Blues For Alice

[CliffR]

Been working on Blues For Alice for a few weeks. This is the speed I've managed to get to with the head so far, and I can definitelty hear some issues with the triplets. Need to slow down again. I'd appreciate any feedback:

[joe2758]

That's a tough one, good work.

I listened at half speed a bit to make sure my advice is correct:

Watch the timing of your slides

The "grace note" type sometimes separate, while the actual 8th note slurs sometimes rush

so sometimes they sort of meet in the middle to where it's not quite clear which is which.

To practice play the 8th note line picked with your swing feel, then add the slurs to compare and make sure it is the same

and then make the grace note slides sound like one note

you don't do it every time but maybe it is something you didnt notice

[GuyBoden]

Cliff, it's going very well. A difficult head to play at a fast tempo.

[Question]

Hi Cliff,

always improving! I think you are on the right track.

Here is an easy one to fix: set the count-in to two measures. This is less hectic and gives you more time to internalize the tempo before you start playing.

Listen to your recording and you will hear that you start off in the first few bars being a bit unstable before you settle into the tempo.

Pianist Peter Martin, in an Open Studio video regarding time said; "If you can hear it you can fix it".

Easier said than done!

[CliffR]

Thanks fellas for listening and commenting.

Joe - interesting observation. I'll have to take a listen myself at a slower speed and see what you mean. There's one near the beginning, descending from the C to the B, which I'd been playing it as a grace note, but decided yesterday afternoon that I could hear two separate notes in Parker's version so changed it to a slur instead. I think the timing on that one in particular needs more work.

Question: nice idea! I like it .

Compared to some of the Parker heads I've tried, I actually don't find this one too difficult technically (I may change my tune once I increase the tempo significantly). What's holding me back is just remembering it all. I found an earlier version I'd recorded for Christian a couple of years ago. It's a bit faster, and the head is more solid (but without the slurs and grace notes), but I *hope* my soloing has improved:

Edit: I just listened back to yesterday's attempt, and "I actually don't find this one too difficult technically" now seems like a pretty silly claim. Sigh.

[CliffR]

Good effort, Cliff! Your tone production is really improving.

Feedback 1: May I know what your picking style is (or the main motion that's driving your picking)? It's a bit hard for me to tell.

Just to share with you, before I started playing this music, my picking motion was a Frankenstein abomination of wrist motion I learnt from Guthrie Govan, a wild undisciplined whole-hand motion, and the dreaded 'string-hopping' motion that Troy Grady called inefficient. It was a mess. I couldn't play anything cleanly.

Your picking is not a mess at all like how mine was, but from the camera angles it seems (please correct me if I'm wrong) you are sometimes using wrist motions, sometimes thumb-and-index motions, and sometimes actually forearm motions that look like wrist motions. I think this could be very well be a significant contributor in timing/accuracy issues. I remember Reg and an older forum member called Matt Guitar Teacher who said that usually people don't have too much trouble counting and keeping time; there's something in the motions of the right and/or left hand that's causing these problems.

You have been recording yourself for quite some time, which is fantastic because you have evidence of how your right hand is behaving. So yeah, I think you are very well-placed to troubleshoot and problem-solve the micro-issues of your technique.

Feedback 2: You might need to figure out how you are going to pick/fret your bop/melodic cells and licks.

I'm going to be posting a video update on the circular picking thread soon, and in it I talk very briefly about how I had to work out very minute things like how every single note is picked - downstroke or upstroke or slurred. Benson style pickers and even Gypsy pickers are known to work out every single line e.g. making sure that majority of phrases played on each string are even-numbered because they need to have their pick out of the strings.

I'm not saying you have to really scrutinise every single note like how those players do, but yeah I think some amount of planning will help a lot. Like, how are you going to play the typical Barry Harris '4-phrase', for example. Both you and I agreed in another thread that yeah, let's not worry about originality/improvisation-in-the-moment and just focus on the fluency. That little bit of planning in the picking of your phrases is going to make you sound fluent almost immediately when you play.

Feedback 3: This suggestion may or may not apply to you (and this is not prescriptive), but when it comes to triplet arpeggios which is everywhere in bebop, personally, I never alternate pick them. Too slow, and I fall out of time with the backing track. I just use a sweeping motion.

Keep it up, Cliff. I wish some of the peers around me have the same drive as you do! (I'm serious.)

Thanks for the kind words and feedback Brent.

My picking style is a combination of finger and wrist motion. I spent some time on pure scalpel, and didn't ever feel completely comfortable with it. But there's still a bit of it in my playing, as Christian noticed a while ago. I'm actually pretty happy with my picking. I like the tone I get (although I usually pick harder than intended once the camera is rolling), I don't have problems with string crossing, and I can pick way faster than I can fret or come up with ideas. FWIW, I also use mostly economy picking, so yeah, I sweep my arpeggios too. There are of course timing issues implicit in that approach.

Honestly, I think most of my timing issues come down to either under-rehearsal, or under-confidence.

Re improvisation: I must have expressed myself badly, or you misread me. I'm very much interested in improvisation in the moment, albeit based on small groups of notes. I do recall saying something about not being interested in originality. By that I meant not being interested in breaking new ground in jazz or what-have-you. I just want to be able to play what sounds like authentic bebop and jazz blues.

Cheers!

[joe2758]

Thanks for the kind words and feedback Brent.

My picking style is a combination of finger and wrist motion. I spent some time on pure scalpel, and didn't ever feel completely comfortable with it. But there's still a bit of it in my playing, as Christian noticed a while ago. I'm actually pretty happy with my picking. I like the tone I get (although I usually pick harder than intended once the camera is rolling), I don't have problems with string crossing, and I can pick way faster than I can fret or come up with ideas. FWIW, I also use mostly economy picking, so yeah, I sweep my arpeggios too. There are of course timing issues implicit in that approach.

Honestly, I think most of my timing issues come down to either under-rehearsal, or under-confidence.

Re improvisation: I must have expressed myself badly, or you misread me. I'm very much interested in improvisation in the moment, albeit based on small groups of notes. I do recall saying something about not being interested in originality. By that I meant not being interested in breaking new ground in jazz or what-have-you. I just want to be able to play what sounds like authentic bebop and jazz blues.

Cheers!

Have you tried playing longer licks and plug them into tunes and mix them around? It will help with your timing because the notes themselves are automatic...that's what is necessary to improve timing.

An example is rhythm changes where you could play 1 lick for every1625, then keep adding more til you have a different one for all 1625s (is there like 6 or something?), then you mix them up at will.

You do the same with the I-I7-IV-iv thing

then learn ii-Vs or dominant chains for the bridge

Maybe throw in some blues licks.

When you mix them fluently it feels very close to improv...and will sound more "authentic" no one can say your lines suck lol (oh you don't like this line? take it up with Sonny Stitt.) and all you have to do is focus on timing, fingering, slurs, technique...all the things that are hard to think about in the moment if you are trying to invent lines of notes

then you break the phrases in hallf etc...by the time your phrases are reduced to 1 bar cells you're improvising I don't care what anyone says!

[digger]

Always a pleasure to listen to you. Cliff, and in your own way you're an inspiration to me - I must get the Aria out and work on some more licks!

Keep it up!

Derek

ps Lovely sound you get!

[CliffR]

Always a pleasure to listen to you. Cliff, and in your own way you're an inspiration to me - I must get the Aria out and work on some more licks!

Keep it up!

Derek

ps Lovely sound you get!

Thank Derek! It's always a pleasure to listen to you too! I ordered this guitar pretty much blind and got really lucky with the tone and playability.

[CliffR]

Have you tried playing longer licks and plug them into tunes and mix them around? It will help with your timing because the notes themselves are automatic...that's what is necessary to improve timing.

An example is rhythm changes where you could play 1 lick for every1625, then keep adding more til you have a different one for all 1625s (is there like 6 or something?), then you mix them up at will.

You do the same with the I-I7-IV-iv thing

then learn ii-Vs or dominant chains for the bridge

Maybe throw in some blues licks.

When you mix them fluently it feels very close to improv...and will sound more "authentic" no one can say your lines suck lol (oh you don't like this line? take it up with Sonny Stitt.) and all you have to do is focus on timing, fingering, slurs, technique...all the things that are hard to think about in the moment if you are trying to invent lines of notes

then you break the phrases in hallf etc...by the time your phrases are reduced to 1 bar cells you're improvising I don't care what anyone says!

Hey Joe,
I have tried longer licks, but I'm finding shorter licks are much easier to mutate and inter-mix. Mostly what I work on are just a handful of notes - an arpeggio with maybe a leading tone, an enclosure, a chromatic descent or ascent, a scale fragment. That sort of thing.

[Mick-7]

I ordered this guitar pretty much blind and got really lucky with the tone and playability.

What is it?

Edit: I just listened back to yesterday's attempt, and "I actually don't find this one too difficult technically" now seems like a pretty silly claim. Sigh.

Hey, from "too difficult" to merely "difficult" is definite progress!

[CliffR]

What is it?

It's a Jaen Berlin II.

Berlin II – Jaen

Our very own Rob MacKillop described him as one of the best luthiers in Europe. I custom ordered it right before the pandemic hit, and he delivered it in a little over three months (the promised time) and was great to deal with throughout. Price was very reasonable too.

[Mick-7]

It's a Jaen Berlin II.

Berlin II – Jaen

Our very own Rob MacKillop described him as one of the best luthiers in Europe. I custom ordered it right before the pandemic hit, and he delivered it in a little over three months (the promised time) and was great to deal with throughout. Price was very reasonable too.

Is it chambered? (hollow inside).

[CliffR]

Is it chambered? (hollow inside)

Oh yeah, fully hollow and hand carved. There's a sound port on the top where it meets the upper side.

[CliffR]

It's also a smaller archtop at 15" and, I think, 2.5" in depth. I have 10-gauge Tomastik bebop flat wounds on it, and I think it has a nice sweet, round sound.

[JazzPadd]

Bop heads are so filled with joy, they exude happiness and glee, at least to me. Very nice playing, thanks for showing us your progress. Wishing you all the best! Lovely guitar, too!

[CliffR]

Bop heads are so filled with joy, they exude happiness and glee, at least to me. Very nice playing, thanks for showing us your progress. Wishing you all the best! Lovely guitar, too!

Thanks so much! I agree: this one and Confirmation in particular always lift me up.