Fingerstyle Jazz Guitar

the whole world of music for me. For 10 years I played
only straight ahead jazz. I played with Atilla Zoller, and
studied as much as I could with Lenny. Like Davis, Lenny
was very big on finding original ideas and developing your
own style.”
Eventually the different musical elements of Mann’s
background began to connect. He returned to the acoustic
guitar, and began writing his own music and playing with
fingerpicker and visionary John Fahey.
“I felt it was finally time for me to play my own music,
rather than ‘here’s a Gary Davis tune’ or ‘here’s a jazz tune,“
Mann says. “My own music, that’s what I hear. Use whatever
influences you have, but try to find your own voice. To get
on stage and play a straight copy of a Robert Johnson
tune doesn’t work. I’d rather listen to the record.”
Three of Mann’s four originals – “Mr. Guitar,” “Gypsy
Girl,” and “Cat Burglar” – are also featured on Mann’s
“Stairwell Serenade” album on Acoustic Music Records.
All of the tunes for that record were written with a particular
guitarist in mind, more or less as tributes.
“I tried to think of all the guitarists who have greatly
inspired me – Gary Davis, Eddie Lang, Lonnie Johnson,
Joseph Spence – and I tried to write something that
emulates the feeling that makes their playing special,”
Mann says. “For me, it was like pulling together all these
bits and pieces I had floating around in my mind for years.
I’m very happy with that record. In a way it was very
cleansing for me.”
Mann attributes the inspiration for the stylish, vintage
jazz lines of “Mr. Guitar” to Eddie Lang.
“It’s not directly based on him, but I was trying to use
a little bit of jazz harmony while keeping a kind of bluesy
fingerpicking feel in it. The middle is just a three or four
chord improvisation, like a blues.”
“Uptown Tails,” from Mann’s “Heading Uptown” album
on Shanachie, was written in a tuning favored by Lonnie
Johnson.
“It’s a dropped D and G tuning I learned from his
records,” Mann says. “His creativity, tone, and swing, it’s
really inspiring – at least his instrumentals are to me.
They’re straight ahead blues, they’re fingerstyle, but they
have a very different voice. He was one of the first guitarists
I heard outside of the Blind Blake tradition who really made