Songs to work on for technique and rhythm?

[pamosmusic]

I just viewed Jack Zucker's recent post of a old clip of him playing Donna Lee and replied with a question that is maybe better suited for this string.

I retired about 3 years ago and began learning jazz guitar. I still consider myself a beginner and to my ear I sound like a hack, although my teacher tells me I’m making good progress. My biggest challenge is weening my ear off a lifetime of rock n roll rhythm and timing, and toward being able to replicate something closer to jazz phrasing. For me that’s a more daunting task than learning theory. Seems to me that Donna Lee would be a great teaching tool for someone in my situation, assuming that I take it a modest tempo. What do you think? Does Donna Lee work as a teaching vehicle for a beginner or is it better suited for a more experienced player?

Probably more advanced. It’s pretty tricky and also just has a lot of music. If you want to tackle something like that, there are some blueses that might work well. Billie’s Bounce comes to mind. Also something like Dewey Square can be good. They’d still need to be slow.

For what it’s worth too … I don’t think these tunes are super hard for learning players because of the scales and arpeggios, necessarily (sweet Jesus, all the usual caveats about scales and arpeggios being important and the better you know them the easier the tune will be and you should work them too).

I think the tunes are hard because of the time feel and articulation, but that’s exactly why you’d want to work on them. One big tip is—if you’re playing them down-tempo—play the eighth notes straight as an arrow. A big hangup for folks is that the rhythmic swing straightens out a lot as tempos get faster. So people practice them slow with a hard swing and then have a really difficult time as the tempo starts creeping up.

lots of other stuff goes into the time feel and stuff, but listen to lots of recordings while you’re at it and you’ll pick things up.

[pamosmusic]

If you find Peter’s tunes too difficult, you can also try easier ones like Perdido, Seven Come Eleven, Nows The Time or Doxy.

Bumping this one to the top too.

[Irishmuso]

I notice the OP plays in major thirds tuning. I understand this on a theoretical level but I have no idea how it would affect playing bebop heads on the guitar on a practical level. Maybe it doesn't make any difference, if you're used to playing in that tuning. I'd be interested in hearing Donna Lee played on a guitar tuned in major thirds. Maybe that's where I've been going wrong

[AllanAllen]

I'd be interested in hearing Donna Lee played on a guitar tuned in major thirds.

Hearing it? It sounds the same, it’s the same notes, just in different spots.