Bass Player: Reginald ‘Swing Doom’ Veal

Reginald Veal (born November 5, 1963) is an American jazz bassist and multi-instrumentalist from New Orleans, Louisiana.

Veal grew up in New Orleans where he began piano lessons at a very early age. After receiving a bass guitar as a gift from his father at the age of eight, Veal went on to later join his father’s gospel group as the bassist. Veal studied with the legendary New Orleans bassist Walter Payton. He attended Southern University, studying bass trombone with the clarinetist Alvin Batiste. Veal was a touring bassist with pianist and teacher Ellis Marsalis from 1985 to 1989, and during this time he also worked with Pharoah Sanders, Elvin Jones, Charlie Rouse, Hamiet Bluiett, Harry Connick Jr., Terence Blanchard, Donald Harrison and Marcus Roberts.

Veal began playing in the Wynton Marsalis Quintet in 1987, which became the Wynton Marsalis Septet in 1988. He is the original bassist for the Lincoln Center Jazz Orceshtra. Veal has worked with Ahmad Jamal, McCoy Tyner, Branford Marsalis, Cassandra Wilson, Courtney Pine, Yusuf Lateef, Nicholas Payton, Eric Reed, Dianne Reeves, Dakota Staton,  Junko Onishi, Mark Whitfield and Greg Tardy. Today, Veal resides on the West Coast where he continues to record and tour.

The one thing you are guaranteed of when you are listening to a Marsalis recording is that the bass player will swing. The players Marsalis uses are not always the most chopsy of players compared to the major figures but, when you transcribe the lines, you really get a sense of how sophisticated these players are in terms of note choices and placement. Listen to the swing feel on this transcription of Veal’s lines on the tune ‘Flamingo’ from the 1990 album, ‘Standard Time, Vol. 3: The Resolution of Romance’. Mostly a straight forward read but there are a couple of phrases that will catch you out. It starts as a tango but switches to a swing feel for the solo.