Anyone got any suggestions for playing charlie songs? I got an audition comin up soon and want to know how i can master his crazy sax stuff? All tips except "get off your ass and practice" are greatly appreciated thanks

Anyone got any suggestions for playing charlie songs? I got an audition comin up soon and want to know how i can master his crazy sax stuff? All tips except "get off your ass and practice" are greatly appreciated thanks

Which tunes?

Parker heads take a lot of listening to internalise the tricky rhythms and melodies.

You are not going to 'master' Charlie Parkers music unless you play and listen to his stuff for a LONG TIME.

Check out guys like Sonny Stitt, Lou Donaldson, Peter King and early Jackie Maclean/ Phil Woods to hear what a metric ****-load of practicing can do for ya.

I didnt mean master like master, i meant like play good lol srry bad choice of words

Transcribe, transcribe, transcribe!

you hardly ever meet anyone who does it anymore .. but have you tried singing the stuff .. thats how I got donna lea down allll those years ago .. singing it .. slowly the fingers started to keep up and I then got the phrasing that I wanted as I could hear it in my head rather than just sitting with the phrasing that my fingers could manage

sure if you can play fast you can get it down nice and sterile but charlie could swing
and your gonna sound like you don't know anything about charlie if you don't at least get some ot that swing

good luck .. go on you'll feel stupid to start with but just try singing it ahhaah

You definitely need to keep the root progression and melody in your head. The singing advice is great..

The singing thing helped a ton getting the rhythms stuck in my head! Thanks alot. :bassist:

look for a bass clef version of the omnibook. It is a book of a huge amount of chaz's solos and heads w/changes.
You could also check out some of the aebersold play alongs. I am pretty sure he has a few different books of bird stuff.
Oh yeah.....good luck!

you hardly ever meet anyone who does it anymore .. but have you tried singing the stuff .. thats how I got donna lea down allll those years ago .. singing it .. slowly the fingers started to keep up and I then got the phrasing that I wanted as I could hear it in my head rather than just sitting with the phrasing that my fingers could manage

sure if you can play fast you can get it down nice and sterile but charlie could swing
and your gonna sound like you don't know anything about charlie if you don't at least get some ot that swing

good luck .. go on you'll feel stupid to start with but just try singing it ahhaah

I sing, it really does help. I thought I was just weird :o:bassist:

look for a bass clef version of the omnibook. It is a book of a huge amount of chaz's solos and heads w/changes.


That's a great book. I've been working out of it for 15 years.

Try learning the actual bass part and chord progressions first. Makes the heads a lot easier.

I have the Omnibook. Grab it!

Anyway, I have to play "kim" for one of our classes.
We're required to sing the root movement, sing the entire song (including his solo) and then play the entire song from memory.

Our teacher suggested to us to take it one or two bars at a time.
Look at it for 3 plays through, then look away.
Then do it again with the next two bars. etc etc.

Remember, start off SLOWLY!

look for a bass clef version of the omnibook. It is a book of a huge amount of chaz's solos and heads w/changes.
You could also check out some of the aebersold play alongs. I am pretty sure he has a few different books of bird stuff.
Oh yeah.....good luck!

+1000. Im also a jazz sousaphone player and these resources really helped me out. Its always fun to get the :eek: look when you play Donna Lee on sousaphone LOLOL.

Also, take it slowwwwwwwww.

look for a bass clef version of the omnibook. It is a book of a huge amount of chaz's solos and heads w/changes.

I beg to differ. Read the treble clef - may as well get better at reading while you're doing it.

If you want to play bop well, you need to learn the vocab. Listen to lots of it, transcribe lots of it, really internalize the style.

And also, practice your ass off. Because no matter how much you say you don't want to hear that and know it already, bottom line is, that's what it comes down to.