Mick Goodrick has been an influential guitarist for the past 25 years.  Both as a teacher and player, Goodrick has been an important figure in the conceptual developments and innovations that have emerged in contemporary jazz guitar styles.
     Goodrick’s solo on Jimmy Van Heusen’s "like Someone in Love" from Harvie Swartz’s 1991 release Arrival (Novus) contains many stylistic characteristics that flow effortlessly from Goodrick’s sophisticated improvisational concept.  Phrases consisting of motivic development, angular intervallic lines and polyrhythms can be found within this 47-bar solo.  Goodrick plays one chorus over the ABAC song form and solos on an eight-bar vamp once before and once after his solo.
      In measures 1-7, Goodrick develops a rhythmic and melodic motif over a vamp on F+7 and Eb+7 derived from the F whole-tone scale.  He plays a set of intervallic skips from this scale that includes jumps of major 3rds and minor 6ths.  Contrasting the use of space in the previous phrase, Goodrick develops a longer melodic line in bars 10-17.  Rhythmically, the line consists of mostly eighth notes, but Goodrick avoids melodic monotony by using intervallic and arpeggiated lines that are often contrasted with step-wise and chromatic lines.  Consequently, the contour and shape of the line contains both angular skips and horizontal form.
      In measures 18-25, Goodrick develops another long phrase, primarily focusing on the steady increase of rhythmic density.  In bars 18-22, he begins with eighth and quarter notes followed by some cross rhythms and a triplet.  In measures 23-25, the rhythms develop from eighth to 16th notes including a "sheets of sound" 5-over-4 polyrhythm.  Melodically, this line is almost entirely diatonic, using major, melodic minor and dorian scales. Goodrick executes the line with his trademark legato left-hand technique using slides, hammer-ons and pull-offs.
      Goodrick’s combination of rhythmic variety and diverse line contour continues in the next four-bar phrase in measures 25-28.  Again, the melodic makeup of the line is primarily diatonic.  In bars 29-33, he plays a phrase of fluid 16th notes that contains more angular intervallic skips and chromatic lines derived from altered and superimposed melodic material.  Goodrick plays the line using legato techniques to achieve horn-like sound and articulation.
      The next phrase in measures 34-36 is entirely diatonic, consisting of either scale or chord tones. In bars 34-35, Goodrick plays a diatonic linear idea derived from the D harmonic minor and D major scales.  In measure 36, he plays an angular phrase derived from an Ab diminished arpeggio over the Abdim7 chord.
      The last two measures of the song form, bars 37-38, contain the following superimposed arpeggio; an Ab major triad over the D7b9; a Gb arpeggio over the G-7; and an E major triad over the C7.  The rest of the solo consists of the eight-bar ending vamp over F+7 and Eb+7 chords.  Over this Goodrick plays mostly linear phrases derived from the Eb whole-tone scale with some non-diatonic chromatic approach notes.  DB
Guitarist Timothy Cummiskey is a member of the Jazz Studies faculty at Ohio State University in Columbus, Ohio, where he teaches jazz guitar and jazz ensemble.  He earned a master’s degree from Bowling Green States University in 1996, where he was a graduate assistant in the guitar and jazz studies departments.