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so i've been watching john abercrombie's videos on improv on youtube, thanks to a member who posted the link here (thanks a bunch!) and John talks about staying away from scales and arpeggios, basically only dealing with intervals, a real key center/horizontal approach. He has this exercise where he solos over a few chorus of "Stella" and he uses random half notes, then he uses quarter notes all over the neck as if he were walking a bass. THIS IS COMPLETELY DIFFERENT FROM WHAT I'VE BEEN STUDYING AND PRACTICING.
I'm used to targeting thirds, using scale fragments and melodic cells. Can anyone/does anyone else do what Abercrombie is doing? He doesn't explain how he does it
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08-31-2009 05:49 PM
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John got that idea from peers when he was younger which basically were Mick Goodrick and he also gives Jim Hall props in this.
I was doing this before I saw this video because my teachers early on were students of Mick's. So I was hipped to this but never got it. After hearing John do it on the videos I practiced this way for months, every day for 15 to 20 minutes.
The results are amazing, I get all my students to work on this in their practice. The Combination of focus on time, friendly notes, melody and feel really can save a lot of problems in practice.
However, to clarify one thing about this thing of anti-scale playing. He certainly does use scales, he talks a lot about this when explaining Ralph's Piano Waltz, when he is explaining the Polychords. When he's talking about using intervals and triads etc he's talking about using this as a focus when playing over functional harmonic progressions, not over tunes with more non-function or modal implications where a scale approach can give you more things to work with.
Purpose of this being in a progression of chords the voice leading is about making from one change to the next by it's most common denominator. In Modal or Non-Functional movements this is a wider pocket to deal with. In the end it's using the same 12 notes, however it is the organization of the process in your mind's ear.
At least that's how he explained it to me, and how I understand it.
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Once again Jake, you have given more insight into our art. This exercise that we're talking of is something Fred at UNT never told me. My question to you is how do I go about practicing this? I am so used to approaching a tune like this:first one or two choruses of guide tones. Then play 3-2-1-5 or 1-2-3-5 of each change (the V in a one bar ii-V) then I outline the harmony, then I use scales, and try to combine it all. I am so used to using or hearing just thirds and sevenths, sometimes fifths that it's difficult ESPECIALLY over a tune that moves fast harmonically like "Stella" Do I select an easy tune? Do I start at a slow tempo (probably) how do I draw four notes while staying away from thirds/root sevenths all the time?
in other words; how did you start practicing this?
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heh, Fred has too many tools to use to teach, cant' teach everything to everyone I guess?
I get ppl started on this typically on a Blues and limit the melodic materials by sticking to major or minor blues scales Or just using the triad information. The purpose is not entirely on the voice leading as much as it needs to be on feel and locking in. Abercrombie is able to take it on other levels harmonically, he's superimposing other chords and subs and all sorts of things like this moving in 1/4 notes on 1 or 2 strings.
What you should so is to pick a standard tune I find with a straight feel. I get students to do this when i start them on Latin tunes, like Recordame is a great example because of how it moves between static harmony and then through typical cycles of chords. If you're working with Quarternotes you just need to be focused on how you're going to approach the changes, which is two ways, either very specifically or very generally (which to me are the only two ways to do anything).
Focus on a tempo that you are comfortable with, in that I mean a tempo where it will not challenge you to make quarter notes line up with your metronome. After you discover this tempo and learn to map out in your mind's ear how to get from one chord change to the next you can start to bump up the tempo or start to get more complex with your Dominant chords, whichever you want to work on at a given time.
Turn your metronome on, count yourself in.
I use Recordame as only a simple example, I would in fact in your or most cases just suggest a tune you know very very well so that the tune itself isn't really an issue at all.
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great exercise! thx for that, jake.
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do you teach your students to draw from the melody of the tune? or to play off the melody
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I had a private lesson with John in 1990. He mentioned that he got into the "melodic bass lines" once he stopped playing fusion. If I remember correctly, he said that fusion screwed his time because he was playing over the rhythm section all the time, not from within. The half note and quarter note lines made him focus on the pulse and that was how he got back into it.
It's a great exercise!
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Mario
Yup exactly what he said to me also. He's got a great memory too, i was shocked when I went to see him this summer and he remembered me from when he was at NT for a week.
Jazzy
I do get my students to pay attention to melody. They seldom do, especially if you're the first soloist, most people's tendency is to want to play everything right away, which is not something I am fond of. I think that comes from personal taste.
One of my favorite lessons I learned was when I was playing with Lynn Seaton and we played some standard and I did my thing with all whatever I thought was cool. After my solo he played the melody again, the whole 1st chorus of his solo with some extra juice in there but basically it was... hey kid! PLAY THE TUNE.
Big lesson for me.
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John visited UNT? When I was there we didn't have too many "big names" come and lecture. We did have the guitar club, the thing on Fridays that met after class where students had to perform every Friday and occasionally theyre'd be a guest or masterclass.
As for the melody, the reason I ask is because I was listening to one of my favorite records, Blue Trane-the ballad "Im Old Fashioned," where Trane, Fuller, Morgan-they all play off the head of the tune, making for a crystal, lyrical sound. I know usually this is how ballads are, or should be played, which is why when I hear Pat Martino play something like Days of Wine and Roses and go ballistic without minding the melody a lot, I cringe. It might be hard to do this over a faster tune, but I noticed that Abercrombie didn't play off the melody at all (I know it was probably for demonstration purposes) but when I play a tune like Stella, incorporationg the head helps me know where I am
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Jazzyteach65,
Sometimes improvising around the melody doesn't have to be that explicit. I've started working on it following Ed Byrne's advice. It makes the vocabulary specific to the song. I made an entry on my blog applying some of the concepts to Yesterdays (the text is in spanish, but you'll get the point from looking at the musical examples). I've tried it with a couple of my students as well and it works. It's refreshing!
Maybe Martino doesn't improvise that much around the melody, but his solos portrait the mood of the piece very well.
Abercrombie talks abouth his concepts in this book
Last edited by Mario Abbagliati; 09-01-2009 at 01:02 PM.
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your page is incredible! Is there any translation into english?
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John was there for a week when I was the TF for Jazz Guitar. I got to play with him and hang with him all week long, drove him to the airport, hotel all that fun stuff. It was a long week but boy was it fullfilling.
I think for the purpose of videos certain things are simplified and you sort of 'get to the point'. Ppl want to hear the hip shit in videos not the melody embellished. Those sort of lessons are best learned on the bandstand, not in videos imo.
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ooo man you guys have actually been with John, thats why you play so damn good.Any others jazz guitar masters that you have been?
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i've been lucky to be honest through my experiences to have gotten to play with a fair chunk of world class musicians. Playing with them has always been a big learning experience. I found for me on a human level getting to do the hang thing was almost always as equally rewarding, I know Matt can probably confirm that.
Last edited by Jake Hanlon; 09-01-2009 at 03:38 PM.
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I like that good musician and good human,best combination, and if he's down to earth person makes you just bigger fan
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I finally walked about four choruses (messed up twice) but until I got it down, of Stella. I used alot of chord tones and chromatics. THIS IS FUN AND HELPS Me SWING!!!
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I got the chance to spend an afternoon with Bob Conti. I always tell people that as great a player he is, HE IS MORE A HUMAN BEING. He remembered all our names, was endearing and answered questions, even if his answers were vague. Playing with him onb the other hand, I nearly fainted, as he school my ass.
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heh getting schooled is 90% of the fun ;-)
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Not yet. Maybe I should...
Originally Posted by Jazzyteach65
Thanks!
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Pat Metheny, Kurt Rosenwinkel, Joe Diorio, Peter Sprague, Ron Schete, Norman Brown. Originally Posted by abdke99
I have Peter Bernstein and Pat Martino in my wish list...
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thats awesome, wish list lol!!! dont get me start on mine........
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Couldn't agree more! I've been schooled by (and hung out with) Joe Pass and Larry Coryell; the benefits of that kind of experience is long lasting, and priceless. I also get schooled regularly by a friend of mine (not a particularly well known player, but one of the finest guitarists I've ever heard) who lives a couple of hundred miles from me in the north of England - we see each other from time to time and jam a little, and I always come away from these sessions feeling humbled yet enlarged at the same time. Originally Posted by Jake Hanlon
I've also been fortunate enough to have played with some great players of other instruments, and it's always a buzz, and a learning opportunity. I used to have a regular gig with a trio way back in the 80s, and every couple of weeks or so, Jimmy Deuchar (a phenomenal bebop trumpeter who was a big name in the UK scene a number of years ago - his bio is here - Jimmy Deuchar - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia) dropped by and sat in for a few tunes - he was a total gentleman, and I learned huge amounts about comping from the experience.
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Yeah I think the point of getting to do these things is to sort of realize that this is all a Human thing. We sort of put these players way up high on a level that they really ought not to be placed in many instances but we put them there because they have achieved so much musically. You or I are only a small distance away from them. Like how Greeks didn't feel their Gods were not accessable to them... that's how I like to think of these opportunties.
I am lucky to have had some awesome mentors and I have some really great co-workers. Ranging from guys who've been featured soloists with Woody Herman in the 70's to ppl who've recorded with Dave Liebmann, Ray Brown all that sort of thing. They are co-workers of mine and I'm the little pup again and it's awesome. Everytime I get to go on the bandstand I hear something inspiring and just shake my head.
Playing with Abercrombie was sort of a sureal experience, we played a composition of mine and then a standard... Stella I recall. I have a video of it but haven't watched it in a year or more now. Next day we played duo and we played another standard, I can't remember what it was (early in the morning). Both were awesome, and intimidating as heck. But it was me creating the intimidation, John just wants to play.
Guitarists are only one side of the story (besides John i've hung with a lot of great guitar players like John Stowel, Bruce Foreman, Bill Frisell, Allan Holdsworth, Vic Juris, Ted Quinlan, Larry Koonse and Jonathan Kreisberg to name some since we're naming). I am equally as fond of the horn players and Piano players etc and such that I've gotten to hang out with (Curtis Fuller, George Cables, Conrad Herwig, Lew Solof, Ari Heonig, Nate Davis, John Taylor, Kenny Wheeler and others)
I realized a long time ago that I'm gonna always be running into murderous players. Now I get to play with them more and more when I get lucky enough to do so. I got to play some with Kreisberg in February and it was such fun, even though if it was competition he killed me (lol). It got me shedding hard again for about 3 months.
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"You or I are only a small distance away from them. Like how Greeks didn't feel their Gods were not accessable to them... that's how I like to think of these opportunties."
I like that idea a lot - thanks Jake
Also - dayum! you have had some great 'co-workers'! (I like that expression too).
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All the people I know here in Vegas who lived around, grew up with or studied with Joe Pass, (Bob Conti, Dave Smith, Joe Lano, Jeff Linsky and some other local guitarists) all say the same thing-Joe was so kind and was so nice to everyone he was around. He often let other guitarists live with him when he lived in LA just to study and play with him.
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