Hello! McLaughlin / Di Meola fan here

Introduce Yourself
#1

Hello everyone!

I thought I’d post a brief introduction, as a longtime follower of Troy’s work and a fan of the site who’s never posted here before.

As you might guess from the title, John McLaughlin and Al Di Meola are probably my two favourite players, and my tastes lean toward jazz, fusion, and rock.

These days I’m mainly playing nylon string, drawing inspiration from the Guitar Trio albums and that period of McLaughlin’s career when he was playing the Abe Wechter nylon string.

Troy’s material has been absolutely transformative in helping me get to grips with this style — particularly in honing the DSX motion that John and Al favour, and which I find most natural too.

I’m hoping to post a few McLaughlin covers and transcriptions soon (there seem to be surprisingly few out there!) and to nerd out with fellow enthusiasts while making some progress in the process. Looking forward to getting to know some of you!

6 Likes
#2

Welcome! I, too, am a big fan of McLaughlin and Di Meola - I look forward to your future posts!

3 Likes
#3

Welcome to the forum, @LS_Guitarist

In the past, did you ever seen Lucas Pickford’s website? He’s bass player and very talented transcriber. He has transcribed some John McLaughlin lead sheets and a few solos -
https://web.archive.org/web/20080729155745/http://www.lucaspickford.com/

His website seems to have disappeared, but the transcriptions are still available on Archive.

3 Likes
#4

Nice to meet you both!

@aliendough thanks so much for sharing that site - I can’t believe I hadn’t come across it before. It’s difficult to find accurate transcriptions of the McLaughlin material, I guess due to his rather idiosyncratic approach.

3 Likes
#5

Hi. Greg Koch just released a short on youtube with what he called an “Angry Mixolydian” scale which was what he called his “Mahavishnu Scale”. Recommended, I’ve been drilling it for the last 3 days because it really has that sound. You might like it if you dig John’s things.

1 Like
#6

Thanks, I’ll definitely check that out!

#7

Hello @LS_Guitarist great to have you here, I’m not on much but I too love McLaughlin and other of the era. Massive jazz rock fusion fan here. Yes McLaughlin’s material is almost non existent, I particularly love his Mahavishnu era and anything on acoustic. I once did a tribute track inspired by him.

1 Like