Quietly, outside of Los
Angeles, Steve Trovato has been leaving blazing guitar
everywhere he goes.
Currently, he is a full time instructor in the Studio Jazz
Department at the University of Southern California. In
addition, Steve has found the time to author over 20
instructional books for Warner Brothers and Hal Leonard, produce
over 50 instructional videos for the likes of Yngwie Malmsteen
and Paul Gilbert, and has even starred in five of them. His
students have achieved major success and include Scott
Henderson, Frank Gambale, Paul Gilbert and Norman Brown. He has
performed with Chet Atkins, Albert Lee, Robben Ford, Jeff
Berlin, Jerry Donahue and Scott Henderson, and contributes to
five international music publications, including Guitar Player,
Guitar One, Axe, Guitar Club, Guitar World and Chittar, as well
as recording for too many studio and motion picture projects to
list. We caught up with Steve as he completed his new release,
Country Jazzmaster.
One of the things
I have always wondered about is who or what influenced you to
start playing guitar?
Well, I think you'll hear this from a lot of guys; it was the
Beatles. I think I was six years old, and I had been playing the
piano. I did my piano recital and played "The Blue Danube
Waltz." Then I saw the Beatles on Ed Sullivan and I thought,
"Wow, girls never screamed for me playing piano." So that was it
and I started playing the guitar. That was pretty much it, and I
have never looked back.
Did you come across a single
moment that it finally hit you? This is it, this is what I want
to do the rest of my life?
I've never been asked that before; that's a really good
question. I would say that there were three pivotal moments: one
of them was when I saw the Beatles, the second was when I heard
Chet Atkins for the first time, and the third was when I was up
on stage and I got a chance to play with Albert Lee -- that was
when I really knew I wanted to do guitar. For some reason those
guys hit me hard -- they played melodies -- and I always loved
the way I could track it even though it was guitar playing. It
was really very sophisticated. When I heard Chet Atkins play, I
could hear the melody. Even with all the notes that Albert Lee
plays, I can still keep track of it-- that’s what attracted me.
I think since I've been playing, if I have anything, it's the
ability to play a melody.
You’re
originally from New Jersey. How did you end up on the West coast
attending GIT (now the Musicians Institute)?
Like every guitar player on the East Coast, we were always
hungry for information about the guitar. I used to get this
magazine and I saw an ad for this place called GIT in
California. I saw pictures of Larry Carlton, Tommy Tedesco and
other people that I didn't know, like Don Mock and Joe Diorio,
and they were starting this school. They were sort of
advertising it being for studio musicians, and that was what I
wanted to be.
Now that you already have one CD
under your belt, you’ve gone into the studio a second time with
some outside input. How are you achieving your tones with the
studio?
When I did my first album, I just took my rig into the studio
with the thought that if it sounds good live, it will sound good
in the studio. I’ve found that not to be true. I also realized
that amps that are made specifically for recording don't
necessarily sound all that good in the studio. It really depends
on the studio, the mics, and everything else. I brought every
amp that I had down there -- I even borrowed some amps. I ended
up with five or six different amps and I had to just go through
all of them to find out which one sounded the best in that
studio -- with that particular set up of room and microphones. I
wound up actually using a boutique amp from a company in
Virginia called Talos. I love those amps. It's a 60-watt,
one-twelve, and it just has two knobs on it, drive and gain.
"Well, I think you'll hear this from a lot of guys; it was the Beatles. I think I was six years old, and I had been playing the piano. I did my piano recital and played 'The Blue Danube Waltz.' Then I saw the Beatles on Ed Sullivan and I thought, Wow, girls never screamed for me playing piano. So that was it and I started playing the guitar. That was pretty much it, and I have never looked back."
What about
guitars? Did you find that’s the same scenario to be true?
It's something I suspected, but I never really had the chance to
put it to the test. I usually use my G&L Legacy live, with the
Kahler on it because it sounds great. You're playing loud enough
where if there’s a bass, drums and everything cranking you lose
the nuances and the subtlety. But in the studio you retain those
nuances and subtleties because everything is under a microscope.
I found that using different guitars expresses that better.
If I want to play a sensitive, sort of Chet Atkins jazzy piece,
the Legacy wouldn’t work because it sounds too thin, but with a
loud phrase it will sound fine. For a quiet passage, I decided
to use a Gibson -- a Howard Roberts with two old humbuckers that
I had. Of course, for the Straty-sounding things I used my red
Legacy with a Kahler on it, which I absolutely love. For the
rest of the stuff I used one of two Teles: a Fender solid body
Telecaster and a G&L semi-hollow. None of them are stock.
Seymour Duncan custom built the pickups for both of them.
What amps do you prefer for live
performances?
I play rock, I use my Dumble. That, of course, is Alexander
Dumble. It says "Built to win" and it really does, it's just
really something. I put a pedal in front of it to make sure it's
got enough overdrive. In the country bands I use a '65 Pro
Reverb, which Dumble rebuilt for me.
What do you use on the jazz
side?
I use my Talos.
Throughout
your time as a guitar player, you’ve been labeled as the
chameleon of guitar. Do have a huge arsenal of guitars at your
disposal that you have hiding in the back room to take out
whenever you need to?
For the live work I pretty much grab whatever is nearest to the
front door on the way out. I was never really one to take ten
guitars to a session because I figured that one guitar would
sound just as good as 10 guitars, but when you really start to
do this seriously, there are subtle differences between all
guitars that may or may not sound better for the tracks. You
really have to have an arsenal of quite a few to do the job
right.
What would be an ideal arsenal?
I would have to say you have to have a solid body, Strat-type of
guitar with single coil pickups, a single coil Tele-type, a Les
Paul-type solid body with humbuckers, a thin semi-hollow body
sound, like a 345, and a jazz box, then, of course, steel string
acoustic and a nylon string.
You mentioned putting a pedal on
the floor in front of one of the amps.
Live I use a Boss GT-6. I use it for time delay effects such as
reverbs, delays and chorusing. It sounds great for that and it's
also great on the floor. For distortion I've been using the AC
Booster and the RC Booster by Xotic Pedals.
The Xotic pedals are fairly new.
Can you tell us some more?
Oh, I love them. Those are the kind of the boutique pedals that
all the guys in town are using. Scott Henderson told me about
them. Studio guys like Michael Thompson are using them.
Basically, the RC Booster is a pre-amp boost that keeps it
clear, but gives it a little oomph. The AC Booster is an
overdrive -- basically a really high-end Tube Screamer with a
bass control on it. Everybody loves Tube Screamers, but it takes
the bass away from it; this is a Tube Screamer that sounds a lot
more transparent and smoother than normal. You can also roll the
bass back in because it has bass and treble controls.
You
mentioned the Kahler Tremolo on one of your G&L's. What do you
like about it?
The thing I love about the Kahler is its flush and mounted
solidly on the guitar body, versus another one. I won't mention
any names, but the initials are Floyd Rose. It is not really
mounted on the body of the guitar as solidly and or as flush as
a Kahler. With a Kahler, the tone sounds pretty darned good. I
really like that about the Kahler. Since you have that big plate
to rest against the body, you get more natural wood resonance,
it doesn’t sound thin and small. The other thing that I like is
the adjustable string spacing. I don't think other bridges can
do that.
On the first CD, About Time,
you cover a whole spectrum of guitar playing. You do a
dedication to Danny Gatton, you’re hitting a little Django,
you've got "Somewhere Over the Rainbow" from Harold Arlen, and
then you even do Billy Joel's "Root Beer Rag." What can we
expect hear on the new CD?
When I spoke with Steve Vai, he was saying the last CD was
really good but I needed a little bit better recording quality.
He said the problem with the first CD, as far as marketing, is
that I don’t know where to market it stylistically; it's all
over the map. I came up with this concept in my mind called
"Country Jazzmaster," with Jazzmaster being one word, like the
guitar. I kept that thread in my mind as I was recording this
album, and all of the songs leaned into that concept. Everything
that you’re going to hear is country-jazz. Western swing,
country jazz -- that sort of a thing.
There's a thread of continuity running through the whole album
that you will hear. I recorded everything from the old Jerry
Reed tune, "Guitar Man," to "Back Home Again in Indiana," "That
She Could Ever Be," "Panhandle Rag" and my ultimate version of
"Ghost Riders in the Sky."
I still remember this vivdly: a
NAMM show where you, Steve Vai and I were standing around
talking, and Steve hailed you as, "One of the greatest Tele
players of all time." Will we hear evidence of this on the new
CD?
That was very nice of him. But, yeah, that’s what I'm hoping
for, and I think that it’s really extremely well played, if I
can say so myself. We all worked really hard on it.
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Steve Trovato: It's About Time and the new, Country Jazzmaster, are available at: cdbaby.com / myspace.com/stevetrovatomusic
Source: Premier Guitar
Edition: November 2007
Article:
Ask Amp Man with Jeff Bober
Copyright © 2007 by Premier Guitar.