What Are You Practising Now?

[AllanAllen]

12 bar blues in 12 keys moving in fourths using only shell chords.


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Thats a good one!

[Greywolf]

I ran sound last Saturday for this awesome trio , they invited me to sit in, but I had a date with me so left it home. Yakou gave me the CD to practice for next time .. he and the upright bassist are from Ivory Coast

an intersting take on the floyd classic

[Kmatuhin]

I envy everyone who practices jazz! Lately I haven't been doing anything, because work and children (one of whom is still a baby) take up all my energy and time. Therefore, it seems to me that I am rapidly degrading in playing the guitar. When I get my hands on it, I just play some fingerstyle, and if it's jazz, then it's usually Misty, Georgia or Autumn Leaves. Sometimes I can improvise at a free tempo on these melodies or on blues changes. That's all.

[AllanAllen]

I envy everyone who practices jazz! Lately I haven't been doing anything, because work and children (one of whom is still a baby) take up all my energy and time. Therefore, it seems to me that I am rapidly degrading in playing the guitar. When I get my hands on it, I just play some fingerstyle, and if it's jazz, then it's usually Misty, Georgia or Autumn Leaves. Sometimes I can improvise at a free tempo on these melodies or on blues changes. That's all.

It can be tough getting the practice in with kids. But if you're still keeping the flame by playing a little bit here and there, you'll be fine. 5 minutes every day adds up.

[JazzPadd]

Just back from a weekly practice with a bassist who lives nearby.

We ran through some tunes to play in a trio with a drummer:

Armando’s Rhumba
Dear Old Stockholm
Well You Needn’t
If I Had You

There’ll likely be a couple other tunes in addition to those, and next week a vocalist may join us to sing “New York State of Mind.”

We plan to add a 45mn set to an upcoming local street jazz festival.

With no pianist, it’ll be a challenge to hold down melody and comping as well as soloing, so I’m listening to several versions to get inspired.

[James W]

I've decided it's necessary for me to learn Charlie Christian's 'Swing to Bop' solo by heart just through listening - that is, no writing it down and I don't think it's necessary to use the slow-down facility on youtube either.

[AllanAllen]

Just back from a weekly practice with a bassist who lives nearby.

We ran through some tunes to play in a trio with a drummer:

Armando’s Rhumba
Dear Old Stockholm
Well You Needn’t
If I Had You

There’ll likely be a couple other tunes in addition to those, and next week a vocalist may join us to sing “New York State of Mind.”

We plan to add a 45mn set to an upcoming local street jazz festival.

With no pianist, it’ll be a challenge to hold down melody and comping as well as soloing, so I’m listening to several versions to get inspired.

Check out Kenny Burrell for inspiration! The albums When Lights are Low and Live at The Village Vanguard are guitar/bass/drum trios and very enjoyable. Chord breaks in your solo, just straight up comp for 4-8 bars to gather your thoughts if you have to.

[JazzPadd]

Check out Kenny Burrell for inspiration! The albums When Lights are Low and Live at The Village Vanguard are guitar/bass/drum trios and very enjoyable. Chord breaks in your solo, just straight up comp for 4-8 bars to gather your thoughts if you have to.

Thanks, I’ll check those out. I enjoyed the Kessel Mitchell record you recommended. And great idea to use chord breaks to gather thoughts in a trio!

[Christian Miller]

I envy everyone who practices jazz! Lately I haven't been doing anything, because work and children (one of whom is still a baby) take up all my energy and time.

It gets easier sooner than you think. The flipside is the acute nostalgia for the baby times... It's hard to enjoy it sometimes at the time, but I'm glad I was there so much. Now my kids are both at school, it's nuts. How did that happen?

[BreckerFan]

Today's practice session:

First part, 6 minutes each on
• Triads root - 4 note root position triads moving diatonically through the major scale in position (3nps)
• Triads 1st - same but first inversion
• Triads 2nd - same but second inversion
• M3 - Kreisberg interval matrix, playing major 3rds in half steps, while steps, and minor thirds within a 5 fret area
• P5 - same, but perfect fifths
• Major scale 132431 - taking this six note cell through the major scale in position (3nps)
• Tremolo - tremolo picking on each string, 140-160 bpm
• Alt - single string alternate patterns, 140-160 bpm
• Bebop econ - practicing 3 nps bebop dominant scale patterns with economy picking
• 3-1 - 3nps/1nps patterns through melodic minor, top 4 strings
• Minor blues 2x - double time etude
• Lost 2x - double time etude on the Wayne tune Lost
• Rhythm changes - etude
• Giant steps 3-1 - etude composed solely of 3-1 patterns
• Hey it's me - etude on Victor Lewis tune Hey it's me you're talking to

Second part improv. Soloing on the following tunes unaccompanied
-Stablemates
-Dewey Square
-Birdlike
-Invitation
-Tadds delight

Then with tracks from Moises
-toy tune
-Softly
-New milestones
-Body and soul
-autumn leaves
-nardis
-this is new

About 3 hours

[AllanAllen]

Can you elaborate on 4 note triads and Giant Steps 3-1?

Thats a very structured session, I like it.

[pamosmusic]

Tell me about this Kreisberg matrix.

[BreckerFan]

Can you elaborate on 4 note triads and Giant Steps 3-1?

Thats a very structured session, I like it.

Yeah I should've said 4 note triad arepggios. So just like R 3 5 R.

3-1 patterns are a family of sweep picking arpeggios that alternate 3nps and 1nps. The ones I use are 7th arpeggios with a few passing tones (9th, 11th, or 13th), so they're less dense than a scale but more dense than a straight 7th arpeggio. Also convenient in that one 3-1 group is 4 notes, so they kind of work as cells that can be connected together. So that exercise is just outlining the giant steps changes with 3-1 cells.

[BreckerFan]

Tell me about this Kreisberg matrix.

I feel like you'll dig the interval matrix. It's just playing an interval (linearly, like root then fifth) and then moving it up by a second interval, so for me half steps, whole steps, and minor thirds. So playing fifths chromatically, then from each note of the whole tone scale, then from each note of a diminished arpeggio. But Kreisberg made a spreadsheet laying out every interval within an octave so he could practice every combination. I can't remember if he does the 5 fret thing but I like it to avoid just sliding the same shape up a string set.

[pamosmusic]

I feel like you'll dig the interval matrix. It's just playing an interval (linearly, like root then fifth) and then moving it up by a second interval, so for me half steps, whole steps, and minor thirds. So playing fifths chromatically, then from each note of the whole tone scale, then from each note of a diminished arpeggio. But Kreisberg made a spreadsheet laying out every interval within an octave so he could practice every combination. I can't remember if he does the 5 fret thing but I like it to avoid just sliding the same shape up a string set.

Yeah I probably would love this

[AllanAllen]

Yeah I should've said 4 note triad arepggios. So just like R 3 5 R.

3-1 patterns are a family of sweep picking arpeggios that alternate 3nps and 1nps. The ones I use are 7th arpeggios with a few passing tones (9th, 11th, or 13th), so they're less dense than a scale but more dense than a straight 7th arpeggio. Also convenient in that one 3-1 group is 4 notes, so they kind of work as cells that can be connected together. So that exercise is just outlining the giant steps changes with 3-1 cells.

For Gmaj7 3-1, are you doing the below 3nps, 1 nps?

G 3rd fret E
B 7th fret E
D 10th fret E
F# 9th fret A

That's quite a spread.

[James W]

For Gmaj7 3-1, are you doing the below 3nps, 1 nps?

G 3rd fret E
B 7th fret E
D 10th fret E
F# 9th fret A

That's quite a spread.

No I think Brecker fan means three notes on a string then one which would be like 3-5-7 on low E followed by 5 on the A, then 4-5-7 on D then 4 on G etc. or something like that anyway. The point being it is optimised for economy picking what with being odd numbers on each string.

[AllanAllen]

But BreckerFan said it was a sweep picking exercise

[BreckerFan]

No I think Brecker fan means three notes on a string then one which would be like 3-5-7 on low E followed by 5 on the A, then 4-5-7 on D then 4 on G etc. or something like that anyway. The point being it is optimised for economy picking what with being odd numbers on each string.

Yeah exactly that.

[BreckerFan]

But BreckerFan said it was a sweep picking exercise

Yeah you get the sweeps from 7 5 3 on the EAD strings and 7 4 3 on the DGB strings (and a sweep string change from 7 3 from B to E string)

[AllanAllen]

Did I get it right? G major

[BreckerFan]

Did I get it right? G major

Yeah that's exactly it.

You can iterate on that picking pattern a ton. Make patterns like that starting on the 3rd, 5th, and 7th. Change it for major, minor, dominant, half diminished, diminished scale, minor maj7, major7#5, etc. And there's also a second set of 1-3 patterns that start with 1 note on the low E.

[Christian Miller]

Redacted

[Christian Miller]

Also redacted.

I’ll never telll

[joe2758]

Also redacted.

I’ll never telll

too late, you should have covered your webcam lens