Approaches to Improvisation

[Question]

I posted a video on page 18 where I played Bill Evans' "Very Early" with just a drum track.

After listening to Breckerfan's nice version of "Miss Jones" I realized that, although I know those changes well, it is still abstract for me to imagine exactly how his lines are interacting with the original harmony. Kind of like hearing syncopation without the pulse.

Since Very Early is complex and not a very often played standard, I played a piano track along to my original video to help the lines make a bit more sense.

Very Early Chart.pdf

(I posted a real (non-exercise) version of Very Early in the "Songs" section if anyone is interested)

[CliffR]

I posted a video on page 18 where I played Bill Evans' "Very Early" with just a drum track.

After listening to Breckerfan's nice version of "Miss Jones" I realized that, although I know those changes well, it is still abstract for me to imagine exactly how his lines are interacting with the original harmony. Kind of like hearing syncopation without the pulse.

Since Very Early is complex and not a very often played standard, I played a piano track along to my original video to help the lines make a bit more sense.

Very Early Chart.pdf

Yes - that's a big help.

[alltunes]

So much for my attempt to divert the Adam Rogers discussion onto a separate thread.
Silly Ragman with his nonsense.

I always thought Ragman has a most appropriate internet forum pseudonym as he always ‘ragging’ on about various things. Still I don’t mind his antagonistic approach too much.

[BreckerFan]

After listening to Breckerfan's nice version of "Miss Jones" I realized that, although I know those changes well, it is still abstract for me to imagine exactly how his lines are interacting with the original harmony. Kind of like hearing syncopation without the pulse.
Very Early Chart.pdf

Yeah I should add some chords but not sure how since it was just a quick phone recording. Maybe I can mess around with it this afternoon.

[BreckerFan]

Also if we're talking about Adam Rogers and Miss Jones, how about Adam Rogers playing on Miss Jones

[pamosmusic]

Also if we're talking about Adam Rogers and Miss Jones, how about Adam Rogers playing on Miss Jones

Get a hold of yourself

[pamosmusic]

That’s a good question! Really I think I just practise one or two things (that’s all I seem to be able to assimilate), and at first (frustratingly) it seems to make no difference. But after about 6 months I find little traces of it creeping into my playing. So really it just takes a long time I think.

For example I learned one or two of the Bergonzi pentatonic patterns some time ago, but now they seem to be surfacing a bit more.

Same thing with the Linear Expressions book some years back, I only learned a couple of the lines but eventually they did show up in my playing.

But I think this small number of initial ideas get varied and developed a bit over time as I gradually incorporate them. So just a few ‘seed’ ideas can generate a fair bit of mileage (hopefully!).

Yeah that’s sounds about right. Part of the reason I play tunes and transcriptions and exercises and stuff on twelve keys is that a key a day means I play a thing for twelve days before moving on which feels right. So when I’m looking at different angles of an idea, I can pretty easily spend a couple months working on the same kind of thing before giving up and moving on. Only to see it six months later in my playing (or maybe not).

I also like to put cute little bebop enclosures and stuff on fancy modern ideas. I guess the jury’s out on that one.

[Mick-7]

I posted a video on page 18 where I played Bill Evans' "Very Early" with just a drum track.

After listening to Breckerfan's nice version of "Miss Jones" I realized that, although I know those changes well, it is still abstract for me to imagine exactly how his lines are interacting with the original harmony. Kind of like hearing syncopation without the pulse.

Since Very Early is complex and not a very often played standard, I played a piano track along to my original video to help the lines make a bit more sense.

Yes, the tune has unusual chord changes. The melody is all chord tones but good luck referencing it for your improvisation.

[Mick-7]

Attached is more fodder for improvisation by Bert Ligon, that I'd posted in another thread.

[Mick-7]

Kenny Werner talking about Very Early.....

[pamosmusic]

Alright I went back through and listened to Adam Rogers My Music Masterclass on chromaticism and polytonality.

Three main things:

1. scales that have the same basic tonality. So for Dm7, he might use D Dorian, D Aeolian, D Phrygian, but also D melodic minor or harmonic minor for the Dm triad, or even D half whole diminished.

2. scales that have the root and guide tones of the chord. So for Dm7 he wants anything with a D F and C. D locrian, D aeolian b5, D altered.

3. Polytonal arpeggios. So he takes a chromatic note from a scale and uses it as a pivot point for out arpeggios. His example is the b5 blue note. Rather than using it as a passing or neighbor note like we usually do, he starts throwing triads off that note. So for Dm7, he’s using Ab to throw Ab, E, and Db triads in the mix. Experimenting with it, other triads are cool too … more minor than augmented, diminished, or altered triads because they’re more melodically stable. Other notes that sound good when I mess with them are the b3 and b7 blue notes in major. Natural 7 in dominant or minor. b6 in any of them.

THINKING ABOUT HOW TO ACTUALLY PRACTICE THIS:

The third one is the one that jives the most with the way I play generally. That sound is around in some older stuff — you can hear guys like Cannonball or even Jim Hall spin that blue note off into bebop lines like maybe if it’s a Blues in F and they’re using that F blues scale sound, you might hear Fm7b5 floating around in the lines. So that conceptually makes more sense.

My gut says to pick a chromatic note and then work through kind of one approach at a time. Like b5 blue note and make that the root of a triad and try to use that for a while.

It would also seem that this approach would mostly work best if you were generalizing the harmony a bit and using it as an on/off sort of sound. Kind of like using diminished stuff in Barry’s sixth diminished thing.

So maybe the first half of Bye Bye Blackbird becomes:

F - % - % - %
% - % - F7 - D7

Gm - % - % - %
Gm - C7 - F - %

That would free up some space to work in some of those sounds.

[BreckerFan]

For 2, I don't think you even necessarily need the root in the scale. One sub I use a lot is melodic minor from the 3rd of a major 7 chord. The natural 6 of the scale will end up being the sharp 9 over the chord.

You can practice the scalar stuff doing like that exercise you did over If I Were a Bell. The key to using that stuff is being able to resolve it smoothly, including throwing in additional chromatic notes to hit target tones.

The way I've learned it, and the way I hear Adam doing it, is using the scale very directionally, just kind of running it up and down and resolving it. I'm starting to practice using more arpeggios within the superimposed scale, so like maybe ascending and descending diatonic 7th arpeggios in E Mel min over C (e g b d# e c# a f#, etc) to really sell that you're playing Mel min rather than slipping it in as a passing sound.

The triad stuff is cool cuz it's a really direct and clear sound, but also no reason you can't use it as a vehicle to stuff with more extensions. Start making the triads 7 chords, start adding enclosures/extensions/scales onto that, etc. As long as you can resolve it it's allowed.

[pamosmusic]

The triad stuff is cool cuz it's a really direct and clear sound, but also no reason you can't use it as a vehicle to stuff with more extensions. Start making the triads 7 chords, start adding enclosures/extensions/scales onto that, etc. As long as you can resolve it it's allowed.

Yeah that's the reason I've had some (very small) amount of success with that one, and haven't so much with the others. Once I can use a triad to make a sound happen, it can be a bebop lick and I'm very happy there

The way I've learned it, and the way I hear Adam doing it, is using the scale very directionally, just kind of running it up and down and resolving it. I'm starting to practice using more arpeggios within the superimposed scale, so like maybe ascending and descending diatonic 7th arpeggios in E Mel min over C (e g b d# e c# a f#, etc) to really sell that you're playing Mel min rather than slipping it in as a passing sound.

Yeah that's intense.

[Mick-7]

The way I've learned it, and the way I hear Adam doing it, is using the scale very directionally, just kind of running it up and down and resolving it.

Scales tend to be too large a note pool for me, although good for stream of sound type lines if you can manage that. I find it easier to think/hear in terms of brief patterns or phrases, e.g., play a 4-5 note phrase that is diatonic to the chord (say, a fragment of a songs melody), and then play a non-diatonic copy or variation of the same phrase over the chord.

Dave Creamer called this "tonal/atonal oscillation," and he discusses it in this article:
https://www.jazzguitar.be/forum/atta...creamer-01-pdf

[BreckerFan]

Scales tend to be too large a note pool for me, although good for stream of sound type lines if you can manage that. I find it easier to think/hear in terms of brief patterns or phrases, e.g., play a 4-5 note phrase that is diatonic to the chord (say, a fragment of a songs melody), and then play a non-diatonic copy or variation of the same phrase over the chord.

I think different instruments have different tendencies/sounds that come more naturally. Guitarist's runs don't tend to include large uninterrupted scales, Rogers being an exception imo. Sax and trumpet players are similar. The vocabulary tends to include a lot of turns and melodic patterns. Piano players, while also using this language because it's just jazz language, are also, with such a huge available pitch range, likely to run scales or arpeggios through multiple octaves. I like the piano/Rogers sound, but its not easily facilitated with caged shapes (Rogers uses Segovia scales).

[pamosmusic]

I think different instruments have different tendencies/sounds that come more naturally. Guitarist's runs don't tend to include large uninterrupted scales, Rogers being an exception imo. Sax and trumpet players are similar. The vocabulary tends to include a lot of turns and melodic patterns. Piano players, while also using this language because it's just jazz language, are also, with such a huge available pitch range, likely to run scales or arpeggios through multiple octaves. I like the piano/Rogers sound, but its not easily facilitated with caged shapes (Rogers uses Segovia scales).

Yeah the transpositions of complete fragments is more guitaristic for obvious reasons, I guess.

I'm thinking I'm going to try incorporating some of the scalar stuff in while I'm working on that. I can get sort of flighty with what I practice, and I set out down that road, so I'm going to stick with it a bit.

I have been adding some chromatic patterns into my late night mindless scale practice though. We'll see how I'm feeling about that when I run out of gas on the scale stuff.

[pamosmusic]

Alright so here’s some of this stuff … it’s way after midnight here so don’t at me on the backing track balance, etc etc

Over the minor 7 chords it’s major 7 a half step down. So for Gm7 it’s the Gb major scale for the Bb and F.

Then I threw the minor in its usual spot over the other chords.

For dominant it’s minor off the fifth, so C7 becomes Gm becomes Gbmaj.

And for major it’s minor off the sixth, so Fmaj7 becomes Dm becomes Dbmaj.

I went with a lot of major bebop language for that stuff. So it’s kind of a heretical take on the whole thing, but like I said, my first instinct with this stuff is beboppification. And I have to keep myself busy while all this scalar stuff sets in.

Some other junk in there I just went for. Trying to grab some ideas off those chromatic passing notes. Nothing too terribly put together.

[grahambop]

Amidst all the talk of Adam Rogers, I’d forgotten that BreckerFan has the unique accolade of being congratulated on this forum by the man himself!

I recently came across it when searching for something, it was in his ‘Night and Day’ transcription thread. (I’ve been going through the transcription to figure out some of the ‘outside’ line approaches used in that solo.)

Pretty cool!

[pamosmusic]

Amidst all the talk of Adam Rogers, I’d forgotten that BreckerFan has the unique accolade of being congratulated on this forum by the man himself!

I recently came across it when searching for something, it was in his ‘Night and Day’ transcription thread. (I’ve been going through the transcription to figure out some of the ‘outside’ line approaches used in that solo.)

Pretty cool!

EDIT: he actually only has two forum posts, both of them congratulating him on the transcription and it appears he only joined the forum to tell him that transcription rules. Wicked.

[pamosmusic]

On another note, I never bought the Adam Rogers video. I like to do the thing once or twice a year where you pay to rent a few videos a month or whatever. So I had some other rentals to burn and got Jon Cowherd's called "Creating Your Own Voice." Not because it sounded terribly interesting or the name really told me anything useful about it, but mostly because Jon Cowherd rules and I didn't know he'd done a My Music Masterclass.

I watched it last night.

Drumroll.

It's on his process for writing etudes.

So it was actually very interesting and very much on topic.

[James W]

On another note, I never bought the Adam Rogers video. I like to do the thing once or twice a year where you pay to rent a few videos a month or whatever. So I had some other rentals to burn and got Jon Cowherd's called "Creating Your Own Voice." Not because it sounded terribly interesting or the name really told me anything useful about it, but mostly because Jon Cowherd rules and I didn't know he'd done a My Music Masterclass.

I watched it last night.

Drumroll.

It's on his process for writing etudes.

So it was actually very interesting and very much on topic.

Interesting!

I wonder if you could fill us in on its content?

[pamosmusic]

Interesting!

I wonder if you could fill us in on its content?

I don't know that there was anything revolutionary in there. He was just working through his process. It was also very refreshing to hear ... like ... Brian Blade's piano player talking about specific weaknesses in his playing and that sort of thing.

He decides he wants to work on rhythm changes, Giant Steps matrix, and triplet rhythms.

So he found this line from Visa that he thought was killer and stole the rhythm, then worked out how he wanted the matrix to sit over the Rhythm Changes A section, then wrote his melody.

He also said he writes very short etudes, generally. Like 8 bars. Then edits them and when he likes them, he plays them in twelve keys. That seems like a smart idea. I was listening while I was cooking last night, but I'll watch again today and take notes.

[grahambop]

EDIT: he actually only has two forum posts, both of them congratulating him on the transcription and it appears he only joined the forum to tell him that transcription rules. Wicked.

Miles Okazaki has also posted on the forum a couple of times as I recall.

[BreckerFan]

EDIT: he actually only has two forum posts, both of them congratulating him on the transcription and it appears he only joined the forum to tell him that transcription rules. Wicked.

Yeah that was pretty cool. No idea how he found out about it and made his way onto our little forum.

[BreckerFan]

Alright so here’s some of this stuff … it’s way after midnight here so don’t at me on the backing track balance, etc etc

Over the minor 7 chords it’s major 7 a half step down. So for Gm7 it’s the Gb major scale for the Bb and F.

Then I threw the minor in its usual spot over the other chords.

For dominant it’s minor off the fifth, so C7 becomes Gm becomes Gbmaj.

And for major it’s minor off the sixth, so Fmaj7 becomes Dm becomes Dbmaj.

I went with a lot of major bebop language for that stuff. So it’s kind of a heretical take on the whole thing, but like I said, my first instinct with this stuff is beboppification. And I have to keep myself busy while all this scalar stuff sets in.

Some other junk in there I just went for. Trying to grab some ideas off those chromatic passing notes. Nothing too terribly put together.

This is great. I really like the major chord stuff in particular, like the line at 40 seconds. Super hip.