As the title suggests, I have jumped straight into my jazz studies by prepping for some shows with Otis. This is a great way to get started again, as literally every song I will be doing my own improvisation. My solo's have become rusty, as well as my applied theory, but what better way to learn then to just play and play.
Our repertoire believe it or not does not comprise solely of Jazz standards, actually, out of the 20+ songs we have got, about 6 (at the most) that are Jazz Standards. You see, we are playing for the people's in cafe's and so forth, so as Otis says... It has to be "easy listening". Jazz is easy listening sure, but you will never see a hard bebop band playing as a Sunday brunch hour band. So we have got a collection of Bossa/Samba's including Girl from Ipanema, One note Samba, Blue Bossa and Orfeo. Then we got the Pop/Old school TV show theme songs such as If, Thats what friends are for, Here there and everywhere. Funk we have loads, Otis likes his fusion funk, so we have some Sadao Watanabe, Billy Cobham, Four Play, Shakatak. Then lastly we have our Blues and Standards.
*a jam on Summertime
So this works for me as I have a bunch more songs I can add to my Jazz repertoire list, It also shows me to listen to the music and solo accordingly. You won't hear me doing a bebop solo on "Thats what friends are for".
Otis is also guiding me on how to improvise. He is taking the role of the rock/fusion sound, and I will try to get the smooth bebop classic jazz sound. Some of the best advice he has given, which might sound rather ridiculous and obvious, was that I "must not play bad notes". It really does seem ridiculous, but, its so true. Often I would try to start off fast, and do all these technical licks and most often I will hit a note that is not on scale, and although Jazz is about that, I must try as best I can to stay clear of those notes. I'm not Coltrane yet, so I can't expect to play bad notes well. So instead, I slow down, make sure what I am playing is in key, and accurate. By slowing down, and really concentrating, I avoided hitting those bad notes.
We have our first show this coming Saturday at a local cafe in Hout Bay where photographers (friends of Otis) will be showcasing their art, and we will be showcasing ours!
Saturday, 05 November 2011
This still doesn't count as a week, just wanted to share another video of myself doing a walking bass line . . . but on guitar!
Its still rough, quite frankly, I personally think its very static as in I am always playing the chords on the 1 of the beat. But still, it's progress. It is getting easier and easier to do this.
On a side note - exams are going well! Back to the Jazz soon enough
Sunday, 30 October 2011
This does not count as a week, but just wanted to upload 2 video's.
This is just my walking line of Have you met miss Jones. I saw down with the chord charts for about half an hour to work out my own line that would fit. So I am confident that I got the right notes, all that needs working on next is the 'swing' feel.
The real purpose of this bass walking exercise is to be able to play/transpose this to guitar as well, whilst playing the chords. Like I've been talking the last couple of weeks. I have actually tried playing it on guitar with chords, and I am impressed by how successful its turning out to be. So hopefully soon I will post another video of me playing this standard but with guitar next time.
>>>>>>>>>>>>><<<<<<<<<<<<<<<
This kid, if I can even call him that, is 12 years old and plays some of the best jazz I have ever heard. Just thought this would inspire you all, and maybe make you feel a little sad ha ha, I know I did!
It was my last week of class for the year, so that brings good news and bad news. The good news is that I am finished, and will soon be able to spend more time to my jazz studies, the bad news is that its exam time for the next 3 weeks, so I will not be learning any new jazz, as I must concentrate on my studies. I intend to graduate this year!
Academics aside, this was a good week of learning. I went back to the books again, namely the Jody Fischer ones, as well as some other pdf's I had around my computer. I had neglected the books, and was kinda doing my own thing for the last couple weeks. But its good to come back to material that specifically teaches you something. The Jody Fisher one was quite helpful, it allowed me to explore the Melodic Minor scale, The diminished scale and the Whole tone scale, and how they can really make my solo's pop out. More noticeably, I read else where that I can try using some of these scales, more specifically the whole tone scale, on plain dominant chords. It will give it an interesting edge to it. For those of you who do not know anything of what I am talking about, all you need to know is that these three scales are very weird and somewhat dark sounding. You can't just play them here and there, they have a very unique sound and special application. This week I was experimenting with their application. Experimenting with new idea's is essentially jazz is it not? I want my solo's to sound fresh and not so 'unoriginal'. -- Just listen to John Coltrane for weird stuff. He went into all this type of avant-garde jazz, whilst being heavily influenced by eastern spirituality/music. I can't say I am the biggest fan of his stuff, but I do respect him as a Great. He did after all, compose the song that to this day is still the song that Jazz musicians use as a benchmark of their skill, compared to others. i.e. "Giant Steps".
Another thing I learnt was to superimpose one arpeggio onto another, its a straight-forward concept, but I never really thought about it. If I play an Em7 arpeggio over a CMaj7, that is going to make the Cmaj7 sound more like a Cmaj9. If we take it one step further, and play an Emaj arpeggio over a dominant G7, its going to make the G7 sound like a G13b9! Now teats 'out the box'. Oh, I also learnt about playing Out-In the box, that's more to do with Tritone-substitution. It has the same principle of playing another chords scale/arpeggio over a different chord, but as long as its A TRITONE AWAY. For those of you studying jazz, don't overlook this concept, it seems daunting at first, but it sounds really awesome.
I did some transcribing too, but not jazz stuff, its actually a funk number by the Average White Band, song is called 'Pick up the Pieces'. I am confident that all of you have heard this song.
[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FnH_zwVmiuE] <--- Link to song
I worked out both the chords and the melody. Was not that difficult, but just goes to show how this jazz study is helping me in non-jazz fields. I also learnt 2 standards. "Have you met miss Jones" and "Tune Up". Both are relatively easy to play, especially tune up, and they give you enough time to think of the chords and what solo to use over it.
Lastly, something that has interested me for a long while is walking bass on guitar. Namely, to play the chords of the song alongside a constant walking bass line. I've been dabbling here and there on my guitar with some lines, but nothing solid. On Friday and Saturday I looked up loads of video's on YouTube on some idea's and I got some great information. One video especially, which I will post up just now. So, I'm still a far way away form groovn' bass on the guitar, but I am definitely going in the right direction. I thought it would come in handy for the shows I do with Otis. Would be good to keep the rhythm as well as to outline each chord I play. Jazz bass is super fun.
I will go more into walking bass lines on guitar, but for now I must study. So time for a bit of a jazz break.
Wow wow wow. So I have now officially made it halfway through my Jazz program. Now to tell you how I feel... EXCITED. It has not been a walk in the park. Jazz is most certainly the rocket science of music, fortunately however, it is not as hard as rocket science. I am slowly getting a name for myself as a jazz guitarist around Stellenbosch, as well as Hout Bay I guess seeming as Otis, my mentor, has asked me to perform alongside him for some jazz shows in and about Hout Bay. That alone makes me ecstatic. I'm honored to be playing with Otis who was one of the top Jazz guitarists in Johannesburg some years ago. He has not played jazz shows in a long while, and now for his debut, he asks me to play. Yes. I am happy! I have made new jazz friends, mostly from the jazz jams. I have been jamming so often at the conserve that even they are beginning to recognize me (Josh and I have started a trend there). We actually jammed yesterday with a bassist (Josh's student), and that was great. Awesome to have bass. We just solo'd over two songs, but we did not get bored. Jazz improvisation is never boring. Even though I'm still a novice at it, I could feel with every improvisation, I was getting more confident and experimental. I would make the 'bad' notes sound as if they are meant to be there.
So after 3 months, I have learned quite a bit: Arpeggio's, Melodic Minor Scale, Chords, STANDARDS, Theory, Blues, History, Aural training, transcriptions, licks, Swing feel, latin feel, chromatism, sheet reading, trading of fours, band leading etc. Most importantly, I have learned, and am still learning how to use all these elements TOGETHER. As Parker Said, you got to learn it all, and then forget it. So when I play at the jams, I'm not constantly thinking; - Db7alt, melodic minor 7, swing, Pass lick, add chromatics, No. none of that. Instead I just do!
More impressively, when I started, I knew about 1 standard. Autumn Leaves. Now I know 21 standards!! And I still got way more to go. I have found pics all over the net that relate to the songs I have, and also to celebrate my halfway mark. So try guess if you can see what song correlates with what picture. The songs are (including both chords and head):
Autumn Leaves
Take the A Train
Blue Bossa
Beautiful Love
Four *new
Watermelon Man
Green Dolphin Street
Cantaloupe island
Harold's Bossa
In a Mellow Tone
Footprints
Sookie, Sookie
Satin Doll
All the things you are
Days of Wine and Roses
Yardbird Suite *new
Night in Tunisia
Witchcraft
Summertime
Fly me to the moon
My Funny Valentine
What makes me more excited is that this is only the halfway mark, and I have already got so much under my belt. What can another 3 months do for me? That really is what excited me! In terms of my goals from the beginning, I have not been keeping strict with them. 5 hours a day, is difficult mainly because I have other commitments. There are certainly a few days when I play for 5 hours or over, but mostly its between 2 to 4 hours a day that I practice and learn. BUT - I do pick up my guitar EVERYDAY. My sheet reading skills have increased, therefore that reduces my practice time I guess. It used to take me like an hour and a half just to read a melody, now it takes me about half an hour. Progress? I think so. My ears are being developed. Once again, it used to take me a while to transcribe music, but now it just happens so much easier. Oh, and whilst on topic. I finished the transcription for Wes Montgomery on Satin Doll, and I definitely will be using some of his licks and techniques. In the Jam yesterday I used licks from Pass and Gillespie that I transcribed, so transcribing has a three-fold effect. It develops your aural skills, it gives you the feel for how the greats improvise, and it gives you some killer cool jazz licks.
So yea, I'm really getting this whole jazz thing. My improvisations are still 'weak' as I mostly rely on arpeggio's, the major scale, and I too often start each lick or whatever you want to call it on the root of the chord I am playing on, which is alright, but its too easy. I have to, and want to learn how to solo over the changes, i.e. to be a semi-tone away from the next chord tone I have to play at. That sounds really jazzy!
Thanks to all who actually read this, you're the ones that keep my motivated and encouraged. I have been getting a lot of kind words from fellow musicians or music lovers alike. Thank you! Now, lets tackle these next 3 Months!
One more week to go and I would have made the half way point. I will tell you how I feel about that next week! So stay tuned :-/
No but seriously, this week has been a bad but good week. As I told you last week, I would not have any practice time because I had another big test coming up, and I did end up spending all my time studying for it. So no new scales or tunes really. Well, except for the tune "Four" by Miles Davis. I am like 92% done with learning that. Its a great tune. And I know my next tune to learn. A Parker classic "Yardbird Suite".
So what did I do this week? Well, aside from studying, I did get some guitar in, as a matter of fact... I jammed yet again at the Monday night Jazz Jams. All I can say is that it went GREAT. Much better than my first time. I was must more confident, and less nervous, despite the fact that there were more people and even some UCT Jazz cats in the midst (whom I got to play with). So how it worked was I went up after a set was done, tuned up and plugged in. Suggested to the band leader (Ramon Alexander - pianist) that we play Blue Bossa. And that we did. I messed up a few notes in the head, but nothing too bad. We did trading of 4's which was a first for me, and it was fun! I don't want to jump the gun, but I think Ramon was impressed with me. After that we played Amy Winehouse's Valerie. After that, Ramon had left, so we got in a new pianist and new drummer, both where from UCT. None of us could decide a tune, so I suggested we try Grant Green's Sookie Sookie. I taught the pianist the chords quickly, and off we went. It was thrilling because I was telling the people when to solo, and who should go first, I also suggested we do fours, and so we did. Then I said back to head. So I kinda took the role of band/jam leader for that session, and it was great. I think I did a great job. To quote my friend who was watching me, this is from his Facebook status update:
"Yeah, ladies and gentleman Adrian Rogowski is on his way to the top. This man has been blessed by the Almighty to do a great many works! Lastnight at the jazz jam he just commanded the jammers with amazing tenacity - and it was only his 2nd official jam! Wow, and it was pleasantly surprizing to say the least! Very proud of you bro!"
Needless to say... I was quite chuffed!
There are video's that where taken. As soon as I get my hands on them, I will link it up here. But, all is not lost, there are some other video's that I have provided for you. Josh and I have been spending some time this weekend at my house, so we set up a small studio with piano and guitar and played some Jazz. He is trying to play more piano, so both him and I are growing in both our instruments. We dressed up for the fun of it, to get the vibe of a formal jazz show. Be kind when you watch, there are a few mistakes:
I love this standard. The chords, the melody, its quite exotic sounding. Ive been wanting to learn this standard for ever. It was on my top 5 list, but I always put it off because I was under the impression it was too hard. To my suprise, its rather easy, well, lets say intermediate. It has some easy major descending chords in the beggining, then loads of 2-5-1's.
Ive been busy this week, I've only got 3 weeks of class left before exams, so everything at Uni is comming to a close and all assignments are due etc. so expect more delays in my learning, however, as long as I get something out each week, its still development. Also, I have one more big test before exams this comming Friday, as well as play rehearsals (I am a guitarist for a play at the drama department), so not that much learning. Maybe 1 standard. We will see.
I continued to practice my melodic minors, and Josh and I yet again had another Jam on Tuesday. The Monday night jams are back on (they have been gone for some while), so I may just jam there too. Also, I have been doing more transcriptions. So far I have only tabbed out 3 of my favourite guitarists i.e. Joe Pass, Grant Green, and now Wes Montgomery. I am transcriping his solo on "Satin Doll" from his Riverside recording collection. I have yet to finish the entire chorus worth of transcribing, but I will get there. I must be honest, I don't do nearly as much transcribing as I should. All the greats did loads of transcribing as they dont have all the material I do, so transcribing is the oldest and most reliable way to pick up that jazz language, so I am going to try my utmost best to transcribe a piece a week by various artists. Another problem I face is actually learning and being able to apply all that I transcripe. So I will try super hard to do that too.
For those of you actually reading, you will notice that this should technically be Week 10. The truth is, the real week 9 I had to study for a test, a big test, so I literally got like 0% Jazz in. There wasn't even a jazz jam for me to listen to, so I thought I'd just continue like nothing has happened.
This was a pretty good week for me, I got all my melodic minors down. That includes (embrace yourself, these names are insane): The Melodic Minor, The Dorian ♭2, Lydian Augmented,Lydian Dominant (Overtone),Mixolydian ♭6,Locrian ♯2 (Aeolian ♭5) and lastly The Altered Scale(learn this one first!). The nice thing about these scale names is that they actually tell you how to play the scale. I.e. The Lydian Dominant is simply the Lydian scale we all know but with a flattened 7, as its the minor 7 and major 3rd that makes a dominant! I made my own scale study sheet for myself, with the help from a professional Jazz muso Keira WitherKay who provided me with the initial information (Thank you), so for those of you who want to tackle the Melodic Minor scale next, use this sheet on the left, it will give you basic theory and the scale fingerings.
Aside from the scales, I also jammed with my skilled friend Josh Prinsloo. We went to the music conservatory on Thursday, found a practice room with a piano, he played the piano and I played the guitar. He is a bassist by trade, so he wanted to improve on his Jazz piano, and boy where his chops fantastic. Real jazzy! Anyway, so we chose a few songs such as Funny Valentine, Blue Bossa, Beautiful Love we played them start to end and both took turns with the head. We improvised back and forth. It was great fun. We definitely going to make a weekly event of it. We also did some ear training, which I HIGHLY recommend. Its very simple, and quite difficult at first, but the ear does get better over time. What you do, is play a 4 or 5 note lick on your respective instrument and the other instrumentalist has to copy the lick... Note for Note. And No, you may not tell them what note you start on, they must figure it out. Even if you hit the wrong first note, it will be a good reference point for where the right note is. Try this. Its really challenging but fun. - - - The reason why I was with Josh at the conserve is that I want to take bass lessons from him. Why bass? Well, Joe Pass can play the melody, harmony and bass all on his guitar so effortlessly, and its just nice to know that if ever there is no bassist around, you can play the bass and chords on the guitar. So Josh will be teaching me some walking bass vibes. What he roughly taught me on our first lesson was some Tritone theory. Basically what it entails is that if you see a dominant shape, play an altered dominant chord a tritone away (flat 5). So G7 will be D♭Alt (♭9 and ♭5 sound quite nice). If you actually compare all the notes between the G7 and D♭alt, you will see they are quite similar, except for the root note.
Lastly, Josh taught me "Harold's Bossa", both the chords and melody. This is a fun fun fun song. And the chords are super easy. Its just quite fast. You must check this video from one of the Jazz jams (before my jazz days) of Ramon Alexander (the master pianist of Stellenbosch) and Lou-Ann Stone (the master saxophonist of Stellenbosch) doing Harold's Bossa. Its tight! I love this recording. Do yourself a favour and listen to it!
Another standard I got down was the classic "Take the A Train" by none other than Ellington. This song also has some nice easy chords, so is a good song to improvise over. There is also an altered chord in it, so my melodic theory will come in use. Cant wait!
This week coming up I will practice the melodics, my arpeggio's etc. Maybe get into some of my blues scales. Who knows. I will surprise myself :-)
If you remember from last week, I had planned on doing some intense jazz theory, alongside my keyboard. Well, I did do that, and my mind certainly grew, the keyboard was such a great feature. Often the theory book would contain a scale lick accompanied by a chord, and it would explain the relationship between the 2. Playing guitar, you cannot hear both the chord and lick without the help of a looper, so with the piano I could play the chord and the lick and hear the jazziness of it. So keyboard was well worth it.
In terms of my theory, I still got a long way to go, I didn't cover as much as I had hoped, but then again, I was on holidays and expected to see all my friends who I hadn't seen in a long while, as well as doing other admin stuff. I did however cover: Pentatonics, Playing 'outside' the scale (Listen to Coltrane for this kind of stuff, its really interesting), I looked at "Rhythm changes" but I will need more energy to really tackle that song/concept. More importantly, I covered the Blues. And the timing was perfect, cause I finally met up with my mentor (Otis) for what must of been a 5 hour 'lesson' and we covered the Blues. So from the Blues lessons I learnt there are essentially 2 types of Blues. The normal/major/dominant blues and the minor blues. The normal blues is only played with dominant chords in the normal I, IV, V progression. The turn-around(s) are more interesting and theoretically intense. Although, on the topic of theory, Blues is actually quite an 'unexplained' occurrence in Jazz. There is no reason why the Blues scale should sound so good over so many chords, yet it JUST DOES. And that is essentially the blues.
Further, I said that I wouldn't play any guitar. I lied. After so many hours of blasting your mind with intense Jazz theory, I just had to pick up my pride and joy and do something else. I covered quite a lot of the melodic minor scale. I have nearly covered it all. So far, I have gone through the:
° Jazz Minor
° Lydian Augmented
° Mixolydian b6
° Superlocrian aka Altered Scale
° Lydian b7 (Overtone)
I love these names. They sound really hardcore. But the melodic minor in general is such a great scale. When I was playing them (over the correct chords) I could actually taste the goodness of the notes. They were resonating with my teeth. It felt right. So I am gonna get these scales under my grip, followed by the Harmonic minor scale (I'm getting excited for that). I really need to brush up on my Pentatonics. I know all my 5 shapes, I just haven't practiced them in a long time. Also, I really really need to learn all the shapes for the Blues scale. So far I only know the Minor blues scale shape, and I learnt that when I was like 10. I must make the effort to learn the other shapes. So as you can see, I have my work cut out for me. This might take me a while, but it was inevitable that I would have to learn all these scales at some point. I will try play them and apply them to the right chords and songs so that I can get the feel for them.
I don't have my guitar with me at the moment, she has gone in for a set up. I have bumped up the string gauge from 0.10 - 0.52 to 0.13 - 0.56 Flatwound. For those of you who don't play guitar, that is a very big jump. Essentially the strings I am playing on will be thicker, so they will be harder to play, but they will sound deeper and warmer and much more Jazzy. I have never played on strings of this caliber before, so I am getting really really excited for this. Will try record the sound so you can all hear the difference.
Oh, I also have a big test coming up this week, so I will need to really focus on that. Academics do come first! I will try ration my time for both Jazz and Studies.
This will be a short one. I'm gonna say it straight. I literally did NO practice this week. I was way too consumed with my law work, so I had to put my studies first. I did however play at the Jam. It was nerve wracking. But all in all, I think I did alright. Especially for a new-comer to Jazz. I got a friend to record it for me, for your viewing pleasure. Its quite long, and the quality isn't the best, but hey, its a reference point I suppose. It kind of turns from a swing to a funk halfway through, so listen out for that.
*I must apologize for the video quality, it looked much better straight off the camera, but of-course, YouTube must of added some green fuglyness
I'd like to give credit to Mr. Ramon Alexander who was the master pianist you hear, if it where not for him, the song probably would have collapsed as some point. Mr. Prinsloo for his rap performance near the end. Lastly to Carlo Milandri for taking the video.
I also recorded in my own home studio a one take improvisation of the all time classic "Blue Bossa". What I did was found a play along version on youtube, added it to my Ableton, and recorded my guitar over the track first time. So what you are essentially hearing is me in the raw and without having listened to the play along first. The track was a little too fast for me, it didnt give me enough time to think about my next move. You will certainly hear that this is a rough improvisation, but its baby steps none the less. In the future I can use this recording as a reference to my playing.
So whats in store for this week to follow? Well I'm on holiday now, so I thought, maybe to give my fingers a break (okay they had a week break already, I know that), but my mind will certainly be busy. I've set up the keyboard in my room, and I intend to do some intense Jazz theory.
Why the keyboard you ask? Well, the keyboard is very much a visual instrument, in the sense that I play a chord and I can see all the notes I am playing. I asked a friend of mine to recite the Ab major arpeggio, and he did so effortlessly, by relying on a visual aid of a keyboard in his mind. I have read countless times that a good jazz muso has a good understanding of the piano too. You don't have to play it amazingly, but just enough to get on by will be sufficient.
Firstly, the jam was cancelled on Monday, so I have no story for you there. It is almost guaranteed to happen this Monday, so I will hopefully have a story for you then.
I must be honest, this was a difficult week for me to practice. I had no inspiration. I do feel bad about it, but at the same time I am only human. I did cover some ground but not as much as one would hope. A friend of mine reminded me of the importance of learning licks, so, what I did this week was mainly concentrate on learning some II, V, I licks. It has been said that no Jazz artist can create an original solo for every song and every night that he or she may play. Eventually the tap will run dry. In situations like that, they learn licks that they practice and make perfect, then when the time comes to quickly do something cool, they rely on the lick. Its not bad Jazz, its very common. The book I'm reading (will get to that) says that a solo may even be 40-90% just licks. So I learnt some licks. There were like 20 to choose from, but I didn't like them all, it's a personal taste after all. So I chose about 3 or 4 of them. Next week I may do the same. Choose another 4 or so from a batch of 20.
I read through that book by Jerry Coker titled "How to Practice Jazz". It is a good book, it's essentially only 43 pages but it covers a lot of ground. Unfortunately the book came too late for me, so I already have a practice system that works for me, but this book is great for someone who has no idea where to start. It tells you exactly everything you should be practicing and it gives you suggestions on how you should divide up your time to practice it. The downside about it is that it was not written by a guitarist as evident by how he kept saying we had to learn a new scale in every key. Now the beauty about guitar is that you need to just learn the fingering for one key, and then you can play it up and down the fret-board. The book also mentioned a lot of other books that I should get which annoyed me somewhat because I just want this book to tell me everything I need to know and not to spend more money on other stuff. Regardless, its a good buy if you are new to Jazz like me, and I'm sure it will be a great resource to my studies.
I re-learnt "Days of Wine and Roses". I forgot it, but now I know both the chords and melody. Its a really great song. One of my favourites actually. Not too many chord changes so might be a good one to improvise over too. I also got a new scale mode under my belt. The Melodic minor's: Lydian Augmented. This scale sounds great for Dom7+5 chords, which are very very common in Jazz. Well at-least in my version of Jazz.
(This version of Days of Wine and Roses by Wes Montgomery is amazing. He is my favourite guitarist. Love his tone and style)
Next week may once again have more licks to learn, as well as another mode of the Melodic Minor scale. I'd like to start applying some of this stuff I have learnt to some songs. Like that Joe Pass solo I transcribed. I'd like to play it note for note to the song, otherwise what is the point of me spending so much time getting it down if I don't learn from it?
Bad news: My chances of playing the Stellenbosch Big Band have slightly diminished (Yes, joke implied ha ha). I was under the impression that I could just audition for the role, and if I get it, great, if not, well that's fair, as it would be a reflection of my playing, and the better guitarist deserves it. It seems now that the Music department will favour its music students over non-music students. Now I am a Law student, and I wont have time nor money to become part of the music course next year. So, the way I understand it, is unless I am a champ at guitar, I will not be chosen due to administrative reasons. I will not let this get me down though, this was my goal, I will practice, and practice harder. I am going to try my utmost best to sight read (they really like that). I will make my presence known to the music faculty, and I will speak to the co-ordinator to see if any type of compromise can be made for a non-music student. I just want a fair chance.
Good news: I am going to be jamming at the Jazz jam on Monday! Quite scary. I have been practicing all week on a few standards that I'd like to give a go, namely: Blue Bossa, Satin Doll, Fly me to the moon, Beautiful love, Footprints etc. So this last week has just been a preparation for this.
I have been improvising over some of these songs, and at first it was difficult, but I discovered I was going to fast for my own level. I need to slow it down so I can understand and appreciate what I am doing. I was once again dominating my arpeggio's, wow I cannot stress the importance of them. I transcribed a piece by Joe Pass and 92% of the notes he chose were chord tones. So I can definitely get away with just arpeggio's. Fortunately my prior practice of the major scales will come in handy so I will be sure to throw some major/minor licks into the work. I spoke to my mentor about everything and he said I should treat/practice arpeggio's like chords in the sense that when I see a chord symbol just play the arpeggio for it. View them like their own chords (which they are essentially). The thing that sucks is that I got a test on Monday (like a real one) so I have to study for that too, and I was hoping I could prepare for the Jam, but I guess it will be instinctive playing then. I will try remember to record it and post it up here.
I learnt "Fly me to the Moon" and the melody for "Nature Boy" the chords all seem different according to the different sheets. Perhaps I should try work them out myself, but I am not really good with chords yet.
That book of mine came, it looks great. Better than I imagined. I will read it and let you know if its worth its penny.
Some proof that I am actually playing. The bassist is my good friend Joshua. This was the informal jam I had last week with him.
Another slow week, but one that was so fundamental. I have finished off my work with the arpeggio's. I am feeling more and more comfortable with them, and everyday I was "playing with them". I would have one chord looping in the back, and I would solo all over that chord using all the arpeggio's I know for that respective chord. This is important (and I highly recommend this practice) as it allowed me to 'connect the dots'. Connecting the dots is a term I use to illustrate how all the notes (of a respective scale/arpeggio) work together all over the neck. I ALWAYS had the problem of only being limited to box playing. I would know a scale and I would only play that scale within the 4/5 frets I knew it in. Not anymore, I have now reached further horizons. I mix all the patterns, go up, go down, sideways, go from fret 1 to fret 18 in one swift motion. I want to be able to see All my options when soloing and not just the next note in the box. My mentor (a page should be dedicated to him, ha ha) always said to me when soloing you must see your fret-board like a map. This annoyed me in the past cause I knew what he was talking about, but could never see the map, I was always stuck in the box. I am now finally seeing 'the map'. This is a great achievement for me personally, as it means when I see a Fm7 chord, I can play all across the neck without sticking to 4 frets only. So my advice to you all, upon learning the required scales/licks/arpeggio's etc. PLAY WITH THEM. Take a chord, loop it, and jam it to hell (within the confine of the scales etc you have learnt).
A friend of mine (Joshua Prinsloo) is one of the go-to jazz bassists of Stellenbosch, needless to say, he is a great resource for my studies. I went to him on Monday night (the jam was cancelled, so we decided to have our own little jam). One thing that I never quite understood was how 'trading fours' worked. Often in a jazz jam, you will hear the drummer playing for 4 bars, followed by a soloist and accompanist for 4 bars, and then back to drummer and so forth and so forth. I didn't know when it would start, and for how long, so I got those questions answered. It would be quite embarrassing if I missed the cues all the time.
I got yet another 2 standards down. "My Funny Valentine", which surprisingly is quite a happy song, I always imagined it to be sad (and who can blame me), but the lyrics are quite romantic actually. Another song, which I could not find in any real book, or in the Aebersold series was Grant Green's "Sookie, Sookie". This came onto my iPod, and it just had such a killer groove to it. I worked out the chords, which is pretty much only Fm7. The turn around is Gm7♭5, Fm7♭5 and I dont know the last one, but I suspect it may be a Eb7#9. Anyway, 95% of the song is in Fm, so great for my arpeggio practice (well for minor atleast). I transcribed over a minute of the Green's solo, but got bored after a while cause he kept using the same lick over and over again. But it is a good lick, and one I will be using for sure. He uses in such a way as to still make the solo fresh. But after spending a few hours transcribing the solo in slow motion, you can see that he is looping a lot of this stuff, but just with a different approach.
Whats in store for me next week? To be honest, I'm not exactly sure. My routine has been really chiseled since the beginning when I had an exhaustive list of things to do. My jazz improvisational studies really comes down to five things : 1) Listening 2) Aural testing/Sing and play on guitar what you hear in your head 3) Arpeggio's (which I now have sorted) 4) Scales (I guess this is the next step) 5) Chromatism > The jazz sound!
I guess I will be dabbing in all of these next week, maybe have a more general structured practice. I'd like to transcribe some Joe Pass. He is great!
I finished 2 books - 1) Jamie Aebersold "How to play and improvise Jazz" 2) Jody Fisher "Intermediate Jazz Guitar" Both are great resources, and I highly recommend them. The Aebersold one I find quite old fashioned, and cheesy at times, but he offers great advice and encouragement. Fisher is the reason I was gunning for my arpeggio's. There must have been like 20 pages on arpeggio practices, patterns etc. Although I mapped out my own arpeggio, Fisher highlighted the importance of it to me. I find this book somewhat incomplete, and perhaps too general, I skipped a few sections that where not relevant, but its still worth its money. I'm expecting another book in the post any day soon titled "How to practice Jazz" could be helpful!
This week was surprisingly phenomenal. I thought I would just be doing mindless exercises on all the different arpeggio's, and although that did happen, I achieved so much more.
For the arpeggio's, what I did was write down every one I would need and for which chord, then I proceeded to practicing them and becoming familiar with them. Jamie Aebersold says that "knowing your chord tones is like knowing where the kitchen, bathroom, front-door and telephone are". Needless to say, arpeggio's are important. All in all there are about 22 new arpeggio fingerings I have been practicing all week and becoming familiar with, that includes major, minor, dominant and half diminished. I've also gone one step further and added the 9th note in just to give them some flavour. For the next week to follow I am again going to drill these arpeggio's in me, the fingerings are still new, and I NEED to know them on the fly. I have a vision to play at the jazz jam soon, like real soon, but I know my solo's will be 90% arpeggio's, and for now I am fine with that, because its progress!
I also got 3 more standards under my belt. Victor Young's "Beautiful love", Wayne Shorter's "Footprints" and Ellington's "In a Mellow tone", in all fairness though, my mentor had shown me that song before, I just forgot it. I don't think "Beautiful love" is such a popular standard, the only reason I learnt it was because the jazz jam I hope to play at soon plays it often, and what better way to gell with the musicians then to know the same repertoire they do.
I also surprised myself with my 'swing' technique, sure its not perfect, but I definitely got something going there, and it just came so naturally, I didn't even have to think about it. Its from all that listening. I put lots of Jazz on my iPod so whenever I walk to and from campus (or just walk in general) I am (as I like to say) "indoctrinating my mind with jazz". I really feel I have progressed so much, and its only been 3 weeks. I can't wait to see the end result.
As the title suggests, this week was all about them Arpeggio's. I wont lie, this week did feel slower and I dont feel I assimilated as much knowledge as I did last week, BUT, this knowledge needs to be taken in slowly and carefully so that I dont disregard it quickly. It needs to become part of me. Another quote that Parker said was "You gotta learn all the theory, then forget it", so I need to make everything I learn part of me. I also had a bit more work to do this week for my studies, but none the less I made progress towards my Arpeggio's.
My Guitar teacher/mentor had always told me the importance of apreggio's, but I guess one never really appreciates the value of something untill you dont have it or need it. Most of the Greats (Parker, Davis, Gilliespie etc) use Arpeggio's left right and centre, they are so important as they allow you to know where in the song you are and also to tell your listeners where you are. So, what I have done was write down all the apreggio's I am going to need, and well now its just a process of getting them down. Fortunately because I have been playing guitar for a while, and my guitar mentor had drilled some apreggio's into my system so far, I know like 50% of all the 'new' arpeggio's I come across.
So, how I am deciding to tackle this new (but so fundamental) challenge, is to learn all the apreggios for all the different chord shapes, and secondly, to play them in fourths i.e. R 3 5 7, 3 5 7 R, 5 7 R 3 (Playing four notes and then moving up to the next degree of the arpeggio). Im doing this because I realised I only know the scales and Apreggio's from their roots. If I see a Dm7, I automatically play the root then the rest of the Arpeggio. I GOTTA BREAK THIS HABBIT. Im hoping through time, I will just see the arpeggio's all over my neck so I can smoothly connect the notes between the chords correctly. So yea, Arpeggio's are the future, scales come next.
I guess this next week to follow will have more arpeggio's, it will take me a while to get them down, but they are the building blocks to good soloing. I also learned 2 new standards. The first is called "Witchcraft". This is not such a popular standard, but I heard the guitarist Jimmy Bruno play it, and wow I was impressed, he had some walking bass lines, some chromatism, some weird chords. I had to learn his version of the song, and so I did, the bonus is that this is part of my transcribing/aural development process. The second song is well known, its Herbie Hancock's "Cantaloupe Island". Alright, well, onto week 3!!!
I officially got my first week of thorough Jazz playing behind me, and I must say it was better than I thought it would be. I imagined it to be pain and endurance, but really the 5 hour limit I set myself was a joke, its not enough, I want more jazz :-) I read that Charlie Parker used to practice 11 to 15 hours a day for 4 years. I know that Charlie Parker didn't practice cause he needed to, but because he wanted to. This week excited me because I wanted to practice more, and not because I felt I had to stick to a framework. On Thursday I practiced for 9 hours! And still crave more haha. My schedule pretty much consisted of waking up, going to class (like 2 hours a day) in-between class I play, then eat food, then play, then eat supper than play. I covered a lot of ground this week, to give it to you in a top 10 list, I:
1) Learnt the standard "All the things you are"
2) Got the melody and chords down for "Night in Tunisia"
3) Transcribed a Great piece from Dizzy (and understood it)
4) Learnt the Altered Scale (7th mode of Melodic minor)
5) Transcribed some Charlie Parker licks, wow that was a challenge.
6) Practiced my 'swing feel'
7)Went to a Jazz Jam (although did not play myself, that is the goal)
8) Practiced some sight/music reading
9) Learnt some epic new theory (it blows your mind)
10) Most importantly. I LISTENED.
This week empowered me as I know what my target for next week will be. I GOT to learn new scales but more importantly I must apply them to the music. Its one thing knowing a gazillion scales its another knowing when and how to use them. I am also gunning for my aural development, I cant stress the importance of that. Lastly, I am going to try know as many arpeggio's around the neck as possible. I read that I must be able to solo unaccompanied by a rhythm section and still be able to let the people know where in the song I am. It goes without saying that I will get 2 more standards added to my repertoire. Rather learn them properly so that I dont have to come back to them later on.
Thats enough for now. Will return with more good news
I have this recurring idea, that I must become good at Jazz. I love jazz, and I am constantly surrounded by jazz musicians. I attend enough jam sessions to see how skilled and phenomenal this 'language' really is. Jazz is a language. Some can speak it just enough to get on by, and some are fluent. Although I don't think one can ever be 100% fluent in jazz. We are always learning.
Anyway, so I study Law, which keeps me busy. Fortunately I have been granted more time, as 3 of my bigger subjects come to an end, so I thought I'd use this time to do something constructive. Why not become a better musician and just learn jazz! I am now seeing it is easier said than done. Regardless, I have about 6 months available to me, so why not try learn this language. I wont be fluent in jazz, but I'd like to be comfortable in my musical expressions and conversations with other jazzists.
I'm not quite sure how I am going to organize and systematically manage to learn what it is I need to learn, I suppose I will figure that out as the weeks progress. For now, this is a super rough idea of what my schedule may look like:
Ø1 hour – Theory – Jody Fisher
Ø1 hour – Learn Standards
Ø3 hour – Practice
1hr – New scale and Technique
1hr – New chords and voicing’s
1hr – Practice learnt theory
Scales
·Harmonic minor (7)
·Melodic minor (7)
·Whole tone (2)
·Diminished
·Arpeggio’s
·Bebop scale (5)
Standards
·Sight reading
·Transposing/All keys – what scale fits with what chords
·Chords vocabulary
·Melody – consider its scale in relation to chords
Technique
·Speed Synchronization
·8th Feel
·String skipping
·Triplet
Theory
Notes on fretboard
Notes in scales
Notes in chords
Looking at it, it seems rather short, but 5 hours, well for me at least, is intense. Yet some may argue it is not enough. We will see. Ok, well I start tomorrow. It will be the time that I am sussing out what must be done. I will be sure to update you all on a week to week basis. Can I really learn jazz in 6 months?
