Practice in Twelve Keys or else

[targuit]

Never used that 'cog' for slowing down. I'll have to try it with the trans I linked which is kind of cool.

Hmmm...I don't see any 'slow down' setting on my 'cog'. Tech troglodyte that I am.

[mr. beaumont]

Really depends on why you're transcribing. If you're testing your ear/training, yeah, keep it at tempo...with the understanding that there's some things you might never hear...but getting a faster accurate ear is a great thing.

But if you're transcribing to cop licks and analyze, by all means, use the technology available...no need to gI've yourself that big of a headache.

[christianm77]

If you click on the cog icon bottom right of the youtube window this menu should appear. Click on 'normal' and a list of speed options will come up.

[MarkRhodes]

i disagree. Slowing things down allows you to get the nuances of the articulations. Musicians have always slowed down. I'm old enough that I used to slow 33 1/3 rpm records down to 16 and then later used a superscope tape recorder. Now I use Transcribe. It's invaluable to slow things down.

Richie Zellon---who is around 60 now, I think--slowed albums down from 33 1/3 to 16 on his turntable to learn licks and phrases just like that. (That did lower the pitch; with Transcribe and other software, one can slow things down withouth altering the pitch.) Richie said he got so good at it that when he went to Berklee, he was allowed to skip the first two semesters of ear training.

[Reg]

Yea... if you can't hear it at tempo... slow it down. The only personal point is that there is a balance. Do you want to train your ears to hear at tempo , or train yourself at slower tempos.

We all copied as kids...I'm also old, that was one of the only ways to learn.

GS and many of the tunes composed during a period where new understandings of harmony were being developed may be simple, or not as musical etc... and the process of becoming aware of a three tonic organization, still trying to use functional harmony organization... as in GS may even be part of the.... learn tunes in all twelve keys thing.

But what's easier... learn a tune in all twelve keys or understand the tune and be able to play in all twelve keys...

I can tell you which approach requires less practice.

The on stage stories... are pretty common. I play different tunes in all keys all the time. Or for fun play a tune using one type of sub as tonal reference.... like take a simple tune in Major and play in Minor... or some other mode or... like I sad play the tune with a sub reference. So now you need to play in all keys, all parallel and relative tonal keys... and thrown in subs... one tune could take a life time.

[christianm77]

i disagree. Slowing things down allows you to get the nuances of the articulations. Musicians have always slowed down. I'm old enough that I used to slow 33 1/3 rpm records down to 16 and then later used a superscope tape recorder. Now I use Transcribe. It's invaluable to slow things down.

Practicing with recordings at 50% I find very useful, personally. That wouldn't presumably have been possible with the old records? Would be down an octave but a bit out of tune presumably?

As with many things there seems to be mutually conflicting schools of thought.

[Reg]

Just some random thought... when one transcribes, what is your approach. How do you end up with the final product.

Do your hear the music one note at a time, do you just hear the one note and not what it implies or what are the relationships with that note. I'm sure all are aware of the basic begin with the form, the spatial thing, get the targets, both melodically and harmonically. Then fill in, if your having problems, get the rhythmic shape between the targets first... and connect the dots...

Is this the same approach with slow down apps.

[grahambop]

I've posted it before, but this is my favourite version of Giant Steps:

[targuit]

Hi, Reg!

My approach generally would be to listen to the song such as a typical standard with either a sheet of music paper or sometimes just a lyric sheet that I print out in a decent font so as to leave some space between the lines. I essentially listen to the music at the normal tempo, lacking Transcribe or other device, guitar in hand or often at the keyboard synth as well set for a piano voice. Usually I just play along, hearing the chord qualities and function and jotting the progression over the lyrics, also sometimes using a slash mark to indicate the measure. Then I fire up Sibelius, enter the chords as blocks, then enter the melody using my keyboard on the top staff, the chords on the bottom. I usually enter notes either in real time or in step time with the keyboard via USB into Sibelius, but if I adding or 'filling out" the guitar accompaniment, I sometimes use a 'virtual' guitar neck thing on my old legacy Sib. G7 ($60). That is because Sibelius can be a little fussy with your time playing in the notes. You have to enter them in real time in a "mechanistic" fashion to get clean notation and the proper rhythm figures. If you play in real time with 'swing", Sibelius will notate it as such. At least my old version.

I hear the melody as phrases usually. So I set the tempo of playback on Sibelius to a slower tempo if it is a fast tempo song, listen to a measure or two or three on the performance video like YT, then I record the melody as I hear it into the proper staff, adding bars if necessary. If it is a tune like Misty where I already "know" the melody, I just play it on the keyboard by memory like singing it. Then I add in the lyrics and barlines, ritardi, repeats, or whatever to finish the arrangement. I don't have to do a Sibelius arrangement to learn the tune, but I really like to do it, as then I have a midi audio file plus sheet music to rehearse or to record with.


I do hear the music as phrases in harmonic relationships. Now I would consider the tempo and relative character of the melody of GS as played by Coltrane to "require" Transcribe if I wanted "note-for-note" accuracy. Just would not be worth it to me in terms of time and effort without the tech tools to make it easier at this tempo. In other words I would consider this tune to be an exceptional situation. (And I am not a great fan of this song, though it is growing on me,) I compared this tune to my preferred player, Sonny Rollins and his St.Thomas tune. That is up tempo, but the melody is more functional? I'm not sure what the right word is, but I find Sonny's work there easier to "hear" and the harmonic bed more traditional, I guess.

[matt.guitarteacher]

I've posted it before, but this is my favourite version of Giant Steps:

Just when you think the Internet is worthless,..... you find something that's just pure gold like that. Thank you. Made my day. The guy muttering underneath the whole time just adds to the surreal quality.

[christianm77]

(And I am not a great fan of this song, though it is growing on me,)

Say it isn't so! :-)

[targuit]

Not that BeeGees thing though!

I do like the head, but in truth I don't really "hear" Coltrane's melodic improvisation. It's so eighth note "jittery" for me. I know this is not a true statement but it seems to lack a direction and flow. Or at least some quality that makes me want to play it. It just seems all over the place and a bit "honkey" to me.

I prefer "lyrical".

[mrcee]

Not that BeeGees thing though!

I do like the head, but in truth I don't really "hear" Coltrane's melodic improvisation. It's so eighth note "jittery" for me. I know this is not a true statement but it seems to lack a direction and flow. Or at least some quality that makes me want to play it. It just seems all over the place and a bit "honkey" to me.

I prefer "lyrical".

It's a matter of taste at some point. I know people that feel that Coleman Hawkins tended to arpeggiate too much. And he seems to be the modern pioneer of that style.

[mr. beaumont]

Not that BeeGees thing though!

I do like the head, but in truth I don't really "hear" Coltrane's melodic improvisation. It's so eighth note "jittery" for me. I know this is not a true statement but it seems to lack a direction and flow. Or at least some quality that makes me want to play it. It just seems all over the place and a bit "honkey" to me.

I prefer "lyrical".

Lol...the head is the gateway drug. This tune is about to suck you in.

[christianm77]

Just say no, Jay.

[christianm77]

It's a matter of taste at some point. I know people that feel that Coleman Hawkins tended to arpeggiate too much. And he seems to be the modern pioneer of that style.

Trane's big hero was Johnny Hodges, in fact. I always find this quite hard to hear.

[christianm77]

Here is the greatest sax playing of all time, just so you know ;-)

[grahambop]

Trane's big hero was Johnny Hodges, in fact. I always find this quite hard to hear.

I think Trane probably learned something about playing ballads from Hodges. I hear some similar lyricism and control of every note here (I See Your Face Before Me):

[targuit]

I love that Johnny Hodge clip of All Of Me. When I see something like this, I think of the essential dignity of these guys. This was still a very racist country. Here were these talented guys playing this beautiful music yet still treated poorly in some places.

I remember driving down with my family to Florida on vacation. My father at the wheel the whole way, we stopped at a gas station in Georgia. I was just a pre-teen - eleven or twelve. I saw the signs at the gas station lavatory. There were separate facilities for blacks and whites. Even a separate water cooler. And I asked my father aloud why there were separate facilities? My father, who had not a racist bone in his body, shushed me. "Be quiet now. Things are different here." It was the early Sixties. The changes borne of protest had yet to make their mark. I have never forgotten that indignity perpetrated upon black people in the South and elsewhere.

[MarkRhodes]

Trane's big hero was Johnny Hodges, in fact. I always find this quite hard to hear.

I didn't know that Johnny was John's hero. But I do love Johnny!

Here's a medley with Duke's orchestra from 1947

[Reg]

That sound good Jay... but sounds like it takes a lot of time.


Johnny Griffin... still my fav

[PMB]

like it or not Giant Steps is an important tune. reminds me of a Jackson Pollack quote. he said that all painters of his generation had to go either over, under, around or through Picasso. same with GS. even intermediate players should study it. no trick chords and the head is easy. and even those advanced players that dislike it have confronted it. it's not the saga of harrison crabfeathers.

i was talking to someone the other day about it and i thought that there was a similarity btwn GS and Cherokee.
both have been right of passage, cutting tunes. And both have a head made up of a lot of 1/2 and whole notes with the chords coming at you fast. and on a different tangent, i see a similarity btwn the Cherokee bridge and the Tune Up changes which were the basis for Countdown, another example of Coltrane changes. I've been grappling with GS for decades and don't know if i'll ever get to where i'd perform it. i've heard cats, pros, do a one schtick pony version of it with a latin feel or whatever, and it doesn't really get it for me. i like the tune as much or more than any Coltrane composition. i love Coltrane but don't think he's going to make it to the composers hall of fame. if i was on the board i wouldn't vote for him. it is a bit of a disappointing realisation, sort of like finding out that Ol' Blues' a chicken killer but it takes more than a few great numbers to get into any hall of fame. imo imo imo

I had exactly the same thought. The 1/2 and whole notes, parallel progressions, even the ii-V-I in the remote key of B major. So here's a belated Christmas present for Christian - a Scrapple-style mashup to be played as a mid-tempo bossa. ;-)

[christianm77]

I had exactly the same thought. The 1/2 and whole notes, parallel progressions, even the ii-V-I in the remote key of B major. So here's a belated Christmas present for Christian - a Scrapple-style mashup to be played as a mid-tempo bossa. ;-)

Gahhh! B'uhhhh! G'phhhhumpp!

*other incoherent noises of rage*

[grahambop]

That sound good Jay... but sounds like it takes a lot of time.


Johnny Griffin... still my fav

I love Johnny Griffin. I saw him play just like this at Ronnie Scott's once. He just blew the roof off the place! As I was leaving afterwards I heard someone saying to his mates 'Wow, they just don't make tenor sax players like that any more!'

[Reg]

I had exactly the same thought. The 1/2 and whole notes, parallel progressions, even the ii-V-I in the remote key of B major. So here's a belated Christmas present for Christian - a Scrapple-style mashup to be played as a mid-tempo bossa. ;-)

I read through and played as described and up... was going to pull out at my gig tonight... but the last phrase is only 3 bars... turns the rhythm around... but then again that's probable part of the feel...