Intermediate
Intermediate
- Create beautifully dissonant tension within your solos.
- Summon “whales” with volume swells.
- Use repetition to empower everyday blues licks with devastating intensity.
Come along for the ride as Stern stuns the 1987 Newport Jazz Festival crowd, taking them from quiet jazz meditations to soaring blues-drenched crescendos.
Throughout my college years, I spent countless nights at New York City’s now-defunct 55 Bar, sitting literally six feet away from guitarist Mike Stern as he and his trio blew the roof off of the place time and time again. With that in mind, let’s set our time machine for the 1987 Newport Jazz Festival, and revisit a particularly thrilling live performance of “Original Rays,” an earworm of a tune co-written by Stern with late tenor saxophone legend Michael Brecker (the bandleader here) and keyboardist Don Grolnick. The original, more subdued studio version can be heard on Brecker’s 1987 debut solo album, in which Pat Metheny handles guitar duties, delivering a typically masterful solo. But it was Stern who would play guitar in Brecker’s touring band, bringing his trademark musical mix of beauty and brashness. Let’s take a trip through the tour de force that is Stern’s solo in a joyously raucous performance of “Original Rays.”
First, here’s the tune in its entirety. It’s recommended to watch all the way through to experience the full impact of Stern’s solo, which begins just as Brecker’s own spirited turn ends, at 5:24.
Whirling, Swirling Bends
Right from the very first notes of his solo, Stern reveals a quiet cleverness. Revisit the previous link to catch the moment he takes Brecker’s final phrase and playfully borrows it for his entrance. Stern is always listening to his bandmates, and this isn’t exclusive to jazz players. A classic use of call-and-response can be heard in the iconic outro solo in the Eagles’ “Hotel California.” As an aside, watch as Joe Walsh uses Don Felder’s exit lick for his entrance.
“Original Rays” is in the key of F major, and Stern’s solo begins with a brief bluesy interlude based around the F major pentatonic scale (F–G–A–C–D). Over the quietly understated droning F5 tonality, he continues his solo with his Boss DD-3 delay remaining on what he jokingly calls his “save the whales” setting. In Premier Guitar’s 2018 Rig Rundown, Stern briefly discusses why he keeps two DD-3s on his board; plus, you’ll see his exact “whale” settings on the left delay.
Next, Stern employs a series of ghost bends—silently bent notes where only the release is heard. He sounds each with a volume swell, which masks any pick attack, resulting in a smooth violin-type entrance. The key is to start with your volume turned completely off. Then, after silently striking the note, quickly turn up your volume knob to return to full volume. Watch as Stern executes a series of volume swells below, then play through Ex. 1 to take a few practice swings, without any pesky bending involved.
Here, Stern mostly explores the F major scale (F–G–A–Bb–C-D-E), but creates tension by targeting colorful notes. In that same segment, he targets the ninth (G) in two different octaves, allowing its tension to hang in the air before quickly resolving to the root (F) with the bend’s release (Ex. 2).
A Different Kind of Tension
Stern switches off his delay and wends his way through the next section by improvising a series of beautiful single-note passages. He again looks to create moments of tension, although this time he purposefully targets notes that are out of key. The phrase at 5:48 (Ex. 3) has him leaning briefly but forcefully into the flat sixth (Db) at beat 1 of measure 2, adding a welcome tension.
Stern again targets the Db with the chromatically-inflected phrase that begins at 6:01 (Ex. 4), allowing it to hang in the air just a bit longer than we think he might. It’s dissonant, but somehow beautiful.
I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention the “Stern-ism” at 5:56 (Ex. 5), a trio of arpeggios moving up the neck in the key of F, implying Fmaj7 (F–A–C–E), then spelling out Bb (Bb–D–F) and C (C–E–G). You’ll catch him using variations of this phrase a few times at any given show to great effect. In fact, we’ll look at another a bit later in this solo.
Using Repetition to Maximize Intensity
At 6:14, Stern glances back at bassist Jeff Andrews and drummer Adam Nussbaum as if to say, “Get ready. It’s on.” With that, Stern engages his now-vintage Boss SD-1 Super Overdrive and ventures into blazing new territory, as he and the band begin to bring the simmer up to a boil. Experiencing him ratchet things up like this at 55 Bar was my introduction to the devastating power of the blues, of which Stern is a master.
There are so many fantastic moments that follow, as Stern moves from one thrilling crescendo to the next, each one more exhilarating. But it’s not just that he’s playing blues licks, it’s how he’s playing them. Sure, he has a nasty tone and is really digging in, but it’s his use of repetitive phrases that so often drives his points home. The first occurrence of this is at the 6:36 mark, with Stern employing stinging bends within a repeated blues phrase, varying it slightly each time (Ex. 6).
Listen further and you’ll hear him repeat more phrases, sometimes just once, but you can feel the energy rising every time. The phrase at 7:10 harkens back to Ex. 5’s ascending arpeggios, this time adding hints of repetition to the mix to create explosive bursts of ferocity (Ex. 7).
Then, following more examples of the power of repetition, Stern truly begins to soar at the 7:27 mark, where he repeats a simple blues lick with reckless abandon, as in Ex. 8. Use the tab only as a guide, as Stern fits in as many repeats of the phrase as he possibly can over these bars.
How much more can the audience take? No matter, because Stern has even more in store for them, and us. At 7:41, he makes his way over to his board to turn his delay back on, and proceeds to completely bring down the house. A whirlwind of lethal bends and blues fury follows, along with a blazing set of climbing tremolo-picked bent unisons at 8:10 (Ex. 9). The contrast of the longer note values here adds a palpable sense of drama, but you’ll need to pick just about as fast as you can in frenzied fashion, as Stern does.
Like a long-awaited exhale, the solo culminates with a thunderous F5 chord, announcing that we’ve arrived at our final destination.
Stern’s solo that day, like so many of his others, is a master class. He takes the audience on a thrill ride, at times seeming to fly out of control, but somehow always safely landing on his feet. A standing ovation follows. What more can be said?
I thought that was the end of the story. But just before finishing this lesson, I decided on a whim to do a quick YouTube search on “Michael Brecker Band 1987,” and I discovered even more gold. Here is Stern doing it yet again a few months later, and just as he did every night, absolutely destroying:
We’re giving away more gear! Enter Stompboxtober Day 24 for your chance to win today’s pedal from Maxon!
Maxon OD-9 Overdrive Pedal
The Maxon OD-9 Overdrive Effects Pedal may look like your old favorite but that's where the similarity ends. Improved circuitry with a new chip yields the ultra-smooth dynamic overdrive guitarists crave. Drive and Level controls tweak the intensity and volume while the Hi-Boost/Hi-Cut tone controls adjust brightness. Features true bypass switching, a die-cast zinc case, and 3-year warranty. From subtle cries to shattering screams, the Maxon OD-9 delivers a huge range of tones.
Features
Improved circuitry with a new chip yields ultra-smooth dynamic overdrive
Drive and Level controls tweak the intensity and volume
Hi Boost/Hi Cut tone controls adjust brightness
True bypass switching
Die-cast zinc case
AC/DC operation (order optional Maxon AC210N adapter)
Product Specs
Input: 1/4" mono jack
Output: 1/4" mono jack
Power: 9V DC, 6 mA, center pin minus (not included)
Dimensions: (WxDxH) 74 mm x 124 mm x 54 mm
Weight: 580g
Here’s part two of our look under the hood of the funky rhythm guitar master’s signature 6-string.
Hello and welcome back to Mod Garage. In this edition, we’re continuing our journey through the Fender Cory Wong Stratocaster wiring, bringing it all together.In the previous installment, the last feature on the funky 6-stringer’s signature axe that we discussed was the master volume pot and the corresponding treble-bleed circuit. Now, let’s continue with this guitar’s very special configuration of the tone pots.
Tone pot with Fender Greasebucket tone system:
This 250k tone pot is a standard CTS pot with a 90/10 audio taper found in all U.S.-built Fender guitars. The Cory Wong guitar uses the Fender Greasebucket system, which is added to the pot as a ready-to-solder PCB. The Greasebucket PCB is also available individually from Fender (part #7713546000), though you can use conventional electronic parts for this.
Fender introduced this feature in 2005 on some of the Highway One models and some assorted Custom Shop Strats. The Greasebucket name (which is a registered Fender trademark, by the way) is my favorite of Fender’s marketing names, but don’t let it fool you: Your tone will get cleaner with this modification, not greasy and dirty.
According to Fender, the Greasebucket tone circuit reduces high frequencies without adding bass as the tone knob is turned down. Don’t let that description confuse you. A standard Strat tone control does not add any bass frequencies! As you already know, with a passive system you can’t add anything that isn’t already there. You can reshape the tone by deemphasizing certain frequencies and making others more prominent. Removing highs makes lows more apparent and vice versa. In addition, the use of inductors (which is how a passive pickup behaves in a guitar circuit) and capacitors can create resonant peaks and valleys (band-passes and notches), further coloring the overall tone.
Cory Wong bringing the funk onstage.
This type of band-pass filter only allows certain frequencies to pass through, while others are blocked. The standard tone circuit in a Strat is called a variable low-pass filter (or a treble-cut filter), which only allows the low frequencies to pass through while the high frequencies get sent to ground via the tone cap.
The Greasebucket’s band-pass filter is a combination of a high-pass and a low-pass filter. This is supposed to cut high frequencies without “adding” bass, which has mostly to do with the resistor in series with the pot. That resistor means the control will never get to zero. You can get a similar effect by simply not turning the Strat’s standard tone control all the way down. (The additional cap on the wiper of the Greasebucket circuit complicates things a bit, though; together with the pickups it forms an RLC circuit, but I really don’t want to get into that here.)
The standard Fender Greasebucket tone system is used in the Cory Wong Strat, which includes a 0.1 μF cap and a 0.022 uF cap, along with a 4.7k-ohm resistor in series. These are the values used on the PCB, and without the PCB it looks like the illustration at the top of this column.
Push-push tone pot with preset overwriting function:
The lower tone pot assigned to the bridge pickup is a 250k audio push-push pot with a DPDT switch. The switch is used to engage a preset sound by overwriting the 5-way pickup-selector switch, no matter what switching position it is in. The preset functionality has a very long tradition in the house of Fender, dating back to the early ’50s, when Leo Fender designed a preset bass sound on position 3 (where the typical neck position is on a modern guitar) of the Broadcaster (and later the Telecaster) circuit. Wong loves the middle-and-neck-in-parallel pickup combination, so that’s the preset sound his push-push tone pot is wired for.
The neck pickup has a dedicated tone control while the middle pickup doesn’t, which is also another interesting feature. This means that when you hit the push-push switch, you will engage the neck and middle pickup together in parallel, no matter what you have dialed in on the 5-way switch. Hit the push-push switch again, and the 5-way switch is back to its normal functionality. Instead of a push-push pot, you can naturally use a push-pull pot or a DPDT toggle switch in combination with a normal 250k audio pot.
Here we go for the wiring. For a much clearer visualization, I used the international symbol for ground wherever possible instead of drawing another black wire, because we already have a ton of crossing wires in this drawing. I also simplified the treble-bleed circuit to keep things clearer; you’ll find the architecture of it with the correct values in the previous column.
Cory Wong Strat wiring
Courtesy of singlecoil.com
Wow, this really is a personalized signature guitar down to the bone, and Wong used his opportunity to create a unique instrument. Often, signature instruments deliver custom colors or very small aesthetic or functional details, so the Cory Wong Stratocaster really stands out.
That’s it! In our next column, we will continue our Stratocaster journey in the 70th year of this guitar by having a look at the famous Rory Gallagher Stratocaster, so stay tuned!
Until then ... keep on modding!
The Keeley ZOMA combines two of iconic amp effects—tremolo and reverb—into one pedal.
Key Features of the ZOMA
● Intuitive Control Layout: Three large knobs give you full control over Reverb Level, Tremolo Rate,and Depth
● Easy Access to Alternate Controls: Adjust Reverb Decay, Reverb Tone, and Tremolo Volume withsimple alt-controls.
● Instant Effect Order Switching: Customize your signal path. Position tremolos after reverb for avintage, black-panel tone or place harmonic tremolo before reverb for a dirty, swampy sound.
● True Bypass or Buffered Trails: Choose the setting that best suits your rig.
Three Reverb and Tremolo Modes:
● SS – Spring Reverb & Sine Tremolo: Classic spring reverb paired with a sine wave tremolo for that timelessblack-panel amp tone.
● PH – Plate Reverb & Harmonic Tremolo: Smooth, bright plate reverb combined with swampy harmonictremolo.
● PV – Plate Reverb & Pitch Vibrato: Achieve a vocal-like vibrato with ethereal plate reverb.
Reverb: Sounds & Controls
● Spring Reverb: Authentic tube amp spring reverb that captures every detail of vintage sound.
● Plate Reverb: Bright and smooth, recreating the lush tones of vibrating metal plates.
● Reverb Decay: Adjust the decay time using the REVERB/ALT SWITCH while turning the Level knob.
● Reverb Tone: Modify the tone of your reverb using the REVERB/ALT SWITCH while turning the Rate knob.
Tremolo: Sounds & Controls
● Sine Wave/Volume Tremolo: Adjusts the volume of the signal up and down with smooth sine wavemodulation.
● Harmonic Tremolo: Replicates classic tube-amp harmonic tremolo, creating a phaser-like effect withphase-split filtering.
● Pitch Vibrato: Delivers pitch bending effects that let you control how far and how fast notes shift.
● Alt-Control Tremolo Boost Volume: Adjust the boost volume by holding the REVERB/ALT footswitch whileturning the Depth knob.
The ZOMA is built with artfully designed circuitry and housed in a proprietary angled aluminum enclosure, ensuring both simplicity and durability. Like all Keeley pedals, it’s proudly designed and manufactured in the USA.
ZOMA Stereo Reverb and Tremolo
The first sound effects built into amplifiers were tremolo and reverb. Keeley’s legendary reverbs are paired with their sultry, vocal-like tremolos to give you an unreal sonic experience.
Your 100 Guitarists hosts are too young to have experienced SRV live. We’ve spent decades with the records, live bootlegs, and videos, but we’ll never know quite how it felt to be in the room with SRV’s guitar sound.
Stevie Ray Vaughan was a force of nature. With his “Number One” Strat, he drove a veritable trove of amps—including vintage Fenders, a rotating Vibratone cab, and a Dumble—to create one of the most compelling tones of all, capable of buttery warmth, percussive pick articulation, and cathartic, screaming excess. As he drew upon an endless well of deeply informed blues guitar vocabulary, his creativity on the instrument seemingly knew no bounds.
Your 100 Guitarists hosts are too young to have experienced SRV live. We’ve spent decades with the records, live bootlegs, and videos, but we’ll never know quite how it felt to be in the room with SRV’s guitar sound. So, we’d like to spend some time imagining: How did it feel when it hit you? How did he command his band, Double Trouble? The audience?
SRV was mythical. His heavy-gauge strings tore up his fingers and made a generation of blues guitarists work a lot harder. And his wall of amps seems finely curated to push as much air in all directions as possible. How far did he take it? Was he fine-tuning his amps to extreme degrees? Or could he get his sound out of anything he plugged into?