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Wait, why can't you blow on this tune?
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06-17-2016 12:16 PM
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I want to hear a medium or uptempo tune. The whole point of this thread was technique and why it's important. Just play an uptempo blues, for crying out loud! You can play anything you hear so hear something fast.
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I wondered the same thing mr. B:
Originally Posted by targuit
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Jason, Lots of good CC-ish nods in there too. Great stuff.
By the way, avoid the iReal book changes on Girl Talk if you wanna use a track, they're terrible.Last edited by mr. beaumont; 06-17-2016 at 12:31 PM.
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Thanks, Jeff. I have always played swing and western swing but am really trying to work on my bebop chops.
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Here's a guy who does pretty well with it:
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And then there's the one, the only, accept no substitutes, no generics available, Kenny "Awesome" Burrell!
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This has become one of a hundred targuit derail-to-being-all-about-him threads. They're ironic, in that they always devolve into him challenging everyone to post something, according to his very strict standards. People post playing, (accept, 90% of the time, Jay) and it all ends up with a positive vibe. People posting playing is great, but the unintended "positive" consequence is that we just pretend like everything is OK with him. Whatever, I've posted my playing in several targuit pissing contests. It is what it is. I'm not more than I ever claimed to be.
This thread contains a lot of the usual obsessive-compulsive fixations of Jay. I won't quote the "12 tones" one again, but Joe Pass didn't "just play 12 notes". He made choices about notes which others call scales. It's ridiculous to constantly argue with intelligent people about basic, agreed-upon terminology, but whatever.
Another Jay obsession. "Arpeggios are just chords." Thanks for the insight, but of course they're not the same, in the way in which they're applied. Every musician on planet earth attaches meaning to this word. Feel free to mock away. Pianists have a much more straightforward way of looking at chords/arps, without guitarists' voicing limitations. Yet, they still play the crap out of them! Hanon is a thing. This is one of many examples of a "Jay against everyone else" obsession. Usually it's just him against the entire Jazz world, but here the jazzers are joined by all of classical pianists as well. Good job on that! It's fine to have dissident opinions on things, but he's making an fool of himself as well, by preaching at the rest of the musical world and implying how stupid they are. Originally Posted by targuit
Another common obsession is this idea that Jerome Kern and Richard Rogers are "more Jazz" than actual jazzers, because they wrote great songs. The Great American Songbook provides much of the material for jazz playing and improv, but it is not, in and of itself, jazz. A lot of those tunes weren't anything like jazz originally, but again, Jay doesn't really know what jazz is. No amount of explaining to him is ever going to fix that.
I'm weary of being bullied with preachy talking-down-to,.... by someone who speaks more highly of himself than he ought,..... about things which he doesn't know,....and then has the absolute, oblivious delusion to cry about me picking on him for actually calling it out. There isn't a rational conversation to be had with him about any of these topics. It's been had. See any of his previous 100 derails...
Practicing Lines - Do you need a backing track of some sort?
Anyway, It's cool for people to post playing. I always enjoy it.Last edited by matt.guitarteacher; 06-17-2016 at 02:06 PM. Reason: trying to be a little nicer....sheesh....
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Matt - I love you, man, I do, but you keep forgetting a very important maxim. Better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak and remove any doubt.
As it is, I am working now on Girl Talk. I've written out the changes and melody as Reg played it, and I'm going to work now on the organ accompaniment, bass and percussion. If I were you, Matt, if you want to play this game, you might want to work on your version. Of course, if you don't want to play.....
This is a very cool tune by Neal Hefti. Now he was a composer! This is not about derailing threads. You attacked me, brother, and I'm sorry to see that. Now we could spend an eternity parsing the meaning of 'arpeggios' that you all feel compelled to practice, or we can play some music and blow over the changes, as Jeff terms it.
I realize that Girl Talk is not a bebop tune at 300 bpm for all the speed queens, but Reg ripped it up beautifully and made my day with his recording. And just to show the haters and doubters on the forum, I will now remove the knives from my back and focus on creating the best version that I can as quickly as I can. If it is street cred that one needs to express an opinion on the forum that is not the catechism of the self-appointed Jazz police, I will attempt to earn that today. That includes my humble attempt at playing an organ track, bass track and hopefully half-decent percussion track on my cheapo Yamaha synth. I certainly will not be able to capture the gorgeous tone that Reg delivered with his archtop nor the sound quality of a pro recording studio, but I'll do my best with the humble tools that I have. Unfortunately I'll have to play to a strict click track to overdub, which is not what Reg's quartet achieved with their slightly shifting tempo which gives some human breath to the recording. I get the tempo here at around 68 bpm or so. The click track unfortunately does not vary tempo like a human percussion section. But, c'est la vie.
Anyway, much as I appreciate Dr. Matt's psychiatric consult and his very kind words on my behalf, I will let my playing do the talking rather than another part of one's anatomy which some seem to favor. Can we agree at least that this is a great tune replete with arpeggios, actual notes, chords, rhythms, a melody, and even harmony? Other than more vapid discussions and navel gazing, isn't it more fun to actually play? Without attacking each other and poisoning the well. I guess it depends upon one's character. Of course, given that I have no idea how to play jazz and am lucky to be able to walk and chew gum at the same time while dealing with my obsessions and neuroses, it will be a task. Let's see how long it takes to get the job done.
Looking forward to hearing all the versions from the stars in our little galaxy of supernovas.Last edited by targuit; 06-17-2016 at 02:38 PM.
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Why does it have to be a production? Just put on a click and blow some changes.
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The irony is thick. Or maybe it's something else we're standing in... Originally Posted by targuit
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Due respect but maybe you should check the thread for a reminder on who first called on others to demonstrate their abilities. That'd be you. Frankly I hate the idea ... you can usually tell from what people say how much weight you should give them. I think the same is probably true here for better or worse. Originally Posted by targuit
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holy shit, I just looked at that other thread Matt posted; why are we still giving this the time of day?
BTW Matt, nice playing it was cool to finally hear you.
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Back to the OP, there's this constant chiding of would-be purveyors of CST, those who would advocate for developing technique through playing scales arp, or exercises. Talk down and mock basically everything Reg advocates and then:
Originally Posted by targuit
But how about the original thread topic? We know Reg plays well. Like the original topic of Brecker/Bird, how does the work of developing fundamental techniques through the study of arps/scales/technical studies influence the end product in a player like Reg? Is it, in fact, arrogant and disrespectful to completely disregard his own opinion of the importance of it? Originally Posted by targuit
Are we actually suggesting that Reg got to that level in spite of "wasting" so much time with technical studies, when he actually points to them as being crucial? Enough with the flattery BS! What are we talking about? Roses and "we all love each other"...."let's all post some pretty song?"
It's the definition of insanity to continually flatter someone while constantly suggesting that everything that "they're about" is a waste of time. In everything Jay says, he implies and equality with Reg which is offensive to everyone with ears. This is just so much BS.
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Jay, improvised, in the sense the notes being unplanned, I can believe. Unedited, in the sense of not being comped tracks possibly, but you're over dubbing two guitars and vocals over backing tracks; that's a firm of editing. That's not live jazz. And frankly, it's really bad. Your singing is out of tune, your playing is out of time, and what you call soloing has nothing going on it even remotely resembling real jazz. You're lecturing everybody else about your knowledge and training and their benightednes, but given what you actually put up of your own playing, it's hard not to see this as trolling. This does not sound like the output of someone with years of training and decades of musical activity. It sounds like someone who has barely any idea of how to make music. Originally Posted by targuit
The obvious riposte to what I wrote is "oh yeah? Let's see what you got."
Fine, here's an assortment of my homegrown noodling.
Here's a little actual jazz (of a sort) with an actual group recorded with no overdubs or edits. Not great, but I don't pretend it is.
https://soundcloud.com/john-albin/sunny
Here's some lame noodling over a backing track. No edits, just a quick take I did to see how a new rig sounded.
https://soundcloud.com/john-albin/da...wine-and-roses
Here's trying some stuff out with a collaborator, cause that's what musicians do.
https://soundcloud.com/john-albin/groovin-on-sunday
Here's some conscious use of arps and scales: in practice
Here's a non-jazz, but actual paid performance in an actual venue, involving vocals that may be out of tune but at least have a little energy.
I also play actual jazz on a regular basis with other people, sometimes even in public, and if a I had recordings I'd post them. Take my word for it or not, but sometimes it's decent sounding.
If you or anybody tells me I stink, I'll be the first to agree. But I don't lecture people about how to actually make music. I know my limitations, and don't think of them as a prescription for others.
John
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This is obviously not meant to answer for Reg but rather give my own answer to that question. Originally Posted by matt.guitarteacher
It's all about how you practice. Anyone who runs scales up and down will have chops but not a lot of vocabulary. The implication that practicing scales is just running them up and down, however, is just not true. Find a short line and work it through all your scales by transposing it diatonically or something like that. One of my favorite books (really the only one I still actually use) is a book by the guitarist Barry Finnerty called "The Serious Jazz Practice Book" ... that is a goldmine of melodic patterns based on major scales, pentatonics, symmetrical scales, arpeggios, spread triads, and twelve tone series. There's also zero fluff ... he basically says that everything is in C and in a small range and that you're all big boys and can transpose to different keys, chord qualities, and scale types on your own. I've barely scratched the surface on it. It's nothing mind-blowing and it's not really vocabulary per se but it will show anyone what chops boot camp really could be.
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better or for worse is right. I think all of us participating in this thread could tell, even if there were no recordings, that what targuit says is almost entirely hot air (and that's not to say I wouldn't grab a beer with ya Jay!). Originally Posted by pamosmusic
what I'm worried about, are the multitudes of beginners who read through these threads (it's easy to forget how many people read through these threads) and aren't yet able to separate the wheat from chaff.
So, we end up with say the 16 year old kid who is tired of playing straight blues and wants to get into straight ahead jazz. He comes onto this forum and reads Targuit's posts and thinks something like "well this guy seems to be a step ahead of everyone else (remember being a young mind and what attributes convince you to follow someone?), I'll skip all those lowly "Jazz fingerings," learn the Segovia scales, get Sibelius, then just play the awesome jazz lines that come to me from my mental jukebox."
I'm just a concerned parent at heart! Jay, you stop corrupting our youth!!Last edited by joe2758; 06-17-2016 at 03:20 PM.
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And I fell in love with that book my freshman year of college and practiced wide interval leaps in scales for hours and hours and hours. My playing now is very interval-ish ... lots of wide leaps and disjointed lines. Whether that's good or not is neither here nor there but I know exactly where it came from.
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I've just started focusing on chops again, and coincidentally just picked up that book. Glad to hear your endorsement! Originally Posted by pamosmusic
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Yeah seriously I can't even let myself look that book up because of my addiction to educational material. EMAS? Better than being a gear-head, I feel for those poor bastards $$$
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Is it totally weird to say that maybe... just maaaayyyyybbbe... different approaches work best for different people? I think Reg is a terrific player, and I've learned a few things from his posts. I think his points about technical mastery are well taken. That said, drilling scales is not going to be as effective for everyone as it has been for him. Ditto arps. Ditto, pretty much everything. Originally Posted by matt.guitarteacher
My ex-wife, in the process of earning her Ph.D., did a good bit of work on learning styles. There are a number of main ones (I want to think maybe 6 or 7) with most people being a combination of a few of them.
For example, I am an experiential/practical learner. In order for me to learn something and have it stick, I need a practical application, and I need to work on it. Five hours of classroom instruction are not going to be as productive for me as an hour of working on a practical application. For me, it's going to be much more effective to work out a few licks than to practice scales and arps to hell and gone. That's not to say that there's NO value to doing that, only that it's going to be of less value to me than to someone else.
My ex is a theoretical learner. She learns a ton by reading about stuff (possibly influencing her to become an academic), and when she reads about how to do something, she usually does it right the first time. Not always, but a good chunk of the time (by contrast, I almost always do things wrong the first time).
For me, CST was a good way to understand the structure and general idea behind jazz improv, but I needed arps to find practical ways to access the sounds.
There's no way I'm going to know my scales and arps as well as Reg. My brain just doesn't work that way. That doesn't mean Reg is wrong about technical skills. I just have to find other ways to acquire them.
Point being, is that we can argue till we're blue in the face about who learned what how, but if we have different learning styles, the effectiveness of the process is not going to transfer.
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The things that impress me about Reg's playing are not really his note choices. The note choices are great, but what I really like is the feel and the time with which they are played. Originally Posted by Boston Joe
Information on jazz harmony, scales and so on, is easy to come by, and it's great to learn it, but that's what it boils down to for me - time, feel and phrasing.
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Originally Posted by dingusmingus
I honestly really don't like the idea of learning stuff through books but I love that book. It's awesome. Partly because it doesn't promise to be anything other than what it is. It's not a method ... you'll probably never play everything in it ... it's efficiently presented but that means that turning the information into practice is completely up to you. But for ideas, it's top notch. It's just like a little encyclopedia and when I start working on something new or want to hit technique hard again I'll just crack it open for one day and it gives me enough ideas that I can put it back on the shelf for six months.
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Okay. I'm down with learning styles . Originally Posted by Boston Joe
I guess, speaking to my style of learning, I had trouble following a lot of those Reg videos, because I didn't know what I was looking at. Weird that after learning some melodic minor scales all of it is much easier to follow, visually and conceptually.
Maybe not so weird. :-) I think he's on to something there, with that "basics first" thing.
Anyway, there's a certain amount you can do with whatever you've got, basically, in terms of experience and playing ability, I guess. But at some point you're going to hit walls. For me, it was definitely melodic minor. There was just no way for me, with the ability level I had at the time, to do anything with the application aspect of melodic minor , because I just didn't have it mapped out well at all, on the fretboard, in multiple positions. There are so many applications of melodic minor, and the myriad of applications he always talked about with it seemed very overwhelming, impossible...
I now hear many on the boards saying the same kind of things I used to think: About it just being for pros or super high-level players or whatever. I wish I could go back a few years and tell myself this dirty little secret: The applications of extended harmony are probably MORE important at lower levels of skill like mine. I mean if you don't have super chops, why wouldn't you want to do be able to do more with what you've got?
There are other things you don't consider until you dive in as well, like the fact that melodic minor, for example, is much more quickly internalized and learned when you're applying it in MULTIPLE ways at once. I mean, altered in five or seven positions is just a drill, but using four different MM patterns over four different chords is something completely different. They all kind of reinforce each other.
Most of the talk I hear of people being really apprehensive about technical stuff seems rooted in people's experience withgetting bogged down in technical-only stuff for years. I mean, at some point you do have to take responsibility for balancing your study of anything. I just can't discounting all of technical for that reason.Last edited by matt.guitarteacher; 06-17-2016 at 04:31 PM.
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Yes, there are definitely times when you have to roll up your sleeves and learn something. I've recently delved into MM in a big way myself. My approach has been to run the scales, just to try to get the patterns into some kind of muscle memory, but then to start applying things right away. I've had some success using MM scale triads as tools. That bIII+ is a fun sound to work with. Originally Posted by matt.guitarteacher
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