The Jazz Guitar Chord Dictionary
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  1. #26

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    Quote Originally Posted by mr. beaumont
    Re: licks-- absolutely. I think the key is to have licks that are malleable...they're ideas you can stretch, contract, make fit different situations, bar lengths, etc..

    My first comment was jackassery but also not...to me, that's what practice is. Looking for weaknesses and fixing them. If I'm repeating a lame idea (and believe me, I repeat plenty of lame ideas) that's absolutely something I work on fixing-- either tweaking to make better or find a different way...it's why I record myself so much (and submit you all to my work in progress videos)
    The modular lick compendium returns.

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  3. #27
    Quote Originally Posted by pamosmusic
    It’s a cool idea.
    Quote Originally Posted by ccroft
    I think it's a great idea. I do it almost every day. I don't even need a recording!
    Quote Originally Posted by Christian Miller
    Well I think it’s a good idea.
    Why thank you.

  4. #28

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    Well now that you’ve gotten a little affirmation, it would still be cool to hear what the changing and improving of the idea looks like to you.

    Maybe some more affirmation in your future.

  5. #29

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    Quote Originally Posted by pamosmusic
    The modular lick compendium returns.
    Exactly what I thought of when I saw Bobby's post.

    Maybe I'm dense, and if so, I definitely owe Bobby an apology-- I really thought EVERYBODY did this kind of stuff.

  6. #30

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    Quote Originally Posted by Bobby Timmons
    Go listen to a recording you made and pick out the lamest motif that you repeat. Then take it and practice reshaping it in as many ways as you can. Bam, killed 2 birds with 1 stone. Eliminated a lame idea and gained good ideas. Can expand on it note wise or rhythms wise.
    Ha! For me that would be pretty much everything I played! But at least I have a lot of material to work with!

  7. #31

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    Quote Originally Posted by mr. beaumont
    Exactly what I thought of when I saw Bobby's post.

    Maybe I'm dense, and if so, I definitely owe Bobby an apology-- I really thought EVERYBODY did this kind of stuff.
    Everybody probably should. Some variations or really similar things I can think of.

    Your modular lick thing, which is kind of the same process but with a transcribed lick.

    The thing I described, which is the same process but without the recording.

    I had a teacher who used to suggest I record and transcribe myself and then do that with things that were cool.

    Both of those also would be the same process but with something you presumably like, rather than with something you dislike.

    Etc.

  8. #32

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    I've spent a lot of time with lick books and a fair amount of time trying to lift fragments that I like from records, but surprising little of that really got into my playing.

    Seeing and hearing another player, up close, execute a good lick (in my chops range) has gotten it into my playing very quickly, although not very often.

    An assignment from a teacher to write out some of my own ideas for playing over ii V's was helpful and I still use one of those licks.

    I don't really work on scat singing. I just do it, and I try to put it on the guitar as I sing. When I'm relaxed enough to do that on the bandstand, and I know the sound of the tune, I'm happiest with the result.

    So, it seems to me that this is the skill I should focus on. When I get to the point where I can play the scatting immediately, at the required tempos, then it would be time to work on singing more sophisticated lines.

    The background for this is that I play in several bands, each of which is usually focused on unfamiliar material. So a lot of this is a chart I've never seen suddenly directs me to solo and the changes may not seem all that easy. In some of those cases, the scatsinging thing doesn't work because I can't feel the harmony, having never heard it.

  9. #33

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    Quote Originally Posted by pamosmusic
    When I’m trying to sit there and do this when I practice, or use a certain device a lot of times, I’m trying to train myself to hear it —see where it fits, what it can do rhythmically, how it can be manipulated — almost more than I’m trying train myself to play it.

    You mention us being products of what we listen to — and I’m not sure it’s reasonable to expect to be able to hear an idea on a record and extrapolate out a bunch of other interesting things without practicing that as a skill.
    I'll try to explain what I mean, my previous attempts to do so obviously fell short....

    Assuming you have a moderate understanding of your instrument and music theory, when you can play a musical phrase that you hear than you understand its structure, the notes it contains and its tonality, and thus the harmonic context(s) it will suit. At that point there is no longer any training or extrapolation involved, you can hear it and recognize when it will be appropriate to play it.

    Quote Originally Posted by pamosmusic
    So you might say you practice playin what you hear in your head, but I would want to know how you practice hearing better.
    Well, ear training, I can't play what I can't hear, so when I stumble and play the wrong notes (not what I heard), I'll discover a musical ear deficit I need to work on. It's not some sort of mystical process, just more of a big picture approach to developing improvisational ability.

    Quote Originally Posted by pamosmusic
    and if we’re listening to jazz, we’re sure as heck listening to some licks too. Thinking of Sonny on St Thomas — one of that greatest examples of motivic development on the books — and he moves freely between loose rhythmic motifs and bebop vocabulary. So there’s that too.
    Yes, that is the ultimate goal, but I'm not sure you can follow a map to get to it. As a philosopher once said, "the map is not the territory."

  10. #34

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    I don’t know man. Again … color me skeptical.

    I would say for most people, the learning of the licks is the ear training.

    and it’s finger training etc.

    I will say, I’d be interested in hearing how you think your playing differs because of the way you practice. I’ve heard stories of Mark Turner mostly just transcribing what he heard in his head, but I’m no Mark Turner.

  11. #35

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    Quote Originally Posted by pamosmusic
    I don’t know man. Again … color me skeptical.

    I would say for most people, the learning of the licks is the ear training.

    and it’s finger training etc.

    I will say, I’d be interested in hearing how you think your playing differs because of the way you practice. I’ve heard stories of Mark Turner mostly just transcribing what he heard in his head, but I’m no Mark Turner.
    Perhaps the licks just get longer and longer....

    In another thread on transcribing I mentioned that in olden pre-pc days we had no sound modulating apps like Slow Downer to use, so we had to listen to a musical phrase at it's normal speed, stop the recording, ask oneself, "what did I just hear?," then attempt to play it, "No, that's not what was played." Repeat the process 'til you get it right. This really developed my musical memory. I think it's what has led me to my current approach.

  12. #36

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    Quote Originally Posted by Mick-7
    Perhaps the licks just get longer and longer....

    In another thread on transcribing I mentioned that in olden pre-pc days we had no sound modulating apps like Slow Downer to use, so we had to listen to a musical phrase at it's normal speed, stop the recording, ask oneself, "what did I just hear?," then attempt to play it, "No, that's not what was played." Repeat the process 'til you get it right. This really developed my musical memory. I think it's what has led me to my current approach.
    Okay right that makes sense.

    But honestly … it sounds like you’re saying you’re not much in need of the kind of stuff they’re talking about on this thread because you did it so much in the past. Which is kind of a different thing.

    Like it sounds like you learned so many lines by ear that you don’t really need to do it much anymore.

  13. #37

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    Quote Originally Posted by pamosmusic
    Like it sounds like you learned so many lines by ear that you don’t really need to do it much anymore.
    Doing much less of it, yes, but I wouldn't say none, there is always something beyond one's current musical horizon to listen to and learn from.

  14. #38

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    I like the Peter Bernstein thing ‘how about I play it and see what it sounds like?’ Haha

    Working by ear is great, but I always found it interesting that Ravel told Vaughan Williams to compose at the piano rather than purely in his head so he could invent new harmonies.

    The implication seems to be that we can tend to fall into our well work patterns even when we are working purely by ear. And this makes sense.

    Real world war training works in quite a modular way in my experience. You can pick a familiar lick, line or voicing. The purpose of learning licks off the record is to learn the vocabulary of common ‘words’, get gpod enough at that and it’s straightforward to work out bop lines etc (I’m told) but other stuff might pose much more of a challenge.

    Which is not to say they couldn’t compose in their heads at all, or that Pete doesn’t also have great ears, but it’s a bit of yin, a bit of yang.


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  15. #39

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    the tune is the lick par excellence - embellishing it, hearing it differently, adding bits in handy gaps. I think that singing the tune generates loads of ideas in the minds of tune-singers.

    and good licks are your friend too! I find that just after I play a cool idea (I'm nuts about the 'Mona Lisa' lick just now) - my own most personal hearing improves a great deal.

    and of course you can spontaneously hear phrases you've heard in other peoples' solos - does that make them yours? i think it tends to - because you maybe put a kink into them that wasn't in the borrowed line - maybe because you don't re-hear them quite right....

    it's such a pity that these chatty spaces for people into jazz guitar are typically so fraught

  16. #40

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    Quote Originally Posted by Groyniad
    the tune is the lick par excellence - embellishing it, hearing it differently, adding bits in handy gaps. I think that singing the tune generates loads of ideas in the minds of tune-singers.

    and good licks are your friend too! I find that just after I play a cool idea (I'm nuts about the 'Mona Lisa' lick just now) - my own most personal hearing improves a great deal.

    and of course you can spontaneously hear phrases you've heard in other peoples' solos - does that make them yours? i think it tends to - because you maybe put a kink into them that wasn't in the borrowed line - maybe because you don't re-hear them quite right....

    it's such a pity that these chatty spaces for people into jazz guitar are typically so fraught
    My favourite one is the Alfonse Picout ‘high society’ lick that bird uses that everyone thinks is a bird lick unless they are an early jazz geek.


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  17. #41

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    You know where licks are great? Turnarounds, licks are really great for turnarounds... bring it all around and give a nod to the top.

  18. #42

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    Quote Originally Posted by Bobby Timmons
    Far out Bop Head. You go to amateur events? My mind is blown. That surely entitles you to go around constantly telling people what's what as if you're superior and trying to shamelessly aggrandize yourself. Can't play so being a little weasel on the forum is your only recourse?
    Munich's Unterfahrt is not an amateur event. It is the place where Emmet Cohen, John Scofield or Peter Bernstein (September 24th BTW) play.

    After the session I talked to that guy who played a great jazz violin. I told him that I am looking for people to play with but that I have the impression that he is a busy pro and would have no time for another project, He told me that he is teaching at the conservatory and very busy but he will tell his students that I am looking for musical companions. Seems like I actually can play a little.

  19. #43

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    Quote Originally Posted by Bobby Timmons
    ^ I can tell someone off who goes around being a jackass for years on end. How could that possibly be out of line? Analyze what he said, it took me a while to figure this out about his behavior. He not only tries to get you to yield to him, he tries to make you submit to others in the supposed pecking order. What kind of shit is that? Once I agreed with him about a BH Hague video but casually referred to the students as kids. He told me I wasn't permitted to do that because they're superior to me music wise. Here, Mr B made a jackassery comment, I refute it without overreacting, and of course Bop Head has to come in and tell me that Mr B's jackassery comment supersedes my bit of wisdom and I need to conform. Yeah, I think I'm good on letting it slide.

    Mostly keeping the phrasing and rhythm but changing a note or 2. Or you can also change the rhythm. Basically my thinking is it doesn't take much to reshape a dumb thing that frequently just comes out your fingers into good musical vocab.
    I will speak out against any behaviour that I find inadequate -- be it racist or discriminating in any way, antisemitic, islamophobe, antiziganistic or anything or simply inadequately arrogant (IMHO) like in the case of your "kids" comment. It did not feel to me like to me like you were agreeing to what I said.

    Regarding the "pecking order" you should maybe consult a shrink. I give a damn about pecking orders -- I have been an anarchist all of my life. But i know where my musical place is. I have jammed tonight with people who could have been my sons and daughters but who were light years better than I am. I would never call them "kids". I know my qualities and I know my deficiencies.

    You asked me recently who I have studied with. I did not study with any Tony Monaco or so. I am an autodidact apart from recorder and piano lessons as a kid. And I studied life in the school of hard knocks. Which is probably why people consider my music and my singing and my playing authentic and true. I played probably 500+ concerts with my former band, partly in front of a few thousand people. I have worked as a tech guy at probably 1500+ concerts of any style you can imagine, from early Korn or Slipnot shows to Abdullah Ibrahim or the first Faithless concert in Germany. That was my conservatory. If I am talking about things I am talking from experience. Which does not mean that I would consider myself impeccable -- not at all. And all this does not make me a better human being. But probably I am not the worst musician on earth

  20. #44

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    Quote Originally Posted by Christian Miller
    My favourite one is the Alfonse Picout ‘high society’ lick that bird uses that everyone thinks is a bird lick unless they are an early jazz geek.
    haha i know exactly the lick you're talking about, though i heard it first from Sidney Bechet on the same tune.

    had no idea it came from Picou.. wow these early jazz guys are heavyweights