LaRue Nickelson, who plays Hillsborough Community College in Ybor City, Florida on Jan. 12, 2025. Credit: Photo by Stephen Splane c/o Tampa Jazz Club. Design by Joe Frontel

The folklore around LaRue Nickelson almost sets the Tampa guitarist up as a mythical figure whose talent is more-or-less unrivaled in the Bay area. His admirers, for the most part, aren’t wrong, but last Sunday afternoon, after working two church gigs in the morning, the 50-year-old spent a few hours partaking in something the proletariat was up to as well.

“I just got done watching the football game,” Nickelson told Creative Loafing Tampa Bay. That matchup on the field saw the Tampa Bay Buccaneers punch a ticket to the playoffs for the fifth season in a row. It was a rare moment in time when Nickelson didn’t have his instrument in his hand, but come the same time next Sunday, he, too, will have just wrapped up what promises to be one hell of a show.

“You should have seen the scores,” Steve Splane told CL. The former host of WUSF’s since-canceled All Night Jazz was talking about the compositions on paper the last time he saw Nickelson—who’s now taught guitar at the University of South Florida for a quarter-century—stage a show similar to the one he’s bringing to Ybor City this weekend.
Nickelson was doling out incredibly-elaborate, six-and-seven-piece band charts, Splane—who now spends his days as a photographer, and on the boards of the Suncoast Jazz Festival and Tampa Jazz Club—explained.

“But then when you listen, it just flows out so effortlessly. It’s a traditional horn section, straight ahead, modern acoustic jazz, but he plays electric guitar and it’s an amazing blend and unique sound,” he added.

For his part, Nickelson, who first jumped into guitar after hearing Black Sabbath’s “Paranoid” and “Iron Man,” has traditionally brushed off the praise, reminding anyone with a compliment that he does have to really work at it.

For a moment though, you could almost hear him smiling through the phone when he added this part: “I mean, it’s fun work. Compared to what you could be doing, it’s hard to say it’s like ‘work, work’, but I spend time on it every day, and pretty much have for my whole life, but it’s definitely more enjoyable than work.”

Not just for him either. Other guitarists can see the devotion Nickelson has to his instrument, and they are in awe of what that time spent together has borne.

“When you dedicate your life to something so abstract, and explore your relationship to it unencumbered, great things can happen,” Nate Najar, another one of the foremost jazz guitarists in the Bay area, told CL.

The guitar, he added, offers so many more branches to explore thanks to its many sounds and all the legends who’ve also devoted their lives to the instrument. He said Nickelson is, without a doubt, one of those great artists. Najar lauded Nickelson’s sensibility around phrasing, and noted how, no matter what’s being played or how he’s playing it, Nickelson is an exemplar of communicating through melody.

“And his sense of taste is unparalleled—these are all things one can learn from awareness, exposure and reflection, but these are not things that can necessarily be taught,” Najar added. “And because his range of experience and exposure is so vast, he plays things that seemingly defy convention.”

Dominic Walker, who leads the DI CoffeeBar Friday Night Jazz series told CL that Nickelson can play anything he wants or hears in his head, and added, “He could be playing any jazz standard and his improvisation inspired by Charlie Parker, Allan Holdsworth, Angus Young, Yngwie Malmsteen and B.B. King all at the same time would not sound out of place.”

Nickelson doesn’t really believe that.

“You try, you know. I’m always trying to get better, but that’s why you practice. If you could do anything that popped into your head, you wouldn’t need to really work at it anymore—but I don’t know anybody who’s done that,” Nickelson said, proving Walker’s other point.

“He’s basically never satisfied,” Walker added, “which annoys the hell out of us because we all dream of playing half as good.”

And there are other players with imagination and chops that capture Nickelson’s attention.

“I’ve seen guys in their 20s and said to myself, ‘Wow, I thought maybe somebody could do that, but I didn’t take the time to do it,” he added. One player Nickelson hung out with, Thomas Griggs, had that effect on him, and so did fingerstyle guitarist Chris Cava.

On Sunday in Ybor City, Nickelson will be surrounded by guys he holds in even higher regard, including longtime drummer Walt Hubbard and Mark Neuenschwander on bass. Nickelson can’t pinpoint exactly when he decided to pursue three-horn arrangements for the original tunes he’s bringing to the gig, but an Orlando-based horn section—Daniel Jordan on tenor sax, Frank Wosar playing trombone, and trumpeter Scott Dickinson—will help bring that vision to life. And instead of piano, he’s tapped Cole Hazlitt to play some chords on vibraphone. “The vibes and guitar blend very well together,” he added.

The show, undoubtedly, will be a peek into a musical mind that’s truly a treasure of the local scene. More than that though, it’s another chance for Nickelson—who records rough MIDI-driven versions of his songs as demos—to explore and play the game.

“That’s the fun,” he said about the experience of getting to bring the sounds from his mind to life alongside other players. “I’m kind of lucky that I get to play music and write music. I’m kind of like a kid with this stuff.”

Tickets to see LaRue Nickelson Group play Tampa Jazz Club inside the Mainstage Theatre at Ybor City’s Hillsborough Community College on Sunday, Jan. 12 are still available and start at $10.

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