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Gyro,

There is nothing wrong with what you are doing, whether you want to learn jazz is entirely up to you.. but do you realize that what you are playing has very little to do with jazz? Just because it's improvised music it doesn't mean you are playing jazz.

So why are you giving your advice to people who are actually trying to learn jazz? Are you actually discouraging others to learn from fake book and adopt your method instead? Why bother posting your opinion on jazz improv when you have no knowledge/interest at all in it?

Frankly I don't share your extreme view of theory vs ear, copying vs being original.. as far as I know, most of us are capable of doing both at the same time.. Why should anyone adopt your extreme approach instead of a more well-rounded approach?

"Fifth, I began to think that
this is not what jazz is all about.
Some the best early jazz players
could not even read music and could
never have waded through a theory
book. They improvised and innovated
on the fly, never concerned for a second
about if their playing was in accordance
with some textbook.
"

Do you realize that the early jazz players did IMITATE other players using their EARS??

Also Are you actually hearing everything you are playing as you improvise? Are you playing what you are hearing in your head, or are you just playing whatever it is that comes out? Frankly everything you described so far is about free-playing, which may or may not have to do with you ears.

Hi Gyro,

Why are you so hesitant to let us hear your playing? I for one think that it would just be interesting to hear your improvising....just like I find it interesting to hear others' play....

Its interesting to hear Monk, Chopin, a nine year old, and it'd be likewise interesting to hear your improvising.

With over 3,000 posts from someone on musical topics, it'd be great to hear that person's playing......

Just like listening to someone who has appeared in over 3,000 appearances on a talk show now talking about how he or she has great experiences in improvised art refuses to share the art leaves a lot of questions in the audience unanswered, don't you think it would be great for your audience in this forum to hear your play?

With all due respect, again, it sounds like someone talking about some art that he or she produced, but never shares it....

Don't you think you would make your point better by sharing your stuff?

Or is the music you produce in improvisation so personal? Is music to be shared with others?

Put yourself in our shoes.....You are hearing from someone who has over 3,000 posts state how he or she is having such a blast making improvised muisc. Wouldn't you be interested in hearing it?

Thanks

I for one am confident that if Gyro posts an example of his playing we will all be impressed. Someone who has given his advice 3000 times on Pianoworld is surely onto something unique and any reluctance to share his innovative musicality merely reflects shyness and not any underlying pathology.

I have no doubt that, should we ever happen to hear his original approach to improvisation, he will not resemble some of my classmates in film school who talked endlessly about not imitating past filmmaking giants, but when pressed to show their work after their assignments were overdue and were about to be failed in class, turned out to be simply godawful.

Hi HooDoo,

I for one did not suggest any "pathology, " but someone who posts over 3000 posts (with most of them probably being against the grain) can hardly be described as shy.

Come on Gyro, lets just hear your stuff! _

True,

after all he does insist on adopting his approach whenever someone post a question about improv. I am sure I am not the only one who wants to know just how effective his method is.

There are plenty of garage band who claims to be 'original' and refuse to be influenced by anything... it's only natural that we are all suspicious.

Again I don't discredit what he is doing as a means for personal fulfillment If that's what you like then that's fine. But it does become a problem when you are telling aspiring student that the entire jazz world is wrong and that his approach is what jazz is really supposed to be.

Pardon my feeble attempt to be ironic. With Gyro, I detect the scent of what comes out of the backside of an uncastrated male bovine.

hahahah that made me laugh!! I think I'm being too hard on Gyro, if he doesn't want to post that's fine. I get the sense that he's just been very frustrated with the traditional approaches to piano playing, with classical and jazz.

I can understand it as I learned jazz on my own, and alot of those theory books are over-complicated. It's easy to see how someone can feel like they aren't improving and don't want to keep learning.

I was talking in another thread about Taylor Eigsti's way to playing music, which uses shapes of the hand to create sounds on a diatonic scale. He had a great philosophy: would you rather understand the theory or just know how to play.

That is why I want to hear Gyro's improvising, as I'm sure it would be quite different to what we may hear.

Once I get a good recording device I'll be putting up some songs.