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I took Richie Zellons fingerings for Mixolydian and Dorian in all 7 positions and broke them into arpeggiated triad patterns so I had all the inversions in all positions.I really like his material and have really worked hard learning his fingerings - that said the material as presented lacks musicality for me. So I looked for a way to use it musically. I came across an idea from Jordan Klemons which really clicked for me and so allowed myself only those arpeggiated triad patterns and inversions ( I think Jordan used only dyads ) as a source for building soloing ideas which really opened the door for me to start a deeper exploration of rhythmic ideas and really made me conscious of note choice, basic melodic idea structure and note timing with so few choices available. I took that and applied it to some standard jazz blues/blues changes. Once I was more comfortable there I have now been allowing myself to add chromatic and diatonic approach notes to the triads from above and below which has opened a number of other doors including recognizing pattern fragments from scales other than the Mixo and Dorian - Diminished scale patterns and sounds for instance that I really enjoy seem to have become readily available. I am currently working on adding upper extensions to the mix and reducing the reliance on the full triad as the basic building block. I like this framework as I have what I see as a basic building block that is musical - the traid - I have a tough time practising scales or modes and getting them to sound musical- and at each step if I get a bit lost I can go back along the road I mapped out and reload . I am still doing scale /mode practice but now it has a purpose which is informing my arpeggiated triads+++ approach. I'm practising the scales/modes in different interval patterns for instance for a reason. I have a good friend who is a long time pro bass player who tells me my playing has dramatically improved of late so perhaps while my explanation is a bit muddled something in it all is working.
Hope that made sense and helps
WillLast edited by WillMbCdn5; 10-15-2016 at 09:43 PM.
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10-15-2016 08:36 PM
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Take some Parker lines and put them under the microscope. That'll give you your pitch choices.
Then, learn the line without any notes. That'll give you the rhythm.
Keep doing it until stuff starts coming out.
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As for answering the OP...
It sounds like you want to play bop lines over the blues, not just "the blues". If that's the case, learning lots of bop heads written over the blues is probably the most helpful thing you can do. Be able to sing the heads while you comp the changes. Be able to play the head with strong time and maybe stomp your foot where the chords would be changing if you were with a group... or if you're a strong enough singer, try singing the basic root note movement while playing the head. Doesn't have to be with walking basslines. Just sing the root, the IV, the root, the ii V to the IV... etc. Listen to the stuff a lot. Practice outlining the chords using basic triads in time... maybe just using half notes at first, then quarter notes, then eighth notes.
Also... it's not bop.. but maybe consider transcribing the first few seconds of this... Nina IS the blues. I found her intro to be so much fun to work out on guitar... especially how it sounds so deep yet is just straight up minor pentatonic. I don't even think she used the b5 blue note... just straight minor pentatonic. But man... she knows HOW to use the minor pentatonic!!!
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What about playing the blues on standards?
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Also, I feel moved to add that we have this tendency to put the 'blues' and 'bop' in different boxes. In fact, Parker played a lot of blues. He plays blues everywhere. The blues is an intrinsic part of his soloing on all changes. IMO if you don't get that you haven't really understood his music.
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Depends on the standard.
Originally Posted by christianm77
I think a "blue" approach is almost always ok...
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I think blues is a feel.
I've heard plenty of people play on a blues form and not sound remotely "bluesy."
I agree, if a standard calls for it, a player should be able to deliver it. It can also be overdone and forced.
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I would say organ jazz combos in general fill this niche, and Kenny Burrell maybe even more than Grant Green (at least for me; I spent more time with him back in the day than with GG). I'd also throw in jump-blues based players like T-Bone Walker, Louis Jordan, and BB King (up to and including, roughly, Live at the Regal). Also, Wes at his gut-bucket-est (e.g., SKJ, D Natural Blues). Among more contemporary players, I'd say check out Dave Stryker and Robben Ford. Originally Posted by mr. beaumont
But aside from all that, and to the original question, which really seems to be more about how to be comfortable in different keys than anything else, what did it for me was singing in blues bands and backing other blues singers. Because it takes questions about changes out of the equation, blues is a great laboratory for transposition, phrasing, feel, etc (provided you can find people who actually play it well, not necessarily an easy thing to do)
John
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I realy failed to find any interressting Guitar Bebop blues using rich vocabulary as charlie parker or bruce forman , i'm not looking for guys using that traditional blues scale sound , i'm looking for that sophisticated blues with a lot of II V cadences alterations etc ! any idea where i can that besides , bud powell , charlie parker and bruce forman ?
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Hi mooncef. Originally Posted by mooncef
Perhaps the guitar this:
Or this:
etc:
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Billy Bean! OMFG- how cool was that? I'm gonna check him out some more, any recs?
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This might be a tad obvious, but one thing I like to do to "class up" the blues sound is to play "major blues". In other words, if I'm playing over a Bb chord, I'll play G blues. It's more consonant sounding than the regular minor blues. Then you can combine the two for a sort of hybrid major/minor kind of thing. You can also do the Robbin Ford thing, and play altered just before the transition from the I to the IV. IOW, if you're playing Bb blues, you can play Db blues in bar 4. This gets a lot of the cool notes of the Bb altered scale, and makes the movement to Eb really pop. You can also use dorian scales over dominant seventh chords for a bluesy sound (especially if you throw in the #4/b5 as well). That's bluesy but has a somewhat more sophisticated polish. But also, don't be afraid to go straight to the gut bucket every now and then, sometimes you have to get dirty to make the polished stuff shine all the more. Originally Posted by mooncef
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This is all really good stuff. To me, the essence of the blues lives in the tension between major and minor. You mention Dorian as well -- and there's another blue note in that one, between the nat6 and b7. Just as with the b3/nat3, bend up from the lower to around halfway between the two notes and let your ears tell you when to stop. You'll hear that in BB and T-Bone, and others who cross-pollinate blues and jazz. Originally Posted by Boston Joe
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The coolest! He was the closest to Parker and Bud Powell in time-feel and articulation of all the players who came onto the scene in the '50s. The Straight No Chaser clip is a bootleg from the '80s when he was way past his peak but still sounding great. Originally Posted by princeplanet
A lot of the best Bean is rehearsal stuff that was released on a now defunct label String Jazz. Luckily, I grabbed it all while it was still freely available. Fresh Sound Records reissued two '50s albums, Makin' It and Take Your Pick recently on a single disc. They also combined The Trio and The Trio Rediscovered (the latter being rehearsals for the official release). As often happens, a few tracks were dropped due to time restrictions especially when tunes were duplicated. West Coast Sessions are Makin' it Again are two other String Jazz rehearsal discs with some decidedly lo-fi tracks but phenomenal playing throughout.Last edited by PMB; 10-26-2016 at 04:06 AM.
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As for your question, mooncef, maybe try breaking down a 12-bar into smaller fragments. There are often very specific phrases/approaches that belong to particular parts of the form. Intros and turnarounds are an obvious example.
For instance, on a 'quick change' blues when the harmony moves from I to IV in bars 1-2, a melodic figure may be repeated with the 3rd degree flattened in the second bar (b3 of the I chord = b7 of the IV chord). In bar IV, a short ii-V (either straight or maybe via a flat V substitution) is regularly employed to set up the IV chord that follows in bar 5. Whether it's a classic blues, jazz blues or a more sophisticated Parker-style blues, that IV change is ever present and serves as an important signpost. Bars 7-10 of a jazz blues usually departs quite markedly from a standard I-IV-V classic blues. Players tend to move away from conventional blues licks here to outline the changes (usually a cycle like iii-vi-ii-V or similar), often double-timing to set the passage in relief.
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Have you checked out any Tal Farlow, Jimmy Raney, Barney Kessel, Joe Pass, or Wes Montmomery? All use tons of bebop vocabulary when they play blues tunes. Maybe start with this: Originally Posted by mooncef
or this:
John
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Doing 12 bar blues with jazz turnarounds helped me incorporate jazz lines that follow the changes (abreviated as they are in a jazz styled blues)
I thought perhaps it might help younger players that can scream on the blues scale but are not so scoped in on the 'changes' aspect to look at the turnarounds in a jazz blues.
In a nutshell, say we are in G.
G7/// C7/// G7/// //// (7#5 at the last 2 beats)
C7/// C#dim///
G7/// E7/// Am7/// D7///
G7/ E7/ Am7/ D7 /
There are two I VI II V turnarounds.
First is a bar apiece (line 3 above) and the one at the end is 2 beats per.
While one can force a pentatonic/blues scale against this and if done correctly, it sounds cool, very bluesy, one can also use the mixo modes plus aug and diminished at the transition points and then follow the changes as one would with traditional jazz lines for both 'turnarounds'.
And of course, mixing and matching makes things really interesting.
It also allows for some hip chord subs.
Anyone care to add any thoughts?
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This is my approach to learning, I hope it works, have spent all of 2016 on it.
It is how I hear Burrell, Green, Morgan, Young, Turrentine, Hancock etc etc etc approach tunes. Even classical based guys like Evans and Rotem Sivan sound to me as blues infused classical.
I had to do Satan's Doll the most excruciatingly pain full song to my ears in a well known online guit school. All I heard in the school was meandering, I could not hear a story, a rhythm etc. Then I heard Burrell's version he makes it cool by playing Blues over the top. I heard an old live recording of Ellington's Band playing it, wow it was smoking, they played it as a blues which lead me to revisit my approach.
I am confused when people recommend first jazz song to learn as Summertime, Autumn Leaves etc, should it not be pick a jazz blues? To my ears starting with those standards I had no foundations, no framework, method, direction, rhythm. I feel and hear that it is starting to come. Every now and then I venture out of a blues form and can now take the blues foundation with me.
I must dig out and share a youtube lesson I saw with Robben Ford and he plays a straight scale straight and of course it sounds like a scale. He then plays it straight again but with a blues rhythm and wow it is beautiful music to listen to, all he changed was the rhythm.
Maybe I am wrong but man I am having some fun.
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I am with you on the jazz/blues. I did a whole Cd's worth of cuts with major and minor blues heads. Blues has the depth in those 12 bars to express in a complete panorama of jazz and blues vocabulary.... a cornucopia of different styles and favors, and it can be an expressive experience for the younger players to get right away, rather than labor for many months or even years to become fluent in bebop or straight ahead playing over jazz heads or standards.... although that is the hoped for outcome in the end, I would wager to add in regards to most young players here.
Boy, what a sentence. And in just one breath.....
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Showing how the basic 12-bar progression relates to the most complex versions is a great way to teach jazz harmony.
You can then demonstrate that the A section of rhythm changes can be reduced to three chords, and so on. Get them playing a blues on Rhythm Changes, and bop on 12-bar Blues, and so on.
A blues feeling isn't reserved for 12-bar progressions alone...
If anyone is interested, I attach my handout on the subject
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That's a good handout mister ! Originally Posted by christianm77
On page four half way down did you mean
Emin7b5 and Gmin6 ?
Is that a typo or maybe I just don't get it !
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Originally Posted by ragman1
Commiserations re. no laptop etc.
Re. examples, I do wish more players here would actually demonstrate a lot of what they talk about. One soundclip is worth a thousand words...
But seriously, it would help. Not that one can't play it oneself but, if you've taken the trouble to write a great long thing here, which assumes it'll be of some benefit to others also here, then hearing it demonstrated would, imo, be immensely worthwhile.
It might also act as an inspiration to go and try it out, something which many words and descriptions may not.
hope you don't mind my saying that
I have have some solos, but I don't want to seem pretentious posting a 4 minute solo, however what the heck. I'll make specific examples when I get the laptop back, or buy a new one.
This has lots of blues riffs, and a number of traditional straight ahead phrases and a few odd bits and pieces. I certainly like to force the pentatonic in 4ths against a blues too. I marry all of these elements, however it is born from the blues scale and developed from it... and I sometimes I follow the chord changes and others I force the blues lines against the turnarounds.
Last edited by docdosco; 11-09-2016 at 05:08 PM.
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It's not so much solos as demos of instructional material. The verbal stuff is, frankly, a bit brain-numbing whereas a brief soundclip would vitalise one's interest no end.
I'm assuming they can actually play what they preach, of course...
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I used Transcibe! endlessly for several years. I pulled tons of lines and phrases from Joe Pass, Barney Kessel, Wes, Martino and others. Originally Posted by ragman1
It's not so much solos as demos of instructional material. The verbal stuff is, frankly, a bit brain-numbing whereas a brief soundclip would vitalise one's interest no end.
I'm assuming they can actually play what they preach, of course...
Once you have the main vocabulary down, you can use it, or play off it, or forget it in the end, however it supplies a blueprint to base phrases from to develop your own arsenal of lines and a style of your own, IMO. A guitar player I know says he never learns lines from other players as he wants to be original and create his own lines and play what he creates in his head.
Hmmmmm. Maybe if he were a savant, that would make sense, but I tend to think he noodles aimlesslessly
You have to learn Dick and Jane and the rules of grammar, and get some language skills under your belt to write the great American novel. Playing jazz is no different.
Again, savant like players are perhaps in a different league, but even Lenny Breau, clearly a genius at guitar, whom I have stolen lines from, stole those lines originally from Tal Farlow. As my buddy Sid said many times, "if you are going to steal, steal from the best"
Some people absorb better through their ears than their eyes, and small chunks always sink in better than 'too much information' at one time. Staying inspired is crucial too. My suggestion is to take small bites, however you gather in jazz guitar gems.....
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