Sal Soghoian

Bio

Greetings, and thank you for visiting my little corner of the musical world. My name is Sal Soghoian and I play MIDI guitar, which means the sounds emanating from my steel string Godin or Jamstik Studio MIDI Controller ( https://jamstik.com ) are mostly everything but guitar!

After many years of studying and appreciating the Great American Standard Song, I fell into a style of playing the bass line, chords, and melody together in a manner similar to the way a pianist would approach a tune. This style has served me well as I’ve spent many decades playing solo and with duos (joined by great vocalists and instrumentalists) in restaurants, clubs, and the occasional concert.

At this point in my life, I’ve developed the inkling to document some of my favorite arrangements in the desire to capture some of the ideas and concepts I’ve found appealing, and that’ve sparked some joy. I hope you find them enjoyable.

Arrangements and Setup

My arrangements are usually written with the purpose of documenting harmonic and melodic concepts that are not meant to be taken literally, but instead should be rhythmically and melodically enhanced as feels appropriate to the playing situation. In other words, the music may be written more simplified and “on beat” to capture a concept but is meant to “swing” when it is performed.

My setup is the output from the Godin or Jamstik goes to an Apple laptop with Apple’s MainStage software installed. In the app, each string is assigned its own digital instrument, with the bottom two (6, 5) usually assigned to upright bass, and the top four (4, 3, 2, 1) assigned to either piano or vibes (occasionally accordion or maybe Hammond organ). From the computer the sound goes to a Bose tower with sub woofer. Also, I don’t use a pick at all. With one exception: playing the Freddie Green chair for Count Basie charts.

Of course, ultimately the arrangements work fine without all the electronics, even on “regular” guitar or even piano.

One last thing… thank you to SoundSlice for delivering such a wonderful set of tools and services. What a pleasure it is to use them — so empowering and cool.

Cheers! — Sal

Albums:
1) “To Be with You” by “Sal Soghoian” · http://itunes.apple.com/us/album/to-be-with-you/id483013814?uo=4
2) “Catwalk” by “Blue Indigo” · https://music.apple.com/us/album/catwalk/484497877