Howard Alden
Elegant, seven-string jazz guitar that bridges the gap between 1930s swing and modern precision. Intimate, warm, and deeply melodic for quiet, thoughtful evenings.
Elegant, seven-string jazz guitar that bridges the gap between 1930s swing and modern precision. Intimate, warm, and deeply melodic for quiet, thoughtful evenings.
Howard Alden is a pivotal figure in the preservation and evolution of mainstream jazz guitar. Emerging in the 1980s, a period often dominated by fusion and avant-garde movements, Alden championed the swing idiom and the seven-string guitar technique pioneered by George Van Eps.
His career is marked by a deep reverence for the 1930s and 40s, yet his technical facility, characterized by intricate counterpoint and a wide harmonic vocabulary, places him at the forefront of modern jazz pedagogy. Alden's cultural footprint was significantly expanded by his work on Woody Allen's 'Sweet and Lowdown', where he provided the virtuosic guitar voice for the protagonist and coached Sean Penn in period-accurate technique. Critically, he is regarded as a 'musician's musician', frequently winning Downbeat and JazzTimes polls for his ability to blend traditional styles like stride and manouche with bebop sensibilities. His collaboration with Concord Jazz resulted in a prolific discography that serves as a cornerstone for the neo-traditionalist movement in jazz guitar.
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