Here’s my perspective on pentatonics and how I’ve been practicing them…
Part 1 – What Are They?
Part 2 – On the Fretboard
Part 3 – Patterns
Part 4 – Applications on Static Chords
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Ok ok, so pentatonics contain five notes. You can say that any five notes constitute a pentatonic scale, but let’s stick to the one in common use for now. Here’s how to extract the “regular” pentatonic scales : (more…)
It’s the beginning of August and it’s most likely going to be my biggest “season of changes” for 2010.
Musically, I’ve played the first “official” gigs with the band “Waï”. For the first time ever, I’m playing over 90% of original (and fairly new) material. That’s a big step forward, I think. That is my personal “Milestone”.
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It really is a different beast : playing originals is (more…)
A metric modulation is, in my very own words, a “gear shift” in time in the context of a song that is in tempo. In fact, it is a tempo change (and sometimes simultaneous time signature change) in which a relationship/ratio exist between the initial tempo and “target” tempo. (An example : “Let’s modulate from 4/4 to 3/4 with half-notes becoming dotted quarter notes!”)
We can find countless recorded examples of metric modulations in jazz from recent years. It seems to be (more…)
I recently received a PDF by email from a colleague and friend (bassist Clinton Ryder) that discussed different implications of the tritone resolutions. The article was inspired by the teachings of master Gary Peacock (it’s chapter 25 in an unknown book on jazz and improvisation… I don’t know the author or the title and I’m just glad this information “came my way”). Here’s what it’s about :
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As you may know, the tritone has a strong pull to resolve by a half step. For starters: In C major, the tritone is made of the two notes F and B. The resolution is : F goes down to E and B goes up to say. This can be seen as the cadence “G7 to C” and/or the cadence “Db7 to C”.
G7 and Db7 resolving to C
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In the “New Pathways Home” article though, Gary Peacock explores different tonal possibilities of (more…)
My traditional “report” on my musical situation, career and development :
In the past week or two, I realized many small but important things. It’s funny how it happened while I (more…)
I posted two videos on YouTube in which I explain 2 ways of working with the metronome in 4/4 time. Here’s a summary of both videos
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- Video #1 -
Using the Metronome and
Working at Different Tempos
In this first one (on YouTube here) I explain how to use the metronome as being “2 & 4″ of each bar of 4/4. Remember that a metronome at 50 means an actual tempo of 100 (since it clicks only half of the time…)
Here’s how I do the countoff in the video : (click on the picture)
Notice that when you first say “one”, it falls in between two metronome clicks. That is the secret right there…
This “2 & 4″ way of perceiving the click is great for swing tempo 4/4. It also applies to latin grooves to some extent. How about ways to use the click in 3/4, 5/4 and 7/4 ? What would you do? (send me an email if you find ways you’d like to share!)
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Still in the first video, I also mention the “16 tempos” technique : a way for you to practice at each “metronomic notch” in the spawn of a week or less. If you play at 4 tempos a day (whatever music it may be) you’ll go through them all in 4 days… (4 x 4 = 16).
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Here’s the list of tempos (found on good old metronomes) :
40 – 42 – 44 – 46
48 – 50 – 52 – 54
56 – 58 – 60 – 63
66 – 69 – 72 – 76
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I like to work at one column a day: you’ll notice, the tempos in the same column are at four “metronomic notches” each. Neat uh?
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Be aware that doubles (and halves) are the same. 50 = 100 = 200 = etc. So you can really start anywhere in the course of a practice session and go up and/or down to cover your four tempos on that given day. Any tempo you play will still fall in one of those 16 basic ones…
Again, it doesn’t matter WHAT is practiced… scales, arpeggios, tunes, exercises, transcriptions, etc. It only matters that you play out of your comfort zone. Some tempos will be harder than others and you want to give yourself a chance to work at them also. This “16 tempos” approach will ensure that you play with “the whole deck of cards” so to speak.
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- Video #2 -
Using the Metronome
for Fast Tempos
This is a recent discovery for me. I talked about it in previous blog entries (part of my daily practice blogging).
This approach has the metronome clicking on “beat 3″ of each bar of 4/4. It’s very interesting and useful in real life…
Here’s how I would count it off : (click on the picture)
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It allows me to practice at fast tempos (above 200) and not have the metronome bugging me with too many clicks. Less clicks means a more relaxed approach… it’s essentially the same as “2&4″, but zoomed out.
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In the YouTube video, I essentially filmed myself practicing at four different very fast tempos (I was improvising on Ab blues form and implying the melody to “Sonny Moon for Two” near the end.) Demonstration speaks better than words in this case… you can hear me go “in and out” of the fast fast and half-time tempo.
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From there you can make 2 observations :
What happens is when you’re in the “240 fast as hell zone”, you can fall back on the half-time whenever you’d like. (In fact, you should always be aware of the halves and doubles when you improvise!)
This is the prime reason why I practice like this. If a tempo is too fast and your lines are getting hectic/blurry and you’re tripping all over yourself, RELAX and play in the half time for a while.
Frank Lozano (Montreal sax great) had me do this in a session. He said “…you’re falling appart!” and also “…you’re tripping over your shoelaces. They’re one the floor everywhere, they’re your 8ths notes!” Nice comments. Of course, we were trying to play Stablemates (that’s right, I said trying), which is not an easy tune …
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Playing fast with a metronome set slow like this is a key to success. YOU have to make all the subdivisions! Have fun!
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I’m still playing through a Polytone Mini-Brute amp : I’m trying it out to see if I like it enough to buy… Still not sure. It’s bassy… I used it for practice, trio session and a duo gig and I’m still not convinced. It’s almost like my gold old Roland JC-50, in a smaller box… and with gain control.
We’ll see…
Another friend of mine offered to sell me his AER Compact 60 … more trial/error in the next few weeks!
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Back to practice…
So, the triad pair F G would go something like this :
I’ll try to work on “all descending” soon… and then “up and down” and “down and up” versions of the same idea. I’m not worrying too much about applications right now… it will come soon enough. (and I know there are plenty of ways to use triads musically)
And then, of course, I will do the 4-note arpeggios of the same triads. F and G major for example :
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next, I practiced a little on Up Jumped Spring to realize I had no more “practice juice” in me. In proceeded to build the Ed Bickert page for JazzGuitarLessons.net (at last!) I took me until bedtime to finish it!
Still working on very small ideas in my notebook. I like using a couple of triads and see were it goes. So far, this has been my most fertile ground :
It may look like a very basic thing… but how about that :
All the while keeping the first C triad as it is (and keeping the fourth note… the F#)
You can change one note in the second triad to get :
You can change TWO notes in the second triad to get :
There are many ways to look at this. Personally, it’s much more an HEARING thing. I keep the basic “C triad to D triad” sound in my mind and compare when I move things around a little.
For example : the written out line above VERSUS the same line ending on a “B” note instead. Not a big difference… yet it can be heard as “C triad to D6″ type of sound OR “C triad to B minor triad”.
I’m trying to HEAR the upcoming triad in a wacky inversion as it comes my way…
more on that later…
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Also practicing : good old Stablemates, I Should Care and …
Woody n You !
I feel like I’ll be working on this last one quite a lot. Descending minor II-V’s … here we go again!
(it’s been a while since I practiced pure scales, but I think I’ll get back into it for this tune : so many possibilities!)
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Saturday. No Practicing. Nice duo gig at night with Clinton Ryder.
I had the pleasure of receiving a “free lesson” from Clinton on EAR TRAINING matters… yes! Most of the stuff comes directly from the master himself : Gary Peacock.
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Sunday.
Some practicing in my teaching breaks. I had students from 9-5 … and then some more on Skype at night!
I practice improvising on the tune I Love You in the keys of F, Bb, Eb and Ab. Sounds great at up-tempos.
In the midst of re-discovering what jazz improvisation is really all about (by reading and working through Connecting Chords with Linear Harmony) I came across a very obvious answer…
It’s funny because I wasn’t even looking for the answer anymore! It jumped right in my face while I was doing something unrelated. Here we go :
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For a while, I was really working hard on arpeggios and scales that were applicable to soloing. Every now and then I stumbled on a nice line or lick that contained some displacement at the octave (down or up). Most of my favorite recorded solos contains quite a lot of octave displacement.
So…
I worked at it, sparsely, I finally decided that octave displacement is for horns and that it’s not really “guitaristic”.
Much too hard to incorporate in my improv. I tried many ways, didn’t work.
Cased closed. (Until today)
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And all of a sudden : “Wait a minute! Transposition is very easy on the guitar because it’s linear, it works in half-steps. BUT… transposing something up or down an octave is much harder!“
I realized that a serious “mind shift” was required for a guitar player to finish a line (or part of a line) up or down an octave. On piano, it’s easy : you hit the same keys! On guitar, you have to re-consider fingerings and it’s almost impossible to execute “linearly”, without jumps.
So I gave up : An octave displacement is just what it is (that’s in my head). It’s not simply “same notes an octave down” in my perception… and that solves the problem!
You can think I’m crazy. I forgive you. I probably am.
In fact, I’m a serious nutcase.
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For example, take a line like this :
And play that instead :
It works particularly well for ascending arpeggios (that a horn would normally “run out of high notes”) or descending scales (“run out of low notes”…). Another Example :
And one last one, for the road (now with 100% more scalar displacement!)
Practice Well.
Marc-A
