Interview and trio performance with the legendary bassist Reginald VEal

In this video, we welcome our newest tutor, jazz bass icon Reginald Veal, who joined us to film his new course, SwingDoom! We had such a fun time with Reginald, and are excited to share this interview today so that you can get to know him too.

Meet Reginald

With an illustrious career spanning over 40 years, Reginald Veal is one of the living legends of the Jazz bass world. Hailing from New Orleans, he has worked with numerous incredible artists, including Wynton Marsalis, Ahmad Jamal, Elvin Jones, McCoy Tyner, Pharoah Sanders, Ellis Marsalis, Terence Blanchard, Cassandra Wilson, Brandford Marsalis, Harry Connick Jr., Dianne Reeves, Nicholas Payton and the list goes on and on. Reginald is the original bassist for the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra.

It was such an honour to meet Reginald, he has been one of my bass heroes for many years and I absolutely love his playing. In this interview, we discuss his musical origins at the New Orleans Creative Academy, meeting Mr. Ellis Marsalis and how that led to a career playing with many of the greats. We touch on playing with gut strings, his unique tone and some of his earliest influences. At the end of the video, there is a performance of It Could Happen To You by Jimmy Van Heusen, in which Reginald is joined by pianist Jamil Sheriff and drummer Caroline Boaden.

If you enjoy this video, be sure to let us know in the comments on YouTube and make our newest member of the DDB family welcome.

Timecodes:

00:00 Introduction
01:08 Origins of the Swingdoom nickname
01:52 Connection with the Marsalis family
04:50 What were you practicing
07:35 The New Orleans scene
09:25 Reginald's tone & set up
11:40 Jimmy Garrison
15:10 Christian McBride quote
16:55 Reginald's social media
17:54 It Could Happen To You, Trio Performance

Reginald Veal Links:

Instagram
Twitter
YouTube

Discussion Links:

Steve Weiss

Unforgivable Blackness – Wynton Marsalis

Tribute to John Coltrane “A Love Supreme” – Elvin Jones

Gershwin for Lovers – Marcus Roberts

Jimmy Garrison

SwingDoom!

by Reginald Veal

This course comprises 37 lessons on jazz double bass playing over three and a half hours of video. Starting with the basics, it covers a range of topics for the advancing bassist. These concepts have been honed from performing and teaching at the highest level for over 40 years to help you play your best music.

If you want to add some SwingDoom to your bass playing, this is the course for you!