lots of intelligent questions. Even though he was sick, he was very animated and engaging. Pure gold! Thanks for the post😊

[@stevegrierson381]

I get the impression that his approach is quite intuitive and personal. He's a great player but finds it difficult to explain methods.

[@rlm4471]

He was mostly self-taught. Essentially, he reverse-engineered music theory in his own way. He knew how to write things out for himself using his own system, but he didn't know the conventional language for a lot of what he was doing.

[@Gregorypeckory]

This is awesome; I've never seen Allan this jovial before. I always knew he had a wicked sense of humor, but never seen him demonstrate it in such a relaxed manner, as if he was at a party with friends.

[@unamacarana]

That's exactly what it looks like. Description on point.

[@stratoleft]

@@unamacarana Allan actually had to endure these people running their mouths? And the likes of you think it's a good thing.

[@stratoleft]

Why? Are you some kinda expert on the various moods of Allan Holdsworth?

[@Gregorypeckory]

@@stratoleft Relax, buddy. I'm sure someone will take your bait if you just keep up flailing away with the random hostility.

[@stratoleft]

@@Gregorypeckory Furthermore, dude, you failed to rain on my parade. I was laughimg while I posted it. Especially the Britt Ekland part. If Allan had to stand there and tolerate the 20 questions from these goofs, at least have some nice lookin' chicks in the audience. Ya know? Kinda like the two chicks opening up this show here :-) kzbin.info/www/bejne/qImZknullsuejbMsi=JyUIhmRoZxjsgxuT

[@nogbadthebad2609]

Extreme talent + hard work = Genius = Allan Holdsworth.

[@pranavphx]

It bugs me a lot when he talks about the synth axe in various videos and how there are only 2 left and now one only works for about 20 min. The world couldn't give him the fame, money but we failed him in that we couldn't even do enough to build /preserve the instrument he loved so that he could play it more often.

[@robnorris8053]

You said it.. WE did fail him immensely.

[@DavidWilliams-sp8gv]

If you look at what Coltrane did, trying to explain it to non musicians is like two entirely different languages. Holdsworth always said he wished he was a horn player. That's why I love what he does, because he is like a guitarist that has a horn player concept. Horn players can outline the chords Holdsworth uses, but we can't play the notes simultaneously and sustain them. Met him a couple times. Great player.

[@rustnpiece88]

Good to see Allan in such good spirits. Some of it might be from the beer but he seems like he's genuinely enjoying himself here.

[@johndoe1765]

PEOPLE MUST KNOW THEIR ARE NO SECRETS TO ALLAN HOLDSWORTH PLAYING WHAT HE HAS DONE LIKE ALL REVOLUTIONARY PEOPLE IS LISTEN TO YOUR INNER VOICE BELIEVE IN YOURSELF GO FORWARD AND NOT BE AFRAID . SO TO THE MASTER GUITARIST AND MUSICAL LIBERATOR ALLAN HOLDSWORTH THANK YOU AND - R.I. P- .BECAUSE YOU HAVE SHOWN US THE CAPACITY OF THE HUMAN SPIRIT THOUGH YOUR MUSIC.

[@digineet8421]

@@batmandeltaforceboo

[@adrianthornton-mark3219]

Thank you❤

[@spacevspitch4028]

"...before I croak." "You'll never croak." 😢😢😢

[@ts4gv]

bro you came back a year later to say the same thing

[@MarvinSheats]

'I just look at the pictures'.... Love it Allan

[@bobyk87]

Allan had a totally different aproach to guitar. It seems it all started with studying scales on the whole neck, visualizing all notes / intervals as a whole thing and pretty much inventing his own names and senses. So many questions make no sense to him. Awesome.

[@fondfarewell2]

Allan personality reminds me of Paul McCartney a bit.

[@winstonschwarz1636]

Yeah but Macca is a scouser and allan was a yorkshireman. Worlds apart!

[@WbadasAllDay]

Answer: British people... Haha Jk

[@TheWoodenZozimos]

A similar timbre of voice perhaps

[@WbadasAllDay]

TheWoodenJeremy British people.

[@abergroov]

yeah he does

[@stratoleft]

That would be funny if Allan just said, .. "I think you people got me all wrong. I really don't want to be standing here, listening to you goofs run your mouths. It's not like you idiots look like Britt Ekland,.. ya know? So, ..um, I'm just gonna take a trip to the Isle of Wight right now and hang out for awhile. Don't touch my stuff while I'm gone."

[@KevinSebesky]

18:50 - 19:10 - Rest in Peace, Allan.

[@sebring1960]

Just an inquisitive audience. I wish Randy Rhoads had the opportunity to answer questions like these, instead of that recorded seminar he did just a couple of months before he was killed.

[@stanL9]

RIP master :(

[@tranquilitybase6417]

‘...until I croak...’. So sad that he’s gone.

[@NeilRaouf]

there are all the berklee/julliard/eastman noobs (not used to use their brain unless someone tells them to) listening to an autodidact. you can‘t learn this at uni. everybody nowadays is so obsessed with getting into music schools.

[@MarshallllllllWalk3r]

You sound detached from the real music scene while being judgemental about it.

[@f.b.1311]

I think it's Jonathan Kreisberg sitting in the front. Damn, Holdsworth will be missed.

[@sebring1960]

He already is....... Especially from his family. RIP Allen.

[@Ariel-l3v]

Nice to know I’m not the only one who sold his acoustic in financial difficulty

[@NeilRaouf]

ah man, Allan! ❤

[@BurntMcgurnt]

I swear that's Johnathon kreisberg at about 230

[@-thetapestream-channel1808]

maybe ,in a thousand years , we began yo understand his melodies deeply... we're just human..... we miss u man!

[@gwenaellafitte]

Genious. Everybody is hoping for a clue at "how? ", but with Allan it's just impossible

[@svenjansen2134]

Sign of absolute genius.

[@sseltrek1a2b]

i think it's interesting that a lot of the questions are about how to unlock the "secrets" of his playing...he obviously did a ton of woodshedding to figure his approach to playing, but so much of what he did was completely intuitive (which is a very hard thing to communicate in practical/methodical terms...)...

[@paulsimon6544]

Legend!

[@Gregorypeckory]

The guy asks about "Slonimsky's Thesaurus of Scales and Melodic Patterns". The author's entire name is Nicolas Slonimsky, and it is an incredible book, very famous, which you can find in many music stores, or obviously online as well. It was written as a resource for composers, and is an incredible wellspring of ideas that helped Allan and many others (famously John Coltrane), develop and expand their vocabulary. Side note: Slonimsky and Zappa were good buds.

[@N0B0DY_SP3C14L]

It is a grimoire of knowledge, but it is not a journey for the faint of heart.

[@svenjansen2134]

Thanks for the heads up.

[@Gregorypeckory]

@@N0B0DY_SP3C14L It's not a journey; it's a reference book like the word "thesaurus" in it's title implies. Nobody should be intimidated by it, nor approach it as a job that needs to be completed. You don't have to work your way through it, any more than you have to read the dictionary from A to Z. I'm sure 99% of the people who buy it never play their way through the entire book; most probably just grab a few ideas when the mood strikes. If you do want to dig in and read a lot of it, it's not that hard, because of the way it's organized; you quickly find out that most pages contain one idea repeated over and over in different registers; once you get the first line; the rest are pretty easy, especially for guitar players, because you are often just playing the same shapes moved to different positions on the neck, so muscle memory helps a lot once the original shape is played through. Imo, it should be approached with joy and excited anticipation for the interesting new ideas you're bound to come away with just dipping into it and exploring. A random page and a half hour can result in a newly expanded musical vocabulary. One session with the book is worth the price of entry; every time the urge strikes after that is a bonus. Everybody should buy it and nobody should be afraid of it.

[@N0B0DY_SP3C14L]

@@Gregorypeckory While indeed, Slonimsky did a marvelous job, starting simply, and gradually, systematically building complexity in his presentations, the concepts get pretty damn heavy pretty quickly. Much of it seems to feel kind of academic, more useful as exercises and studies than emotionally expressive phrases. That said, I commend your positive attitude toward this immense compendium of knowledge. I also agree that every single time one approaches studying the ideas depicted in the Thesaurus with even a modicum of discipline, one emerges a stronger player. Sometimes it seems like less fun than other times, but it is always helpful.

[@sseltrek1a2b]

so much here- i love his comment about reading music...reading is a great skill to have, but it depends on what you are looking to do as a musician (ie: i've noticed that people who are trained to rely on sheet music have a really hard time with improvisation)...this clearly is not where Allan lived- it wasn't a requirement for where he was bent in terms of writing, etc...the brilliance that came out of his music without this skill is mind-blowing...

[@P00TANARA]

He never closed the volume..!!

[@dynamicalbiz]

Interesting that he mentions Debussy as an influence because I always thought it was in his music.

[@avantprog6902]

Clair de lune👍

[@supahsekzy]

Definitely, also good to see that as a non-musician, your taste is eclectic enough to identify influences of music that exist almost a century apart in time. Right on!

[@cougar2013]

I respect his intellect, disposition, and talent. I just can’t get into the music. It’s like I wish I loved it but I can’t seem to convince myself that it gives me the feeling that the music I like gives me.

[@svenjansen2134]

Totally understand that. It's useless noodling at times but there's something behind it to discover. I found little satisfying things in his music so I gotta keep listening. He's really good.

[@SurveyofFilmMusic]

You're not going to find AH talking about the HOW of his technique. he is old school, and he's not going to explain really how he plays the way he plays. 16:00 is a fine example of that.

[@TheWoodenZozimos]

I thought he answered it fairly well - just in an abstract way, as is would take a lot of time to vocally describe ways in which his chords move like multiple fluid melodies. He’s not gonna spell a bunch of notes out in a clinic. But he gives a good verbal description of what his chordal playing sounds like.

[@raymondkarlsson9794]

Heard Allan first on Tony William’s Believe It. From the top! A playmate (guitarist) had the album and as a drummer I was blown away. We even played the Tempest song Foyers of fun in our band at that time (mid 1970’s). I went into jazz and fusion but kept an eye/ear on AH along the way. Some great guitar and bass collegues of mine got me hip to many AH Trio recordings. I have a DVD with Alan Pasqua, Jimmy Haslip and Chad Wackerman live at Yoshi’s in San Fransisco that I bought and really enjoy. Nice with this clip of q & answers, (not so) small talk!

[@avantprog6902]

Damn, which was that album that Allan sang on? He was surprisingly soulful.

[@fred8097]

Hmm I’m 90% sure that’s Jonathan Kreisberg asking the question at 1:55

[@dynamicalbiz]

Thanks for that note. Not a musician so my approach was not technical at all although happy to see my ears work reasonable right. .

[@HalJikaKick]

He's pretty buzzed :)

[@azizal-azfar1930]

2:14 that guy looking directly at your soul!

[@JamesDaSilvamusic]

Dude he is so funny!!!

[@moretrio]

It's cool to hear Allan making a comment on EVH! Two giants!

[@frederf69]

AH with Jaco. Wouldn't that be something

[@svenjansen2134]

In Heaven

[@Journeymanlive]

Well Skuli on Hard Hat Area is already more than enough for me! what a band, with a top form Allan.

[@rmcfee]

Why doesn't someone get him a glass of wine!

[@TheWoodenZozimos]

Where’s the part 2 to this?

[@Harbaksh1234]

13:09 ... That's an amazing thing to find out!

[@spacevspitch4028]

"Before I croak!" "You'll never croak." 😥😥😥

[@ts4gv]

bro you came back a year later to say the same thing

[@ScottCurts]

"Read?! I just look at the pictures " lmao

[@jcshirke]

Neeeever mind. He repeats the title at 31:40. ;)

[@michaelvaladez6570]

Ni e to see this clinic. I me him briefly at an intermission, quite a gentle soul, for taking the time out to chat with.May he rest in peace.I like everyone' else was in shocked of his passing at the age of 70.His legacy will live on.Blesssings to his family.

[@paulrichards13]

"Wow" - Wow guy

[@andrewgillis8572]

horn style guitar players Sonny Greenwich, Ray Gomez, Corrado Rustici, Michel Cusson, the genius John McLaughlin, Hendrix by times; because they came along after the horn players John Coltrane & Miles - plus I will add, came after pianist Ahmad Jamal. JM said he found AH's charts mind-boggling

[@plec15]

🐐

[@andym28]

Rarely heard Americans sound nervous. Guess it was a mark of respect.

[@williamking7420]

Love Holdsworth but this is a terrible audio setup. Too bad...

[@foobarbazquux]

T

[@jcshirke]

What's the book that's referenced at roughly 30:00? Does anyone know the title? I had a hard time making it out.

[@jeremyrathod5604]

Wow, what a genuis and what a personality.

[@vasantiago3038]

Allan was credited as the soloist in the movie Speed. .

[@supahsekzy]

Yeah man. Whenever you hear really melodic, major Lydian playing, Debussy is inevitably behind it.

[@Samsgarden]

Is this album going to be released?

[@tonyspada2744]

He was a nice guy ❤

[@superjam1446]

We want to hear about the chords!

[@papasmurf4441]

26:48

[@anobiumpertinax]

Thanks for this video!

[@dnstone1127]

Damn, had no idea he had died RIP.

[@MauricioOnofreOsorio]

R I P Allan

[@MrEdwinvai]

❤️

[@EsaelPaggin024]

First question was answered with WE DID! or WE ARE! So..... where is Snakes and Ladders?!?

[@Samsgarden]

And what's going on with the so-called album he did with Donati?

[@EsaelPaggin024]

are you thinking of the Planet X stuff? That's the only collab they did on an album

[@taunokekkonen5733]

Allan holding a clinic is a waste of time, apart from the banter. No one will ever understand how he heard music.

[@knumorvid]

Well, the answer is already In his music. I guess people are too lazy to transcribe him.

[@papasmurf4441]

19:48

[@monkeysbum999]

If you have to ask ,you wont understand the answer