We don’t got no piano

[Father Gino]

My band is essentially a guitar/bass/drums unit with a trumpet playing lead singer who is the band leader. Said band leader suggested this tune with me singing it:



The guitar player is not going to know what to do with such a piano centric tune and he’s not familiar enough with the blues/jazz idiom to make something up. Can anyone suggest a similar song with more or less that progression and feel with vocals performed by a guitar/bass/drums band. It doesn’t have to be an upright bass (which I don’t own) and it doesn’t have to be quite so loungy either. I want to give the guitar player a primer on playing that 2/5 turnaround with some more interesting chords and rhythmic ideas thrown in beyond just strumming away waiting for his solo.

Am I making any sense? I’m such an ignorant old hack and I can’t tell him what to do. I was thinking maybe Duke Robillard or Ronnie Earl, but I can’t find a song that fits the bill.

 

[Reedt2000]

How about this one:





Or this one:

 

[electracoyote]

"Stormy Monday" is a popular jazz standard, which is probably why your BL wants to do it, and it can be comped effectively on guitar by even a moderately competent guitar player. He won't have to do everything you hear the piano player doing on that recording.

Find a good chart, key it where the BL wants it, and make it happen. It's not that difficult.

 

[two fingers]

I don't know tue chicken or tue egg order of who did it first.

Is that a blues song that was jazzed up by Lou Rawls' band or is it a jazz song that every single blues artist ever did as a blues song?

I'm guessing 99% of people who have ever heard that song know it as a blues song.

Either way, this is a conversation for your guitar player to have with the band leader. If the guitar player can't, or doesn't want to, play the Lou Rawls version, then he needs to tell the band leader.

(By the way, I love Lou, but this version is terrible.)

 

[mongo2]

Our jazzy guitarist/singer with me on bass duo does Stormy Monday. We even include a swingy section and people love it.

 

[Matt Liebenau]

As already stated, Stormy Monday is a pretty commonly covered song. I’d bet if you search it on the YouTubes you’ll like one of the jillion videos that comes up. That said, the Allman Brothers or T-Bone Walker is never a bad place to start.

 

[Father Gino]

Ok, I’m not getting my point across here. I don’t care that the song is Stormy Monday which to my mind is an iconic blues standard (written by TBone Walker.) I know we could play the song. I know the guitar player could play the proper chords. I’m not so crazy about this rendition either.
What I want is to hear a guitar/bass/drums trio play that kind of feel. There are many, many tunes like that but I can’t think of a one that has no keyboard in it. Seems I always gravitate towards keyboard driven songs but end up in a band with only guitars.

 

[callofcthulhu]

Ok, I’m not getting my point across here. I don’t care that the song is Stormy Monday which to my mind is an iconic blues standard (written by TBone Walker.) I know we could play the song. I know the guitar player could play the proper chords. I’m not so crazy about this rendition either.
What I want is to hear a guitar/bass/drums trio play that kind of feel. There are many, many tunes like that but I can’t think of a one that has no keyboard in it. Seems I always gravitate towards keyboard driven songs but end up in a band with only guitars.

The piano/horns in the Tbone version posted above feels pretty ornamental - you could likely lose it altogether without compromising the feel.

Here's the original power trio playing it:

 

[JRA]

making an arrangement of that tune for your band should be pretty easy. collect/write the changes the way you want to play them, pick a feel, and count it off.

good luck!

 

[Father Gino]

No, no, no. Not the feel of a slow blues.

I want to hear a guitar/bass/drums trio play any song with the feel of the Lou Rawls song. I don’t even want it to be Stormy Monday.

 

[Reedt2000]

No, no, no. Not the feel of a slow blues.

I want to hear a guitar/bass/drums trio play any song with the feel of the Lou Rawls song. I don’t even want it to be Stormy Monday.

Here's an uptempo version of on green dolphin st, bass/guitar/drums/vocals


Closer to what you're looking for?

 

[buldog5151bass]

More people will know a guitar driven version than piano. Trust me.



GREAT tune.

 

[jmlee]

This one's fun in a 3-piece setting. The guitar basically does those sectional horn parts along with some comping. Trumpet solo?

 

[Max Bogosity]

Lock him in a room with a bunch of Grant Green and Kenny Burrell records for the weekend.

 

[Wasnex]

It's just a medium shuffle. Although I can't find a decent Stormy Monday shuffle with guitar it should be no problem for a decent guitarist.

Stylistically it would be similar to the Tbone Shuffle.



So I suggest trying Stormy Monday; if the guitarist is not up to the task...try the TBone Shuffle.

 

[Michedelic]

It sounds like you want is an uptempo shuffle with some swing to it...
The following ideas may not have exactly the same feel, or be strictly trio stuff, but you can adapt it...

 

[M0ses]

It's a "jazz standard" - wooo,,, scary! But if you listen reeeeeally carefully... it's also just a blues. You're rreeaallyy worried your guitar player isn't gonna know what to do with a blues without Lou Rawls to lead him round it? C'mon man. Is he from an alternate timeline where guitar didn't supercede piano as the dominant instrument in blues music way back about the same time blues and jazz diverged out of ragtime? If he's anything like a typical North American guitarist, 85% of everything he's ever played has been the blues, dude...

 

[Michedelic]

Ok, I’m not getting my point across here. I don’t care that the song is Stormy Monday which to my mind is an iconic blues standard (written by TBone Walker.) I know we could play the song. I know the guitar player could play the proper chords. I’m not so crazy about this rendition either.
What I want is to hear a guitar/bass/drums trio play that kind of feel. There are many, many tunes like that but I can’t think of a one that has no keyboard in it. Seems I always gravitate towards keyboard driven songs but end up in a band with only guitars.

I think you may be a little too literal about this...the beauty of many jazzy blues tunes, or blues in general, is that(for the most part) if you have your rhythm section together, you can put anything on top. While some songs hang on a particular signature riff or part which, if you don’t include it, it will be conspicuous in its absence, you can take many others and arrange it in any way you see fit. In the case if the Rawls arrangement, which is different than T-Bone’s original version, as I mentioned earlier, it’s an uptempo swingy shuffle(if that indeed is the groove you need)but you can play it with any feel, on any instrument, you like. Now, back to the format you’re looking for...this just popped into my head. I used to see these guys all the time, and while there’s a bit of horns on the recording for sweetening, they always played it as a straight trio live, and nothing was missing. I’ll contrast it with some earlier renditions...


The old school “hit” version...

...and then a nominally rock’n’roll take on it..

One song, three different ways of doing it.

 

[Eli_Kyiv]

Isn't this song just a plain 12 bar blues? Let the guitarist play chords on quarter notes with inversions and additions, and the job is done.

 

[Michedelic]

Isn't this song just a plain 12 bar blues? Let the guitarist play chords on quarter notes with inversions and additions, and the job is done.

No, there’s the half-step up and down from the I(and sometimes V)and the other passing chord lift that ends on the V(sometimes the II before the V, depending on the version)that sets it apart. I’m most familiar with the Bobby Blue Bland rendition.