ALL FRETS - July/August 2018 ENTIRE ISSUE | Seite 25

has gone by very quickly and they are both young
ladies now. Sophia is soon to be 17 and Noelle is
19 and has just finished her first year at Vanguard
University as a Theatre Arts Major.
Both the girls are very musical and have become
excellent dancers. They tap dance like crazy, sing
like birds and play the piano. Noelle recorded a
CD 2 years ago called Ain’t We Got Fun. She
picked the tunes and I arranged the music and
produced the CD. She sang some great songs
from the 30’s and 40’s and Sophia played brushes on the project. I played guitar with string bass
and cornet rounding out the group. Playing music with my kids is such a thrill and their talent and
enthusiasm keeps me going and wanting to play more.
Sophia has especially excelled on the piano and
leads worship at the Christian church we attend.
We have just recorded four songs on video with
our group Euphoric Swing for promotional reasons
and will be seeking local gigs and jazz festivals. Go
to “noelleroth.com” and look for a “videos” tab
where you will find links to these and other vid-
eos.
After Leaving the Night Blooming Jazzmen I have
continued to play banjo and guitar but opportuni-
ties to do so have diminished greatly since the
1980’s. I rarely get called to play banjo anymore
but occasionally still have guitar gigs. I play mostly
electric guitar in sort of a late 1940’s jazz style (I’m
a big Barney Kessel fan). I enjoy quartets and trios
mostly but my favorite is playing duo gigs if I’m
not playing with my kids. My bass player (John Dominguez) plays like Ray Brown and we can make
a lot of music for just two guys. On occasion I have also added Sophia on brushes to make it a trio
which is great fun.
My transition from banjo to guitar was something
that happened over many years and while I still
love the banjo music I grew up playing, my focus
is now on guitar in a jazz setting. I found that my
banjo playing abilities were not much help to me
with regards to my guitar playing. Apart from the
obvious things like harmonic knowledge and rep-
ertoire, I had some very important changes to
make. My right hand was built for playing the
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