Keeping Track on Over the Bar licks

[Kevin Hsieh]

On my solos I like playing over the bar lines that are not patterned over the 1 2 3 4, but i have trouble hitting the 1 on the next phrase i want to play.

any tips?

[j.a.e.r.i.p]

i would just kind of take a funk approach and just feel one-one-one each time it comes around. it helps i think also to play syncopation excercises centered around anticipation of one. which can be found pretty easily

[Chris Fitzgerald]

It's a brain-split thing. It's easy to play over the bar when someone is laying down the time, harmony and form in a strong way, because all you have to do is to keep an ear on the underpinning and then merge with it when it sounds right. The real trick (IME, of course) is to learn to continually hear the underpinning/framework in your mind's ear while playing over it at the same time. It feels kind of like juggling sometimes, but that's what makes it manageable for me when I'm able to pull it off. My tip would be to practice playing over the bar while soloing without accompaniment, and recording yourself as you do it. Later, you can go back and figure out where you got lost and why, then it's easier to work on the trouble spots.

[Kevin Hsieh]

thanks chris.

yea i'm currently experimenting with that in the shed. It seems like it's a lot easier with someone laying it down with some chords in the group situation. But i'd really like to get it alone and know where i am. I had the metronome going on every 2 and 4 and i kept getting lost so i switched it to every 4 beats with the first beat accented. And that's helping me out.

almost there

[monkmonk]

Hi all-
total newbie question. But I'm a jazz pianist, and I've studied for a while. When people talk about phrasing over the bar, I really don't understand what that means. Are you talking about phrasing into a different time signature? Like playing a tune in three but feeling a phrase in four. Or playing in four and feeling a phrase in five? To me I hear Lester Young phrasing over the bar, but surely that's not what you mean.
Thanks,
Tom

[Kevin Hsieh]

Originally Posted by monkmonk

Hi all-
total newbie question. But I'm a jazz pianist, and I've studied for a while. When people talk about phrasing over the bar, I really don't understand what that means. Are you talking about phrasing into a different time signature? Like playing a tune in three but feeling a phrase in four. Or playing in four and feeling a phrase in five? To me I hear Lester Young phrasing over the bar, but surely that's not what you mean.
Thanks,
Tom

what is "over the bar" & "displacement"?

[monkmonk]

thanks Kevin.

[fingers]

Chris' suggestions are great. This is all really echoing him.

I think the thing that helped me the most was recording my attempts, both in the practice room and on gigs, and analyze from there.

On a gig recording I will usually take a tune or two and really pick it apart. I'll pay close attention to all the things I have been practicing and try to identify other weaknesses that need attention.

The things that has helped me, as Chris points out, is always trying to keep the melody and the harmonic rhythm in my head. It is hard 'splitting your brain' (as Chris said) but this insures that you are playing the tune at hand rather than a set of changes and can help keep you on track.

[frichter]

I've been kind of working on the same kind of stuff lately. As usual, I agree with the stuff that Chris and Fingers have said. I have been doing a couple of things to get myself used to the "over the bar sound" and the split brain concept. First, I have been transcribing some Holland . . . his sense of time is great, so his ability to play over the bar without losing perpetual motion is wonderful to listen to and something I would like to strive for. By transcribing lines and practicing them, I put them in the subconscious and help my mind understand whats going on.

Another thing I have been doing is displacing and taking walking lines over the bar. I walk a bass line over a standard (that I know so I don't have to think as much about the line itself) and then displace it in different ways so that I am walking over the barline. For example, I will walk for three beats and then start a quarter note triplet on beat four and then land my walking line on beat two of the next bar (after the triplet) . . . I will also walk two beats and then displace the next two notes by an eighth note and land my walking line on the and of four (I hope that makes sense).

There are a bunch of variations I do with this (quarter note triplet starting on beat two, subsequent dotted quarters starting on beat three, walking two bars regular then two bars on the upbeat, etc.) The point is that I create a pulse with my own walking line and then displace it and manipulate it to go over the bar. For me, this is helpful in starting to create the split brain thing because while you are displacing you can still feel your pulse (walking line) either consciously or subconsciously. I don't know exactly how much sense I made, but hopefully it helps (its been awhile since I have been around so my posting skills are a bit rusty).

[Sam Sherry]

All good stuff. My two pfennings is that losing track of time over the bar may reflect:

a) Some need to further develop the internal clock. How are you using the metronome? Are you practicing with a metronome on "just 2" or "just 4?"

b) That you're not trusting the others in the ensemble to tell you where you are. Somebody in the band knows where the beat is. Can you hear them clearly?

c) That you are having difficulty breaking patterns of when you start phrases in the bar. Two good exercises are

1) Play a chorus. Start every phrase on the and of three, or whatever you pick. Move through the bar this way. It'll take a long time. This is slow work to help you get used to starting in different places.

2) Solo some. After every phrase, you MUST wait 2.5 beats and no other amount to start your next phrase. This is an instant rut-buster: You will place yourself in unfamiliar spots, which is good.

As always, these are practice exercises. Use of practice exercises on the bandstand will cause your bridge to fall over: On the bandstand, listen and play.

[fingers]

Originally Posted by frichter

Another thing I have been doing is displacing and taking walking lines over the bar. I walk a bass line over a standard (that I know so I don't have to think as much about the line itself) and then displace it in different ways so that I am walking over the barline. For example, I will walk for three beats and then start a quarter note triplet on beat four and then land my walking line on beat two of the next bar (after the triplet) . . . I will also walk two beats and then displace the next two notes by an eighth note and land my walking line on the and of four (I hope that makes sense).

This is especially hip if you get a piano player or guitar that hears it happening and responds by either playing with or against you.

I love doing this stuff if things are happening. Sometimes you have to just lay it down so other folks you are playing with (especially singers) don't turn time around though. There is a certain art to know when it is appropriate.

btw say hi to Jeff and Dan. I understand you are in a combo with them at DePaul. Great players and great guys.

[Kevin Hsieh]

i'd love to hear some of this stuff. it's hard to visualize it from reading. maybe we can start a thread posting our recorded displacement ideas. this could do a lot for those who are still confused or have an idea and would like a new kick in the right direction

[David Kaczorowski]

Originally Posted by Kevin Hsieh

On my solos I like playing over the bar lines that are not patterned over the 1 2 3 4, but i have trouble hitting the 1 on the next phrase i want to play.

any tips?

Yeah, don't worry about hitting 1. Phrases can begin and end anywhere.

Learn to feel chunks of time. You know what a bar feels like, maybe two bars or four, but how about 8 or 16, or 32. Learn to what large chunks of time feel like. Also learn to hear/feel the difference between the way each beat in a bar sounds. I play in some groups where it's pretty normal for no one to be playing 1, but you can hear where in the bar you are. And it's not counting, you can just hear it. You could walk into the room from outside, listen for a moment and know exactly where the beat is because each beat has it's own kind of color.

[TomSauter]

I may be in the minority, but I think the best way to get a handle on this type of thing is to just work a bunch of stuff out. Write out a couple choruses of a blues using only dotted quarters and memorize it. Practice that with a metronome, playalong, on a gig/rehearsal, etc. One of the biggest obstacles is trying to play over the barlines and not knowing if you're right.

[frichter]

Originally Posted by fingers

This is especially hip if you get a piano player or guitar that hears it happening and responds by either playing with or against you.

btw say hi to Jeff and Dan. I understand you are in a combo with them at DePaul. Great players and great guys.

Yeah . . . playing in a group that is rhythmically sound enough to interact in a constructive way is a wonderful thing to be a part of.

I do play with Jeff and Dan -- they are indeed great players and people. Jeff keeps on urgeing me to go check you out (which I have been trying to do), but so far I just haven't gotten it to work out. Hopefully sometime this month .

Originally Posted by TomSauter

I may be in the minority, but I think the best way to get a handle on this type of thing is to just work a bunch of stuff out. Write out a couple choruses of a blues using only dotted quarters and memorize it. Practice that with a metronome, playalong, on a gig/rehearsal, etc. One of the biggest obstacles is trying to play over the barlines and not knowing if you're right.

Don't think you are in the minority -- that is why I said that transcribing Holland has helped me. I have taken the stuff he does and worked it out over and over. I also feel that the walking stuff that I mentioned is a good way of working it out. Once again, I feel that by working stuff out it can be stored into your subconscious which allows the split brain thing to work. So if you are in the minority . . . I am right there with ya.