Eddie Lang Unaccompanied - April Kisses

JazzDawg

Working through Michael's great 'Unaccompanied Django' book gave me a renewed interest in unaccompanied pieces. I found this link to an Eddie Lang transcription of 'April Kisses'.
http://classicjazzguitar.com/articles/article.jsp?article=55

Listen to the tune and you can understand why Django was influenced by him. Another piece is 'Jeannine ( I Dream of Lilac Time), still looking for a transcription of that one. He did a few others too that are simply amazing displays of his skills. You can find these tunes on his 'Handful of Riffs' CD, available in the new store:
http://shoppingcart.djangobooks.com/ecom-prodshow/lang_riffs.html

And BTW, if you get a chance, buy Michael's book. 8)

Dedwood

Check out the Mel Bay book Masters of the Plectrum Guitar (MB95293). It contains tablature for April Kisses as well as standard notation for several duets; Feelin' My Way, Pickin' My Way, Rainbow's End, and A Handful of Riffs. The book also contains a number of transcriptions (both solo and duet) by the likes of Carl Kress, Dick McDonough, Tony Mottola, Oscar Moore, Mundell Lowe, George Van Eps, Bucky Pizzarelli, and others.

JazzDawg

Thanks, I'll take a look at it. I love that older style stuff. Those guys were amazing.

xav

Sorry to bump an old thread but that site has gone offline since this was posted. The good news is that it's still available via the Internet Archive here: https://web.archive.org/web/20071211133942/http://www.classicjazzguitar.com/articles/article.jsp?article=55

I've also made a PDF copy just in case which is attached below.

Bones

Yeah that's a really fun one to play and a nice solo piece. You can retain the essence of it but still mess around with it and make it your own, no reason to stick to exactly as written, I'm sure Eddie did it different every time.

François RAVEZ

Here is a tablature by René Duchossoir.
Best
François RAVEZ

Lango-Django

Nice tab, Francois, thanks for sharing.

Deux petites chicanes... two minor quibbles...

- Lonnie Johnson's name shouldn't really be listed on the title because he had nothing to do with playing or writing this song.

- I wish Rene D. had transcribed Eddie's intro, too, so that some of our young hotshot guitarists might try their hand at it.



And let it be duly noted that Eddie played this on his heavy-stringed Gibson L-5!

Eddie was fond of these kind of speedy intros...

Bones

Thanks for the tab Francois.

Hey Will. The intro is (I think) 4th fret on the sixth string, open fifth sting, 1st fret fifth string, open fifth string, 4th fret sixth string, open fifth, etc chromatically up to a harmonic on the 5th fret fifth string. If I could figure out how to run the camera on the PC I'd video it. Hmmmm. I'll tab it out if I get a bit of time later.

Bones

Edit, I just opened the tab. Will, the intro is tabbed out and looks as I described.

François RAVEZ

Sorry but the intro is transcribed in the tab as far as I can see?!?
Best
François

Lango-Django

Apologies to everyone. You are absolutely correct, the intro was there all along in plain sight.

Oh, shit. It's official. I'm losing my mind.

This is possibly the explanation for my latest "super-power"... the power to put something down and then ten seconds later, to be totally unable to find it...