Although most guitarists learn from a variety of mentors and sources in the course of their musical development, not many have studied simultaneously with one of the great bluesmen and at one of the world's most renowned classical music schools. Woody Mann began his studies with the Reverend Gary Davis at the age of 14 and attended the Juilliard prep school program (playing clarinet) while still in high school. He went on to study at Juilliard at the college level, majoring in composition, and then turned to jazz. Mann's hip original pieces, such as the featured "And 3 Not 4" off his most recent album Heading Uptown, blend many of his diverse influences.
Although Gary Davis is responsible for an entire generation of fingerstyle blues guitarists, few of his former disciples sound as original and fresh as Mann. Perhaps his original voice is due to what he calls the "sense of form" his years of classical music study gave him. Or maybe it's just a constant striving to find his own way. "When I studied with Davis, I copied him of course," says Mann, "but I never wanted to perform his music like a straight cop because unless I could do it better or different, why perform it?" Davis' influence continues to show in Mann's playing and in his writing. "To him, it was a discipline of getting the chops and the sounds," Mann explains. "Everything was the sound. And I think that's what I gleaned from him. He'd play a riff, and then I'd play the riff, and he'd say, 'No no, that's not it,' even though the notes were all there. It was the sound and the swing and all those inner things. It wasn't just the song; it was the approach. This has become a part of my playing. When I write a tune, I always think of him."
While studying with Davis (Mann's mother would drive him to his lessons in the Bronx from their home in the suburbs of Long Island), Mann got acquainted with the local blues scene. One of the key people he met was Nick Pearls, who owned Yazoo Records and let the young Mann listen to his extensive collection of old 78s. Pearls also introduced him to legendary players when they came through town. "Nick would call me up and say, 'Hey, Son House is in town,'" Mann recalls. "I recently found all these tapes of Son House and myself, and Joanne Kelly from England, and Bill Williams, and Bukka White, so I'm trying to put a record project together of all of those."
After this intense early exposure to folk and blues, Mann began shifting his focus toward jazz and found a mentor in pianist Lenny Tristano. "He was into improvising," says Mann, "not so much jazz; just sort of learning to make your own music. I studied a lot of the things with him I had learned in classical school but never applied to the guitar: scales, arpeggios, triads, seventh chords, singing solos. . . ."
Mann began playing in trios around New York, and it became clear that learning music from a nonguitar point of view was resulting in a unique voice on the instrument. "In a way, I felt very inadequate as a jazz player, because everyone was learning these hip Wes [Montgomery] solos, and I didn't learn any of that," Mann recalls. "It was just improvising. Even now, when I play jazz, I pick it up and do it my own way. I don't have a lot of the stock-in-trade, Joe Passtype licks. I play all the standards, but in my own way."
Mann says that the tune "And 3 Not 4" is "basically a take-off on a tune of Lenny Tristano's called '2 Not 1' that starts on the second beat. I had been thinking about writing a song to open the show, just something easy, light and loose, to loosen up. I was just horsing around in the studio with [percussionist] Danny Mallon and started thinking about that, and I said, 'Let me start at three.' There is a measure of three, not 4/4. It was just this little riff I was fooling around with--it was very spontaneous. Then we came up with the B section. Since I've been performing it, I keep adding new parts and sections to it. It's very guitaristic."
On the CD version of "And 3 Not 4," the guitar is accompanied only by sparse percussion. The tune combines a solid and catchy melody in the A section with gorgeous, fat jazz voicings in the B section and a middle section that evokes the comping of a modern jazz piano player. The tune shouldn't be too difficult for the intermediate fingerstyle player, although it might introduce some unfamiliar chord extensions. Hearing Mann perform the piece live brings home the importance of keeping the groove going and also proves its potential for improvisation.
Besides maintaining a hectic touring schedule, Mann keeps busy with a variety of projects. In 1997, he produced the late guitarist Atilla Zoller's last and only solo recording, Lasting Love (Acoustic Music Records), which kindled his interest in producing. In addition to composing new material for an upcoming album (most likely with a trio), Mann has been studying fado music on the Portuguese guitar and was invited to perform at the 1998 Lisbon Expo. The author of many guitar books and tapes, he is currently planning an instructional method based on his hours and hours of taped lessons with Reverend Gary Davis. This summer he will also be teaching at the International Acoustic Blues and Slide Workshop in New York City from June 12 to June 17 (for details, contact the seminar coordinator, Trevor Laurence, at PO Box 903, Times Square Station, New York, NY 10108; [516] 767-8718; www.guitarseminars.com). Located on the Columbia University campus, the workshop will feature a core faculty of Mann, Bob Brozman, Martin Simpson, and John Cephas.
-Teja Gerken