Guitar wizard John to serve up Electrifying performance
GUITARIST John Etheridge first put together Sweet Chorus in 1998 to celebrate his association with Stephane Grappelli, who had died the previous year.
More than a dozen years later the band is still going strong, with the combination of Etheridge and violinist Chris Garrick filling the front-line roles of Grappelli and Django Reinhardt in the original Hot Club model, with the excellent Dave Kelbie on rhythm guitar and Andy Crowdy on bass.
"You never really think these things are going to go on," he said.
"The first three or four years we were very active with it and it is a style of jazz that a very broad range of people enjoy. Since then it has been more intermittent. We do things as they come up, but it’s a bit less frequent than it was.
"I probably wouldn’t want to be doing it all the time, but it is still very enjoyable when we do get out. I think of myself as primarily an electric guitar player, so playing acoustic is a nice change for me."
While the Hot Club model remains the template for Sweet Chorus, do not expect a strict sound-alike. The band includes a number of more contemporary tunes rather than stick with the original repertoire and Etheridge plays a bit on electric as well as acoustic guitar.
"Stephane was always keen on that himself — when I played with him I made no attempt to sound or play like Django, and that was what he wanted," Etheridge said.
"I would throw in some bit of modern harmony and he would say: ‘Oh, I like it — I don’t understand it, but I like it!’
"He was always keen for things to be moving on and he liked the rhythms to be a bit broader than the straight Hot Club rhythms."
While he has refreshed the Sweet Chorus repertoire with their take on tunes like John Coltrane’s "Moment’s Notice" and "Giant Steps" on their recordings, their live shows tend to stay closer to the established style.
"A group like this is one where people have certain expectations of how it will sound and I find it interesting to try to find tunes that will work, but that wouldn’t normally be played in this setting," he continued.
"You can give them all kind of twists, but when we play live it tends to be a more straightforward repertoire.
"I am great believer in different approaches to live performances and recording. On stage it’s more about energy and getting a good feeling happening. If you buy a record you have lots of chances to listen to it and pick up the subtleties."
Sweet Chorus is only one of Etheridge’s regular projects. These include duos with Chris Garrick and classical guitar giant John Williams, through to electric jazz rock with Soft Machine Legacy and the Frank Zappa-inspired Zappatistas.
A more recent addition has been a group going under the self-explanatory name of 4 Parts Guitar, featuring Etheridge alongside follow pickers Gordon Giltrap, Clive Carroll and classical guitarist Raymond Burley.
"It’s basically Gordon Giltrap’s inspiration," he explained. "It’s always fun going around with other guitarists, and what appealed to me was the fact that we are all very different, so we are not treading on each other’s toes.
"Doing this kind of project with three other jazz guitarists would be very different — when you are all coming out of the same area and doing much the same thing, that is when it can get a bit edgy and competitive. In this line-up, we are all very different, and we do solo slots as well as the quartet.
"It’s the same thing in the duo with John Williams. That is very enjoyable. John is obviously the pre-eminent classical guitarist around and there is no way I’m going to try to compete with that."
Soft Machine Legacy allows him leeway to work out a different side of his musical talents, and to return to his
first love, the electric guitar — played loud.
"I’m basically an electric guitarist — I started out on electric because I saw Hank Marvin. I love acoustic guitar and it definitely keeps you honest, but I do like to turn it up as well and they are very different instruments. It’s nice to have that variety of projects, but my view is that whatever the context, it is always me playing. I hate being described as versatile — for me, versatile is what a good session musician is, able to play in a particular style or sound on demand.
"I’m not really versatile in that way. I can’t do that — I think it always sounds like me, just playing a different kind of music."
John Etheridge’s Sweet Chorus is at the OneTouch Theatre, Eden Court, on Thursday, 30th June.