Lovebown said:
Good post...
Not exactly sure what you mean here...What I was talking about was the process of transcribing a solo (that just really like/want to play like), learning to play exactly along with it (with right nuance, time feel, etc.), and preferably writing it out in standard notation. Sure, you'll be playing someone elses ideas verbatim, but that's besides the point for this exercise. The point here is to get inside the time and feel, and check out what works in the solo.
Sure ..everyone wants to sound "unique" and so forth, but avoiding transcriptions for that reason is silly. Bird transcribed (more or less anyway), Coltrane transcribed, Scott Lafaro transcribed etc.
However, I feel I'm getting a little besides the point I'll stop here.
/lovebown
That was in response to the "get the Parker Omnibook" suggestion. I never said to avoid transcribing, as I said, "reading transcriptions...", pretty clear, yeah?
I would say that the act of transcribing is more about the act of transferring idea to instrument through training the ear to hear with more clarity than it is about acquiring vocabulary or finding out "what works".
But the original point remains, reading what somebody else played over a given harmony at whatever tempo still does nothing to enable you to come upwith your own material at that tempo. If you hear an idea, you are going to do the best that you can to get that idea out in spite of your technical shortcomings. All the technique in the world is not going to give you ideas if you do not have the aural wherewithal to identify the notes you are hearing internally clearly enough to get them out on your instrument. MY concern is that Mike will practice all of these Bird heads and then still find himself frustrated in his attempts to solo with intenet and meaning over changes at tempo. Why do Ithink that might be the case? Because it was the case for me. When I first started out all of my practice and effort was to increase my technique. This did not enable me to play solos or walk with any kind of real intent. So then I started concentrating on increasing my vocabulary - chords, scales, alterations, modal interchange. Still no intent, it was all just gibberish. The thing that has had the greatest impact on my playing is this concept of working from the ear forward. Practicing improvisation with limiting factors - 3 bars of moving melody, different rhythmic units as a constant, rests in specific places, moving rests, different emphasis/specific accents on
different notes within rhythmic groupings (accent 2 8th notes, accent 3 triplets etc.). Learning the melody and writing a specific chord line to standards and playing those until you can hear the rhythm, the harmony, the melody and your own individual line going on all at the same time in a tune.
Charlie Parker and Lester Young could play the same tune at the same tempo and sound different. Not because they had different technique, but becasue they had different ideas.
WILBY - I don't think I agree with you in concept. In the first place, I am not telling Mike that this is where he should start, but what he should aspire to. And that I think he would be better served by doing something other than what you have suggested so far. Playing along with Band in a Box, is going to do far less for his ear and his concept than putting the metronome on 2 and 4 and playing 50 choruses. As I said above to Lovebown, there are some specific exercises I have found to be far more useful and productive. Because, as I have said, I feel the problem is more conceptual than physical. You are able to play a tune you know really well faster because you hear it better and have a conception of it, not because of muscle memory (if muscles don't have a brain, how do they have a memory?). If Mike can play an F blues at 120bpm=qnote, including an 8th note laden solo, then (according to you, it would seem) he should be able to play an 8th note laden solo over MOMENT'S NOTICE. Even if the first time he played it was when it was called on the gig.
I'm saying he's going to have a better chance of playing a solo that means something if he can hear what's going on in MOMENT'S NOTICE. If he works on really hearing what's going on, he will have ideas that he can play with his current level of technique. If all he works on is playing faster, then he will still be faced with a paucity of ideas once the tune starts. Personally, I'd rather have ideas.
It's just my personal experience, but I have had more success at learning tunes WITHOUT any outside aural aids than otherwise. Internalising the melody, internalising the chord line - you hear the tune going by AND hear your line. To me that's clearer (I play with more clarity) than playing a line that may or may not define the harmony, but can skate because the machine is going to play the next chord no matter what. It's just my opinion but my experience has been that you have to work on this stuff sometime and it's up to the individual to decide whether they want to do it when they are starting out or when they hit a wall later.
MIKE - there are a number of things to remember. First and foremost you practice to make progress. Sure it would be great if Kenny Barron hired us all right now, but is that a realistic goal? You can only play at the level you can play right now. If you have any input at all on the gigs you are doing you can always ask the other musicians what their goal is, to play uptempo or to make music? And while you continue to work in ways to increase your ability to play uptempo (or whatever, following whoever's advice you care to), the practice room remains the practice room and the gig is the gig. If you don't solo on uptempo tunes, or have to ask that they don't wait til the last set to call them, then that is the reality of the situation. There is not going to be a quick and easy solution and it will take work. The reality of the gig world is that will either be OK with the folks you are working with and they will bear with you, orthey will not and they'll hire soembody else. But that won't affect the rate at which change comes, only the work you put in will change that.
Keep working with your teacher, if he can stay in touch by e-mail on the road that's great. If he has any "senior" students you can get togther with when he is gone, see how he feels about that. But he is the person that will be hearing you play and can give you pertinent and specific advice.
May I ask, who are you studying with?
