-
Don't be sorry, that's what these blogs are for (constant updating on a given topic) and your question shows how even more valuable this forum is in the sense that, we have the passage of time to work on our craft and come back to talk about the journey so far.
Originally Posted by king.goochan
I don't know about the 6 geometric patterns (yet). But what little I think I know about patterns so far is this:
It's infinitely easier to "see" patterns and sub patterns once you have whatever YOUR PRIMARY melodic patterns down cold in your memory. And since there are many possibilities, different guitarists favor different patterns (so to speak). I see these patterns as splintered scales (licks as some would call them).
Conti is right about one thing - The one thing (so to speak). Regarding Pat (assuming they all learned pretty much from each other like Conti says - the playing field was smaller so folks met each other on the circuit "Hey, what was that you played during this song on the gig?") - you INTERNALIZE MELODIC PATTERNS FIRST and the THEN IT BECOMES INFINITELY EASIER TO ANALYZE the ALREADY MEMORIZED PATTERNS.
So when Pat is talking he sees these "sacred shapes" from an internalized visualization of the whole playing field of patterns so very well that the brain is able to make these associations very easily - from prior experience. It would have been infinitely harder for him to see these patterns without the prior benefit of a deep knowledge (through repetition and experimentation) of these shapes in advance.
I've had Pat's DVDs for a while now - even before Conti. They were too advanced at the time I bought them. I've watched them at least once but I realize that I have to completely digest what I'm working on now AND THEN BE ABLE to MOVE THESE MELODIC PATTERNS ACROSS THE FRETBOARD both VERTICALLY and HORIZONTALLY. Once they're so ingrained in me, THEY START TO FRAGMENT and become NEW MELODIC PHRASES.
And then soon after logging serious time on the fretboard experimenting with these ideas YOUR BRAIN INTERNALIZES THE MELODIC POSSIBILITIES WITH THE FRAGMENTED PATTERNS - IE: starting a phrase from the middle and ending at the beginning of the old phrase etc etc etc. The possibilities are literally endless BUT WHAT YOU END UP WITH IS WHAT YOUR EAR AS THE PLAYER LOVES AND GRAVITATES TOWARDS.
In a way, all these greats have been saying the same thing but in their way. There is a video of Herb Ellis playing with Frank Vignola. In the video his answer to the eternal question of how to improvise he said, pick 52 songs and play a song for a week. I played Green Dolphin street for two weeks straight and you definitely start to see more and more possibilities with the melodic shapes and what you can and can't do. All this stuff is transferable to other songs - with varying degrees of difficulty.
Great question!
-
07-14-2015 09:11 AM
-
Originally Posted by destinytot
I shall echo your sentiments and also repeat my eternal gratitude for being able to mooch off all the ones who came before us.
Regarding "finger dexterity on the guitar" AKA "Technique", Conti refers to it has having a vocal box or (your physical speaking voice with which you....talk or speak).
Having an idea in your brain as you play is one thing but to be able to make your instrument physically reproduce that idea (or express that idea successfully during a performance) is a WHOLE other thing. And that takes endless practice and improving your playing technique. You're doing the right thing!
Cheers!
-
I suppose that's possible. Pat is a master. He knows what he is doing. He was better at 17 than I am at 56. Whatever he is doing works for him. It seems odd to me and I don't think it would be helpful for me. Originally Posted by king.goochan
-
All the shapes, whether eternal or how ever organized... anyway they all just become means of composing or improvising. You always have something to start with... from yourself or someone else.
Patterns basically have two organizational references... symmetrical or unsym. We're always looking for the Symmetry right... whether it's the even or 50/50 and variations or the golden segment version ...A is to B as B is to A+B
/______A_____/_________B_____________/ .... close to 35% to 65%
Anyway there is a natural feel or balance to symmetry... more so because of the spatial aspect. The content can be somewhat loose and it still feels OK.
Bartok had his axis system, for functional and tonal organization. Schoenberg ended up with his structural functions of Harmony... Substitutes and regions, had problems with the spatial finish, but was a beautiful organizational concept.
I guess my point is we all look for an organizational means to use what knowledge we have about music etc... and... for us improvise, solo with out having to always constantly pay attention to all the details and at least believe that they're still somewhat in balance. yea... I should have posted this on a different thread... sorry.
-
This was a great post. I agree with so much of it. Conti definitely has his favorite phrases, as did Charlie Christian, Barney Kessel and Herb Ellis. One of the features of the guitar is that the same series of pitches can be fingered different way and on (or along) different strings. It's good to have what Reg calls a "default". Something you can do without thinking about it. I've learned much of mine from Charlie Christian and Herb, though I like some Conti things too and some Frank Vignola things for that matter. Originally Posted by West LA Jazz
About that video, though, I think you mean Frank Vignola and Bucky Pizzarelli. Great stuff:
-
07-14-2015, 10:26 AM #156destinytot Guest
Bit of wishful thinking here, Mark: "His pick initially scraped the coils of the lower strings’ coating but eventually rose aloft, a method the master applies or exploits within the shed before he* explodes onto the scene."
*gender-neutral!
PS I use flat-wounds myself...
Last edited by destinytot; 07-14-2015 at 01:13 PM. Reason: 1. replaced (a) 'kept' with 'rose' (b) 'a master' with 'the master' 2. add PS 3. replace 'they explode' with 'he explodes'
-
I Ching, huh? Interesting - I've been getting some 7-string advice from Van Eps via the Ouija board, myself.
-
07-14-2015, 10:55 AM #158destinytot Guest
"I guess I wouldn't believe in anything anymore if it weren't for my lucky astrology mood watch." (Steve Martin)
-
Yeah, the problem isn't when, the guy who is playing is a prodigy of the instrument and just doesn't happen to know how he is capable of doing what he does, but when he actually has students, and his explanations seem to continually go over their heads, over the hills and mountains, only to land back into Pat-land. Or he persuades them into thinking Iching is going to meaningfully make leaps and bounds in their playing. But then again I suppose the truth in this case doesn't pay the bills as easily. Originally Posted by MarkRhodes
You can sort of piece together parts of whatever it is he does-- but at some point you realize whatever background organizational structure is there for improvised lines, he isn't conscious of it-- same goes for pick technique. Guy had some major brain surgery and was later to play very similair after as he did before (though, the pre-aneurism Pat still had more 'depth', imo).
There's a video out there recently of Pat giving a workshop in Moscow. A translator is there to communicate his thoughts from English to Russian. I would have difficulty doing so at times from English back to English. And at times you can tell the guy is utterly in disbelief of what Pat wants him to communicate.
-
Wow, lots of intelligent minds here.
Just gotta put into words what Im absorbing:
Formulas and equations to derive outcomes from are valuable in themselves.
But the actual music probably comes when a musician faces real life situations : improvising. Taking chances. Outcome unknown.
But then, improvisation without internalized formulas is like typing randomly on a keyboard and try to come up with decent language.
Non―musicians tend to think there isn't science behind good music. I understand , that customers only want music, not the science. I don't care, Ill do anything to make my music better. Science , or hours of practice, or the ICHING
-
Speaking of Steve Martin, he studied philosophy in college, didn't he? I think I read somewhere that he read Wittgenstein. I spent a year with "Philosophical Investigations" glued to my hand. (I was, um, dating the head librarian, who checked the book out on her account and let me keep it long as I like. "Trust me," she said, "No one else here will want to check out this book." She was right.) Originally Posted by destinytot
-
07-14-2015, 12:52 PM #162destinytot Guest
Joking apart, I do get how studying this will improve one's jazz guitar playing (by improving mental focus, emotional and physical balance, breathing and posture), but it isn't the most direct route - and it's not for everyone.
-
[QUOTE=jbyork;549701]This is something like what I try to do when I teach creative writing to the 5th-graders: think an author you like, and pretend you're them. Choose a sentence, a paragraph, or a longer excerpt; find a metaphor or simile you like, and use it in a way that seems cool to you. QUOTE]
I still do this! Though usually in speech, not written language. Sometimes I'll pretend I'm a politician asked about a pressing matter. ("I'm glad you asked that....") In college I prepared for tests by pretending I was the teacher giving a review class. When I'm reading something, I often put the book down and "riff" on the point the author is making.
Many of my stories have started as lines that rushed out of my mouth that I caught by the shirtail, so to speak, and thought,'Hey, that's pretty good' and then used it to start something. Despite my gift for the occasional line, I don't have the same gift for story; even the ones I managed to see into print were nothing to brag about.
Another way at this is to recite some Shakespeare ("You shall mark many a duteous and knee-crooking knave....", "There is a tide in the affairs of men....", and "Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow... are favorites) and then just try to keep the rhythm / mood going, however I can.
(Many songs do this, of course.)
-
I think that if you have a good ear and can play a decent scale Robert Conti is a waste of time. His time is so horrible that I have trouble understanding him he is not acurate his swinging time is so bad. His sixteenth notes is not acurate even his triplets. I'll better transcribe benson's solos or Pat martinos solos than him. And practicing with his midi track is not fun at all. Look at all his students they have the same problem very BAD TIME. I can't even listen to him.
-
I guess this is an update to some of my earlier posts on this subject. Originally Posted by jorexsaligan
If the SINGULAR goal of a teacher is to ENCOURAGE and TURN ON A LIGHT in a student's head, then Conti has succeeded in spades!
If there is room for a second goal, the second goal of a teacher is to help students understand the nature of what it is they are trying to study and understand. If this is so, then again, Conti has succeeded in spades.
You can tell when a player is practically lifting music scales (in order) and placing them in a musical context without mixing the notes up to create a melodic picture. Isn't that what Jazzer's aren't supposed to do? Not sound as if you're zooming up and down scales? Well, Conti preaches hard against doing that - playing scales against chord changes.
Conti’s lines (which are melodically reorganized scale fragments) helped my ear SEE and more importantly CONNECT the WHOLE fretboard, if that makes sense, sometimes this is ALL a self learning student needs to go on in search of (to understand HOW TO PROCESS) what she or he is looking to express in musically. This in of itself is PRICELESS.
Connecting the fretboard effortlessly with Conti's materials was HUGE. Before that I could play so (to speak). I had facility but I couldn't connect the fretboard at will like jumping from 1st position to say the 8th position and still finish an idea. ONCE I UNDERSTOOD THAT, it was on. I applied that to stuff I had picked up before Conti. I was able to build on that foundation with other teacher’s materials that my ear called for.
Vic Juris, Mike Stern, revisiting Benson, and many players to whom I owe a debt of understanding and gratitude were all made possible because I had that NEW foundation. Heck, I even incorporated ideas from Chick Corea and melodic grooves by obscure Tabla players. This happened because I was able to transpose the Conti idea of how to connect the fretboard to apply to new ideas that I wanted to incorporate into my playing. I even started paying renewed attention to why gypsy jazzers relied so much on three fingers. Hey, learning man. It can take you to strange places.
Timing and other essential tools of a musician's performance bag are topics ALL unto themselves. After all, rhythm ALONE is at least 90% of what drummers study, no? To me these topics are part of the numerous concepts such as intonation, motif repetition, finger stamina etc etc that can only be truly be absorbed by being in real life situations and having musicians of greater ability than the student to draw from and truly pick up all these "tricks" to put in one's "bag" so to speak.
Turning on a light in my head is what Conti did for me.
Would I be crazy to say that there is a reason the 1% of high achievers in ANYTHING have their "lights turned on" and the rest don't - at least not yet? Now, have I had the same questions that you have about timing? Yes. So what did I do? I had to slow down the tracks to see how I could make the lines work for me. NOTES ARE NOTES. Melody is melody but music is a GUMBO of MANY CONCEPTS and I believe it is the responsibility of the SELF TAUGHT student to SEARCH FOR THESE THINGS. A teacher cannot teach you how to achieve what you hear in your head. YOU HAVE TO PUT IN THE TIME. I realized that sometimes, I had to remove notes from a phrase to make it GROOVE the way I wanted it to for I CANNOT live without the almighty groove. Conti at 70 years plus plays faster than I can. He also uses the softest pick available. I tried that pick. It don’t work for me!! I haven't put in the years playing on the road like he has. Yes. He has been a gainfully employed musician for longer than 2/3rds of my life. There is a reason he still gathers crowds at NAMM and last I checked musicians want to be able to play for an audience. We can't tell people what not to love. It's like my Neurosurgeon friend who prefers movies by Michael Bay over more serious fare such as The Remains of The Day! Hey!
If music is a marriage of melody and rhythm, every player will have an advantage in one department over the other even if ever so slight. I've even heard the great Bireli Lagrane get lost rhythmically while playing on stage.
Back to Conti.
I had to figure out how to make his materials work for me. How to see and most importantly CONNECT the board was very important to me. I didn't want to be a position player. I wanted to leap across frets to take advantage of note clusters on other parts of the fretboard and still find my way home.
I have almost all of Conti's materials. I used them strictly for about 2 years way back when I first bought my first Conti lesson. I persisted even when I wanted to stop. This was because I was tired of searching and being unhappy with my understanding of the fretboard. I even had to drop his musical lesson books and go back to use his PRECISION TECHNIQUE for about 6 months straight. I had to do this just to IMPROVE MY PHYSICAL NOTE PLAYING FACILITY be able to come back and play some of what he was teaching decently (to my ear). Precision technique taught me other ways to sweep pick, play double stops in ways I hadn't imagined how to, pinkie finger stamina and more. These are tools that ANY player of any instrument needs.
LEARNING IS LEARNING and an astute student sees lessons in the most unlikeliest of places which reminds me of an old proverb.
"Go to the ant thou sluggard, consider its ways and be wise".
I knew I had made the right decision because when I went back to practicing with Hal Leonard playalongs, it was very clear that something had improved for the better. In one sentence it was FLUIDITY. I was able to mix up his KEY FRETBOARD NAVIGATIONAL IDEAS with all the stuff I had picked up over the years. That to me was worth the price of admission. Now, I HAD TO make those lines sing and groove but was up to ME the student to figure out how to groove
and GROOVE IS IN THE HEART (thank you DEEE LITE) lol. I am STILL working on groove. Practice makes perfect is what I’m told.
I read in George Benson's autobiography where he confesses that he had a recording gig where he kept losing his way while playing on a particular orchestra date. He eventually went and fessed up to the conductor because he had to find a way to nail the recording. I took that to mean that in a given musical journey, there is a CONTINUAL STRIVING to maintain and get better. I guess we'll be students our whole lives.
Now, I’ll go nuts and make a prediction even if you think I'm crazy. In the future, there is going to be a famous young guitarist who Conti has never met and probably never will. This young guitarist will mention Conti as the guy who helped him "SEE" and understand the fretboard. Conti has harnessed the power of video and the internet to spread his word – whatever that may be. Sometimes, that little escape hatch inside our heads AKA that "aha moment" is ALL that a student needs to realize his or her true talent.
This alone my friends, is worth the price of admission.Last edited by West LA Jazz; 12-30-2016 at 03:48 PM.
-
WELL SAID!! I agree completely
-
Yeah, very well said West LA Jazz!
I've heard the criticisms of Conti's time before. I too am a fan of his materials. To me he is a great teacher of how to have lines "sing" and connect melodically, and how to construct lines which move along the strings.
He's really pretty casual in his productions. Sometimes his time is off; sometimes his played lines don't match the pdf. So what? You've got to make of the materials what you can, that's a given with any method.
-
I'm a fan of Conti's material too. One of my goals for 2017 is to get further into his "Jazz Lines" than I previously have. I like strong lines that sound good by themselves. It's why I like Herb Ellis so much. And Wes. Originally Posted by JazzinNY
-
Thanks for sharing your experience, West LA. I got encouraged by this thread and started working on one of the Ticket to Improv DVDs. Liking it so far. Originally Posted by West LA Jazz
-
I'll bet there are a lot of Conti fans who'd be interested in anything you'd be willing to share about how you came to study with him and what the lessons were like. Originally Posted by rob taft
-
Great post -- I remember reading this thread awhile back and seeing your comments. I always hoped you'd return to the thread and give us an update. It sounds like you're pretty happy with the progress you've made so far. Originally Posted by West LA Jazz
I'm interested in knowing how you organized your practice time, using Conti's materials. Apart from the 6 months you devoted solely to The Precision Technique, what kinds of things did you work on daily?
-
I think we need to keep in mind that transcribing itself would probably be viewed by previous generations of players is a cheap imitation of actually sitting down with an old guy and looking at what his fingers are doing. In a certain sense learning from a player on the video has some of that element.
if Wes had a DVD set, I'd certainly buy it and I don't think anyone would question it. :-)
of course not comparing him....Last edited by matt.guitarteacher; 12-31-2016 at 01:31 PM.
-
After reviewing the thread, I see that you did talk about this at length in an earlier post (#109). Naturally, I'd love to hear more if you have more to add, but this covered most of what I wanted to know. Originally Posted by snailspace
Last edited by MarkRhodes; 02-17-2017 at 12:53 PM.
-
Snailspace, Originally Posted by snailspace
I have hung with Robert at a half a dozen NAMM shows, as Peerless builds his guitars. Interesting guy. He has always been friendly with me, however he has a lot of detractors, and he is no shrinking violet. One year he mentioned a law suit he had against another jazz guitar forum for disparaging, nasty comments about him. I guess he felt he was being trolled.
I have never seen his material, however many swear by it. If it works for people, then it's all good.... Robert plays with a feather thin pick, .09 or .010 strings with action extremely low. He plays a short scale. He also has sausage fingers, and for the life of me, I can't figure out how he gets them to move like they do.
He has a system. He has the philosophy and the material. He looks at playing jazz guitar differently. Either one will be an open enough slate to benefit, without preconceived ways of understanding jazz, or maybe one will already have other learning methods that clash with his method.
We are all different. We approach learning jazz tunes, styles, jazz structure, jazz lines and phrasing differently, we study differently, we use different tools, we have different favorites and heros.
So, whatever works for you personally is cool. I don't ever slam other jazz guys (over guitar anyway) Live and let live. If I don't dig something, I tend not to criticize. Yes, some guys are sloppy with Transcribe slowed down to 25 %, however they still burn in real time....Last edited by docdosco; 12-31-2016 at 03:08 PM.
-
Well, I think of transcribing as ear-training, i.e., learning to hear intervals, note durations and chord voicings and figure them out by yourself. Watching the 'old guy' might show you the most economical places to play them but there is a world of important ear-training to be gained by sorting it out yourself auditorily... Just MHO. Originally Posted by matt.guitarteacher
Reply With Quote
mclaughlin sound here
Today, 12:26 AM in The Players