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Joined: May 2005
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Originally posted by Riddler: .... Re the voicings - they are mostly just roots in LH, 3-7 or 7-3 in RH. I'm inclined to stick with a minimalist comping style till I get more experience. I'd like to play shells in LH and 4-note rootless voicings in RH, or voicings in LH and octaves in RH, but I know I'll get carried away and start pounding! The advice I get is: keep it sparse. ....
I should probably clarify that those comments were about the voicings I used to comp for the virtual vibe player, in response to Barb's question. The advice to “keep it sparse†is meant to prevent me from getting in the way of the soloist, who might want a lot of space. For the most part, on that recording of Autumn Leaves, I was playing block chords, though there were a few 4-note LH voicings here and there. The standard LH style I learned is the 4-note voicing. Also, I spent quite a bit of time working through parts of Phil Degreg's book, practicing shells, guide tones, extensions, etc. Great book, BTW. Ed
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Originally posted by Riddler: What comping does your husband like when he is playing? Hi Riddler, My husband does like those color tones when I comp. When he solos, I do those occassional jabs. When he plays the melody, I may break up those closed voicings a bit and play less jab-like Phil DeGreg is a great jazz educator. He has a lot of good tips on his website. He was one of the teachers at the Aebersold Summer Jazz workshop last year. Barb
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Some sad news. Pianist Esbjörn Svensson of E.S.T has passed away. He died in a diving accident yesterday. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Esbj%C3%B6rn_Svensson
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Joined: Jan 2007
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Hey gang and welcome to the new folks. Just checking in. Good to see all the recent activity. My piano time has completely disappeared and I don't see things getting better for a few months probably. I'm trying to sit down and practice as much as I can, but I'll probably fall behind a bit. Let's keep the fire burning tho! I can't wait to get back into full swing again. I really miss it.
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Bump. OK, what's everyone doing? I've been spending quite a bit of time on the classical side of things and not so much on the jazz side. I tried to find the AL thread and needed to go to the welcome info post to find it. We all can't be THAT busy!!!!
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Hey Woody, we're here. I'm always busy with jazz and continue to practice. But it's ok to get a little rest once in awhile to charge our batteries.
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Well, here is an improv of AL changes. There are lots of mistakes. A couple of times I lost track of where I was, chord-wise, and there's plenty of bad notes to go around. My rhythm is pretty awful too. Also, there's no ending But, this is improvisation and I have to start somewhere. Presumably as I do more of it I will get better (if I live long enough). http://www.box.net/shared/hknv1yjk0s
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Joined: Dec 2007
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Thanks Barb, but...well, the bass player and drummer - they swing. And they were very nice not to walk out :p I'm really becoming convinced that self-recording is the way to go. I'm going to work with this one for awhile and try and fix the parts that don't work (most of it); look at the little bit that does sound good to my ear and figure out why. And I need to get rid of the exagerated swing-time rhythm - what Jazzee refers to, I believe, as oompah (the first time I saw that on this thread I thought of tuba players and polka bands.) Besides all the help and advice on this thread, there's also very good advice on the Improvising thread on the Non-Classical forum. I'm not going to turn this in to a science project. Do I play the altered anti-lochrian or the semi discombobulated mixolydian with this chord? No. I'm just going to do it by ear and try and have some fun and see where it goes. I sure hope we see lots of others posting their improv samples. For me its weird putting something up that I haven't practiced and polished. But it really helps clarify things and puts things in focus. In looking over all the pages to this thread there really aren't very many member recordings to listen to. This is a very supportive group. I hope everyone takes advantage of it.
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Xcal,
I think you show some really good skills.
The two things I'd recommend is - leave more rests. If you try to sing a solo before hand, and record it, you'll see that you leave a lot of room because you need to breathe.
- To improve the swing, I know of only one method, that's to play on top of records. Slow it down like crazy (you can use Audacity for free, or Transcribe!, which does it much better for +-$80). Play simple lines on top of world known pianists.
Keep posting, that was great!
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Knotty, thanks very much. I will follow your advice. Two very excellent suggestions. (I record with Audacity but use Transcribe for everything else and couldn't get along without it).
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xcal, how long have you been doing this? Sounds great!
BTW - the idea is not to post thinking this is some sort of recital. Regardless of the level posted, the point is for us the listen to it and give constructive advice, which hopefully will help to "bring you up a notch".
There are many good points in the recording. Your voicings sound jazzy and your right hand has a nice consistent swing. I especially like how you land your quarter notes slightly behind which is something we have talked about a lot here (a Brad Mehldau favorite).
Now the thing to work on is the left hand. First of all you have to lay it low a little bit. It should support the RH and not take over. Stylistically, when playing the LH, it's best to have it play only intermittently, during quiet moments. And the volume should be low, although the chord should be evenly played (lots of control required there).
You already brought up the lessening of the oompah-oompah so that's good that you're aware of that and add more off beat accent instead. But when you do this, make sure to maintain legato at all times so it doesn't sound jumpy.
Knotty already mentioned adding space. You don't need to fill up every measure. One other thing related to this is that you should try not to start your lines on beat 1 of the chord. A good spot is beat 4 or 4+ of the chord. This will cause continuity in the line.
BTW - It's not a bad idea what you did here which is to use a lot of quarter notes. That's a really good starting point.
Let's stop here as one should only address a few concepts at a time.
If you keep up with the posting here xcal, you will develop really fast. Listen to the recordings from the early stages to latter stages of the many posters and you see how quickly everyone improves after posting recordings with warts and all.
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Thanks Jazzwee. I'm new at beebop. I've been messing around with the blues, but could never get going with jazz, although the desire to do so has been rattling around in my little brain for a long time. Joining this thread forced me into it. I'm working my way through PGMusic's (BIAB) 101 Jazz Riffs. They are fun. I have Mark Levine's book, which after the first 25 pages or so I got bored with. I also have Jim Snidero's Jazz Conceptions. I've only done the first tune but I plan on doing them all. They are a gas. Except for the BIAB stuff, all the rest I've learned about from PW forum. I'm anxious to put yours and Knotty's ideas to work. I know the L.H. needs lots of work and I need lots of practice to get those offbeat accents. As far as the L.H. volume goes, I think that's a BIAB issue. I was really surprised when I heard it. I use RealDrums and RealBass. The piano, of course, comes in as MIDI. To create a wave output file I have to set BIAB to use the DXi Synth, which apparently bypasses my DP. I'll see if I can adjust the L.H. volume during that operation, but I'm still not happy with the sound. It doesn't sound like my piano at all. If anyone has any suggestions, please let me know. My "sound card" is an external M-Audio Firewire. Everything goes through that and then to a digital stereo receiver. And I'm just now getting to know BIAB.
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Hey, another Jim Snidero fan! Once you start, you won't be able to stop, I warn you!
You'll see a sharp increase in difficulty between tune 1 and 2.
Don't hesitate to ask questions about these etudes. Btw, did you record yourself on tune 1? I'd like to hear it if you did...
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xcal, you need to turn off the piano comping in BIAB then. You can't really have two piano players anyway it gets too busy. I thought that was you and it was too dense and unrealistic.
BIAB has a great bass and drums and that should be enough. The Real Drums are awesome on it.
I think you'll be good at Jazz if you keep up with this. You have talent.
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Hey, another Jim Snidero fan! Once you start, you won't be able to stop, I warn you!
Knotty, I believe you! I havent' even looked at the second one - I'm having so much fun with the first one (are you sure this is legal?) , which I'll stay with for awhile until the rhythm becomes more natural. I hadn't thought about recording it. I'll have to figure out how to do it. Jazzwee, I had the piano muted (turned off). It's complicated. I can only record from one input, but Realdrums and RealBass are wave files and my piano in BIAB is MIDI. To combine the two into one source or sound file I have to (as far I know) use the DXi soft synthesizer, which isn't so great. An alternative would be to use external mics. That's what I do for classical guitar. Maybe I'll try it with BIAB.
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Xcal, I really enjoyed your playing. I think your improvising is adventuresome and energetic, and radiates a lot of good feeling. What BIAB style were you using? I'd like to try it out. Also, I keep thinking I hear bits of the theme from MASH in there, but I'm not sure whether you intended to quote it, or if I'm just making an association with it because the two songs are so alike. Btw, I connect the piano audio output (not midi) to my computer audio input, and record BIAB plus the piano with Audacity software. That seems to work well, and I can adjust the BIAB and piano levels independently. On another subject, here is a link to another performance of Autumn Leaves that I really enjoyed. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=baDM3_6w8-E Ed
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--- Knotty, I believe you! I havent' even looked at the second one - I'm having so much fun with the first one (are you sure this is legal?) [Smile] , which I'll stay with for awhile until the rhythm becomes more natural. I hadn't thought about recording it. I'll have to figure out how to do it. ---- I used to record myself with a webcam. At one point, I decided I spent too much time on the piano to record in such low quality. So I bought some entry level recording equipment. About $300 worth. I get great satisfaction when I play my own recordings on the amp, and people think it's a CD.
The 1st tune is a very good lesson in tasty LH voicings. You'll find them used in all the other tunes, so it's not a bad idea to sit on this one for a while.
Also, since you have Transcribe, you could learn it in Bb also. Once you know it in Bb, learning it in Eb should be really easy.
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Thanks Ed. I was using ZZJazz.sty Jazz Swing Style. Also, I keep thinking I hear bits of the theme from MASH in there, I forgot to mention that one of the things I learned was that the Theme from Mash must have the same changes When I heard the theme creeping in I decided to just go with the flow, but it wasn't intentional. Thanks for the link to Stanley Jordan. He's quite the tapper. I've seen him before, his videos are popular on the various guitar groups. I thought about transcribing his improv, but I can't even think that fast. In fact, that's one of the things that's kind of kept me away from trying to play jazz - the incredible chops these jazzers have. As Jazzwee pointed out, I'm using a lot of quarter notes, and even those are taxing my brain Speaking of chops, have you heard Tommy Emmanuel? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6lbvSBNLLoo&feature=related Jim Snidero's 1st Etude: you could learn it in Bb also. Once you know it in Bb, learning it in Eb should be really easy. More good advice, Knotty. Thanks.
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Hi AL buddies,
I just wanted to do a little blog today about my jazz trials and tribulations.
Today was my lesson day and I've been learning some really difficult tunes lately. This latest one is a Chick Corea classic and is quite complex, called "Tones for Joan's Bones". I demonstrated it to my teacher today after working on it for a couple of days and apparently I figured it out correctly with just a couple of minor chord timing issues that I have to fix. Next I have to expand this to Chick's actual voicings so this will take I'm sure, about a couple of months to get under my fingers.
My teacher told me to study this tune last year and I said to him that he must have been out of his mind! There was no way I could have figured out this tune a year ago. Now it's actually doable. But he said I was selling myself short.
Next we worked on some concepts for handling 'Giant Steps'. This is a long term project. I've been working on this for awhile and can play it only slowly. Giant Steps is the fingerbreaker of jazz. I'm not shooting to master it soon since it isn't something that I would play publicly. But every jazzer needs to master this at some point.
Anyway, we were chatting later and we discussed where I was at and I said, I just want to reach being an 'acceptable' jazz pianist. Suprisingly, he said "you're already there. In fact it's time to book a gig!"
That was shocking to me. I know I've progressed well in the last few months, especially since we got this thread started. But the idea of being ready for a jazz trio gig was a too big of a jump for me. I play solo piano informally in public but I personally felt I was not ready to interact in a band setting.
So that's my next goal is to have the guts to do a jazz gig. I feel I have to be overprepared to be doing something like this. Would my teacher have recommended that I do a gig if I wasn't ready? I guess probably not as it would embarrass the teacher if I failed.
But maybe his confidence in me will push me on. I have to think about this. In the meantime, back to practicing...
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Piano
by Gino2 - 04/17/24 02:34 PM
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Piano
by Gino2 - 04/17/24 02:23 PM
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