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Week 15. Day 2. Since I accidentally played Cherokee in Db last night, I went back and played it in Bb this evening. Surprisingly, I had more difficulty focusing and getting off book and locking in the changes tonight. I imagine a long work day may be the culprit. Also, my left forearm was feeling weak at the keyboard today and the guitar this evening, so that was slowing me down a bit, too. Oh, well. Tomorrow is another day.
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03-16-2021 10:49 PM
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Week 15 Day 4. Review and rework Thursday
Baubles in Bb. In 4 with lots of extras.
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Here we are with the Baubles project in Bb. Take a look at these changes and try to internalize it before you begin. Try to avoid reading the exercise when you're actually playing. Honestly, it'll get in the way with your being able to actually pick up the skills you need for the gig, because I'm hoping when you're playing in real time, you're not reading off a lead sheet. You're playing with your mind's eye and your mind's ear; those are the skills you're pushing to acquire, the muscle groups you're trying to tone up.
If you do feel you need to use a lead sheet to get the tune into your head, that's fine, but try this first.
1) Copy the changes only with bar lines onto manuscript paper. In that process, if you run into wonky or confusing enharmonic spellings of the chords, re-write them into a form you can use. If you see a change written as a 7th you'd rather not use (G13(-9) that you'd rather see as G7) then by all means note that and play your own personal choice, but play it like you mean it. Better to go off script with something that sounds like it belongs there then to read changes like a shopping list.
Make your own lead sheet that's easy to follow, free of unnecessary writing and helps you get the music in your ear.
2) Lay out the changes by key area and use Roman Numerals to indicate what you're actually hearing.
Hopefully when you're playing this project, you're thinking of the II- chord going down to the tonic Bb chord as you begin. If you can start to hear this way, I guarantee you'll be hearing and playing faster with more feeling and content and you won't NEED a lead sheet.
Practice the music, not the sheet. That's a noble goal anyway. Keep it in mind as you're progressing to be a better soloist.
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Week 15. Day 3. I tackled BBB in D. A much better evening of music than last night. JBN's post about getting off book is spot on. I typically go through the changes on my own just to internalize the key centers and little areas of possible confusion. I'll also comp the chords to get a feel for the harmony. When I started, I admit I was looking at iReal Pro as the chords went by, but not religiously. More like a cheat sheet. Each time through the progression naturally I would get more acquainted with the changes. By the end I felt quite free in my ability to improvise over the entire form. I tried to push the bpm a bit. It's never fast enough to give me trouble with 8th notes, but triplets are challenging. But now that we're able to combine the two I find the exercise to be much more musically satisfying and inspiring.
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If you're swinging the eighths, the triplets make a lot of sense. They take up the same amount of space but they're what I think of as "informed swing".
Originally Posted by D'Aquisto Fan
If the eighth note swings, it's like "ripple". If the triplet swings, it's like "element". Ripple ripple element ripple, Element element ripple Element, ...you get it. I like it because you can tell a story with the rhythmic combinations alone, and once I'm feeling rhythm, the notes follow.
Try it, look at the piece, not in harmonic blocks, but in phrase sections, each of which has a rhythmic story to tell. If you can hear the story of one segment, it can give a beginning, a context for what's coming up; just in rhythm.
Continuity and connection is one of the key elements that informs the feeling of a whole when you solo.
It's actually what I'm working with with melody while I'm practicing. I got this exercise from Mick when I played a regular thing with him, because I noticed that many times when I would end a solo segment, he'd pick up on the last idea I played, and he'd use that as the motif to start his own solo with. This not only made me aware to end with distinct contour, to pass on, but listening to the many ways he'd build and re-imagine that melodic/rhythmic bit, would be a wonder. Yes, it brought an acute awareness of rhythmic information to the blank canvas that can so easily be bound by the limitations of straight eighths and half notes.
Mick gave me an exercise. Use a recorder. Play for an amount of time, it could be 3-5 minutes. Free. Any structure, chord solo, dyads, faux bebop, whatever, as long as it was my story that day. Bring it to a place I felt I could rest and turn off the recorder. The next day, listen to the last 10 seconds---and then hit the record button and do it again. No rules, I could run with the idea, or contrast, or repeat and morph, or start with the sound of space that goes in unexpected new places. At the end of the week, listen to the whole thing as a whole. I won't even begin to tell you all I got from this exercise alone except to say as my awareness of the different elements of soloing grew, this made me a better practical soloist. It's like a tiny conceptual HR program in continuity and listening.
Breaking out of the limitations you never knew were there. That's going to keep you busy.
Have fun!
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Week 15 Day 5. Friday's project, Angel Eyes plus.
This is a whirlwind revisit of our study on minor and major.
I'd be really interested in knowing your impressions and how they differ from the first time we spent a week on this.
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Week 15. Day 4. BBB in Bb. For some reason things didn't click this evening quite as well as last night. I'm trying to follow my ear more and not be so rigidly dictated by the changes. I also tried to incorporate JBN's rhythmic suggestions. Throwing triplets in to spice up the steady 8th notes is a lot easier on my right hand than trying to rip off a long stream of triplets at these tempos. Frankly, the tempos aren't even that fast. Sometimes I resign myself to the fact that I might just be the David Gilmour of jazz who is incapable of playing fast.
I suppose as long as the ideas are tasty and interesting that's okay. At least, I hope so!
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Week 15 Day 5.
Musical appetizers.
I've got the luxury of time, and I felt like playing today. But there were some live streams I wanted to check out before, so I brought up the most recent Jerry Bergonzi weekly gig he does and under headphones I listened really deeply. Unfolding before me were things he was doing: Short passages accentuated with sticatto attacks, thematic ideas that crossed the bar lines, sequences that didn't follow the changes but had such a compelling line to them that it made the piece better... I was really inspired by that.
Then I picked up the guitar. And in some residual mind meld I was thinking in a much broader way. I was moving differently, planting small ideas up and down the neck as I followed the harmonically along and across the fretboard, and having sounds and textures work with each other. I even combined chords with solo lines as I was hearing piano commentary on what I was playing.
And I heard my own solo as it was being made. I became aware of how much of the time I don't hold myself accountable for what I've just played. Today I was hearing differently.
Tomorrow I'll try heavy listening as an appetizer to a heavy diet of Super Chops. I may be on to something. We'll see...and listen.
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Project sheet for Week 15 Day 6. Saturday's Major minor workout
Angel Eyes plus in A minor
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Week 15. Day 5 with Angel Eyes in D minor. It's interesting. Last night after I finished BBB, I took a couple passes at Angel Eyes. I really felt inspired. Tonight, not quite so much. Sometimes I think doing the "lesson" versus just playing boxes me in a little bit creatively. Admittedly it's the end of a long work week and I hadn't had a chance to pick up the guitar all day until I started the Super Chops. Oh, well. Tomorrow is another day!
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This time, I got almost all straight triplets. Bpm at 72, quite slow, and it doesn`t mean easier, because it gets more focused on precision. I also studied the chord chart on just the tonal centers (Lesson 1-B 1.html - Google Drive) and it was interesting to hear only its changes. I can see that people are very advanced on lessons, but I'd like to keep the progression beging from the first lessons to get it right until I stay in the same level that others.
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Very nice! Very smooth as you navigate the changes. Well done! Originally Posted by mauriciopcsouza
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Week 15. Day 6 of Angel Eyes in A minor. Not much to report. The second time through was my most inspired. I got interrupted before turning to the third time which might be one reason I felt like I was starting over a bit. I must admit I'm tiring a bit of some of Howard's idiosyncratic harmony. Makes me look forward to tackling "regular" tunes. Hopefully I'm stuck at one of those plateaus with a breakthrough on the horizon!
I'm glad to be finished with Angel Eyes this week!
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Week 16. Day 1 with ATTYA. I know it's supposed to be a day of rest, but I just felt like pushing on. And I like playing over Howard's ATTYA changes, unlike Angel Eyes or the modal exercise. I took a glance at the remaining weeks and other than enabling hammer-ons, pull-off and slides soon, nothing really changes other than ramping up the tempos. Which brings me to my conundrum. I'm not sure how much faster I can play. I've never had Super Chops. The Super Chops program doesn't appear to be transforming me into a super chops player. For example, I bumped up ATTYA to 140 bmp in iReal Pro. Yes, I can play steady 8th notes at that tempo. But triplets for anything more than a quick burst are beyond my reach. By the end of the program the target speed is just shy of 200 bpm. I'm going to keep on doing the program because I've come this far, but without sounding defeatist, I'm not certain how much more I'm going to get out of it. Especially if the primary goal is faster tempos. It's also feeling rather redundant. Like I said the other day, maybe I've hit a frustrating plateau and hopefully, miraculously somehow I'll propel forward into some kind of breakthrough. But I must confess I'm skeptical.
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I agree with you 100%, but Howard Roberts is always emphatic in stating that those are suggested targeted goals in a suggested trajectory of reaching a speed of proficiency that is seen as impossible by many. So with that goal, the surmounting of obstacles to impossibility that I'm going through this program. Originally Posted by D'Aquisto Fan
Any graded program will have a pre-set curve that can take you or lose you, but in the end, it's YOU who determines the individuality of your skillset when you're through. I for one don't believe in speed for speed's sake. It's much more important for me to have listening skills and command over the execution of an expressive vocabulary. But I know that in the past, I've gone for a line, and fallen on my face. It happens. But the worst part is fear of failing kept me from attempting those things again, at least in public. This graduated program, taken with very much my own content and approach, is serving me well and in some form, i use it as a template for some of my students.
That's why I'm trying to share information of how to discover new ideas, and ways to see the forms you play so THAT is what you practice and test while the HR program tempers your growing abilities and talents.
The question about doing this program at different levels: Spot on! It's a push in the pond and you needn't make the crashing cliffs at Aculpoco the water you jump into, but any body of water that brings you into the water will teach you more than any class. These pieces-projects are quite a thoughtful foray into many different types of Standard tunes: Modal, Major/Minor, Key areas, dominant chords and their use, different keys and the challenges of a tune called in a different key...just for starters.
But too, it's absolutely expected that you're going to hit a wall, sometimes day after day, but there are things that will transform you. Jump in the water and you may cough on a mouthful of water, get cramps, smell like chlorine or algae, emerge from the water with shrunken trunks and wrinkled fingers but as some point you're going to notice that you no longer hesitate on the dive in because your body learned how NOT to belly flop.
Slow down the tempo to what you can handle but keep the tempo as a reminder, a metric of the control you have over your thought and playing process.
Truth be told, my tempo is all over the place, but each day it's as HONEST as I can be. And I'm a much better swimmer than I was 16 weeks ago. I notice it for sure.
Be wary of the myth that chops are just about speed. This is about an integrative development of your playing skills. The ease with which you can hear and play a form that will not forgive you if your attention lapses.
So if you don't get much beyond Andante in these projects but you graduate from playing blind arpeggios into some kind of lyrical control and you remain in tempo with steady notes, when you actually play for strictly creative reasons, with unlimited rhythm and nuance, there will be an imagined phrase that seems perfect for the moment, you'll go for it, and your sound will be exactly what you imagined.
You won't be thinking about the water; you'll just be weightless and enjoying it. And so will anybody listening.
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Whoa! That's great! The time is solid, the changes are right there, I can hear everything clearly and your shifts are seamless. Bravo! Originally Posted by mauriciopcsouza
There's some serious thinking and variety going on and you're really comfortable in that exercise.
Your shifts really work well, and there's a feeling of convergence with your tonal centres.
Might you be ready to open up a new part of the neck, a new fingering area? This will really challenge you to make larger shifts, and find your intervals in that new position. This combination of position and linear string playing is the next step and it really opens up the "lyrical" side of playing. It also makes you see the notes in a non pattern way and that's kind of essential when you start building up a vocabulary of ornaments and figures. Once you get that, sounding "jazzy" is natural.
Nice job! THanks for sharing!
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Week 16. First day, Monday's project ATTYA type changes in Ab
Take these at a speed that works for you. And set your speed for how fast you can play AND think:
And this is one of the projects I had a detailed breakdown and analysis of. You can look back at earlier posts for commentary.Last edited by Jimmy blue note; 03-22-2021 at 03:47 AM.
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If I'm not mistaken we're on to Week 16 with exercise 4A. Howard's All The Things You Are changes. Originally Posted by Jimmy blue note
Week 15. First day, Monday's project Cherokee type changes in Bb
Take these at a speed that works for you. And set your speed for how fast you can play AND think:
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Thanks, JBN for another dose of great advice and much appreciated inspiration. I'm determined to first and foremost ENJOY the remaining weeks of this program. The best way for me to do that is to try and make music. Which of course is always my aim. Often that means letting go of the rigorous dictates of Howard's somewhat idiosyncratic harmony and following my ear. So much of what Howard has provided appears to be a great lesson in tension and release. So whether I'm actually spelling out the #11 and 13th of a dominant chord for example isn't always my chief aim. As long as I hear the tension and release and make it musical. Originally Posted by Jimmy blue note
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Headslap! Dang, right you are. Is anybody else in a surreal time loop these days? Thanks D'Aquisto. So it wasn't Deja Vu ;-) Originally Posted by D'Aquisto Fan
Triplets and eighths, remember to develop your sense of swing. Swing has a different feel and personality at different speeds. Keep this in mind.
Swing also has a different historical feel depending on the era that it was played. Listen to recordings, it's like people spoke differently at different points in time. Be aware and listen to your playing, keep your ears open!
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I'm brought back to my days in music school. There were many classes that had an arc of their own, a study pace that was guided by the syllabus. There were many classes my grades suffered because I didn't do assignments as they were given. I had found a tangential direction and in each case those tangents felt like fantastic discoveries and they felt true. I was fortunate to have a close friend on faculty and we'd spend hours after hours exploring those wayward directions. Ironically, those "wrong" distractions that kept me from getting better grades provided me with the context by which I saw a real personal relevance in the material given in class, but it had to be personal. Originally Posted by D'Aquisto Fan
Learning is non linear and any "method"'s real value is like a train that takes you where you wouldn't have gone. Let the tracks take you-it's their job. But see what's out the windows and don't let those tracks stop you from finding the footpath that runs parallel.
First time I did SuperChops, I was much younger (the book was still in publication and it was intimidating, just looking at the changes) and I didn't even finish the book. It took a while to get on that train again, but it was always an inspiration in my learning, that I should go further.
Between runs, my ear got better, my fingers learned ways to get around, my head became stocked with ideas and what they meant and the fingerboard became gradually and eventually free from "dead zones". I got better and each time I returned to the HR program, it held more AHA! moments and it gave me the real time skills to put things together.
During this pandemic, this is the daily hourlong gig that keeps one accountable and improving. Good timing too! The end is in sight!
Stay healthy everyone and stay fresh!
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I’ve been thinking about speed and the Super Chops program for a while now, and I’ve come to the conclusion that, for me, reaching speeds of 200+ bpm for the exercises is simply not realistic this time around. But, nor should it be. 20 weeks is simply not enough time and you're setting yourself up for failure if you take HR's speed suggestions as gospel. It can take a few years to really make solid gains and improvements in speed - especially if you're over the age of 16. What I do know is that my chops are improving from where they were, and that I have every expectation of them continuing to improve when I tackle Super Chops again in 6 weeks - I plan to keep repeating the program until I am close to the aspirational goal of 200 bpm.
For now, I seem to have plateaued at about 112 bpm for triplets. Don’t get me wrong - the occasional triplet at 112+ is a piece of cake. But playing continuous triplets for 10 minutes, trying to be creative, developing motifs and melodies, outline chord changes, following the tonal centers, switching neck positions every few bars or so, etc, etc - well, that all becomes taxing and precarious at anything over 112 bpm. I start flubbing too many notes. I’ve been stuck at this level now for almost 3 weeks, and while part of me finds it frustrating, another part of me is taking comfort in the fact that, even if I can’t perceive it, I am making progress on the guitar.
I would like to make it to at least 120 bpm for triplets at a comfortable level by the end of the program, but we’ll see.
-Travis
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Week 16 Day 2 Tuesday
ATTY plus.
I want to point out that in the text of the book, as it's posted a few posts up, Howard Roberts sees this period of study as the formative time when we solidify our playing and "let it gel" so to speak.
These daily selections are merely a suggestion. He points out that you don't need to do these in the given order, so mix and match if you'd like.
He also stresses that it's more important to find your OWN limit and work to that. This is the internal and practical limit that will be our playing-real creative playing-threshold. He points out that even if you are away from the instrument a few days, this level is where you can count on returning to. This is the riding on the bicycle threshold.
So don't obsess on working to levels that don't fit, but do strive to embrace the skillset needed to negotiate the project forms, so you can solidify your proficiency level. It's not about the speed that you can move your fingers, it's about the speed at which you can make music.
Study and playing hint: Practice playing with ascending and descending lines to form arcs that complement and create form with one another. This means learn your lines not only from the root going up, but from a root on the 1st, 2nd or 3rd string coming down. Do you know your scales, melodic abilities and positions coming down? Is your thinking based on roots predominantly in the bass? Remember that positions of familiarity exist all over the fingerboard. Once you've mastered an area and can hear melodies on one direction, know by sight, by fingerboard mapping and by EAR where the next root in the upper register is.
The implications of this are more imaginative lines, different contours, voice leading and a choice you can make to change any direction at any point in a chord passage. Unorthodox changes in directions can create their own rhythm, even when you're playing steady notes in eighths and triplets.
Think about this. Contemplate this the next time you find yourself tending towards predictability. Look for and keep your own catalog of "devices for changes" and let them be your friends.
It's fun. Have fun!
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Week 16. Day 2 of ATTYA. This time in Eb. [I'm a day ahead since I started on Sunday.] I'm trying to take JBN's advice to heart about mining this program for what it can bring to me personally. I realize one thing I liked a lot in the beginning of the course is having 6 days to really familiarize myself with a tune. Obviously all those extra days enabled me to internalize the changes that much better. Sometimes during this "review" period I feel like I'm scratching the surface a bit then we're moving on to the next exercise. I suppose I could spend more days on a given tune. Although that could lead to me intentionally avoiding Angel Eyes and the Modal Madness exercises.
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Week 16. Day 3. This time Blues For Alice in C. I like these changes, so I enjoyed myself more. Much easier to get off book and just play. I'm trying to balance working on my tempos but not at the expense of saying something musical. It was a good session.
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