This page contains my improvisation recordings from 2008. As you'll hear below, the recordings feature such highlights as cracked notes, poor note choice, unsteady rhythm, and meandering phrases! And that's why recording myself is so important. It's the best way to evaluate my playing and to chart my progress over time. I don't expect that I'll ever be a great jazz trumpet player, but I am anxious to hear how much better I can get with practice. As always, I welcome your comments and suggestions.
Unless I overlooked a recording, it's been about four years since the last time I posted a ballad recording ( My Funny Valentine from 2004). Hoping to meet my unofficial ballad quota of one every four years, I gave "My Foolish Heart" a try tonight. This was my first time improvising over the tune. I don't think it sounds too bad, especially considering the fact that I didn't look at the changes. And for the sake of consistency, I even threw in one of my trademark cracked notes near the end!
APRIL 19, 2008
Aebersold #116, Trane's Ride
I recently purchased the "Miles Of Modes" Aebersold recording. As you might guess from the title, it has a lot of modal exercises and tunes. It also has a pretty energetic rhythm section, at least on some of the tracks. This clip features one of my favorite tracks from the play-a-long, "Trane's Ride" (written by Jamey Aebersold). If you've listed to several of my recordings, you know cracked/missed notes are par for the course. Heck, my recordings would probably be unrecognizable without them! Well, let's just say this recording doesn't disappoint. Near the end of the recording are two notes in a row which I totally miss. They're just tiny squeaks of air...
MARCH 9, 2008
Aebersold #104, Drone in E
As I often do when recording, tonight I set my Aebersold tracks to shuffle and tried playing with whatever was randomly selected. I was really in the mood to play something fast and hard-hitting, so when this track from the Kenny Werner - Free Play play-a-long began, I was tempted to hit the "next" button. I decided to give it a try, however, when I saw the title of the track, "Drone in E". Since that's the key of F# on the trumpet, I figured this would be a good chance to challenge myself to play in one of my less familiar keys. This is my first time playing with this Aebersold track, and it's the first time I've shared a clip quite like this, but I thought it came out good enough to share. Just pretend I actually hit those two notes at the end :-)
FEBRUARY 16, 2008
Clip #1 - Aebersold #56 - "I Mean You" by Thelonious Monk.
Clip #2 - Aebersold #56 - "I Mean You" by Thelonious Monk.
I first recorded with this "I Mean You" play-a-long track back in 2004 (). I've improvised with the track a few times over the years but I hadn't had the inclination to make any new recordings until last weekend. Above you'll find a clip from last weekend (Clip #2) as well as a clip from this weekend (Clip #1). As you'll hear, Clip #1 is similar in style to most of my other jazz recordings while Clip #2 is a little more adventurous (at least in parts).
When practicing jazz improvisation, I try to approach my solos with a variety of styles. I'll play a few choruses in a straight-ahead hard/bop style, then I might try something really sparse, or maybe I'll play in an angular or avant-garde style. These varied approaches aren't always successful, but they do help open new avenues of creativity that I might otherwise miss by playing everything the same way all the time. Variety... it really is the spice of life!
As I wrote in my review of the 2007 Atlanta Jazz Festival, last year's Atlanta Jazz Festival was fantastic. The 2007 festival featured some of today's great young musicians such as Vijay Iyer and The Bad Plus and living legends like Charles Tolliver, Bobby Hutcherson, and Herbie Hancock. Ever since the 2007 Atlanta Jazz Festival ended, I've been anxiously awaiting news about the 2008 festival. Who would headline this year? Would there be any great trumpet players? I even started searching the Web a little earlier than normal, as I scoured jazz musician websites hoping to see "Atlanta Jazz Festival" in their schedules. I just knew the 2008 Atlanta Jazz Festival would be one to remember! Turns out I was right…
THE GEORGIA DROUGHT TAKES ITS TOLL
Earlier this year, Piedmont Park officials announced the cancellation of all large festivals due to the Georgia drought. Apparently the ground was so dry that large crowds would have killed all the grass. While this may have been a prudent decision for Piedmont Park, it left Atlanta's largest festivals, including the Atlanta Jazz Festival, scrambling to find a venue. You can imagine how disappointed I was to hear this news. Even worse, when the news first broke, I heard rumors that there might not even be a jazz festival at all this year.
NEW FESTIVAL LOCATION
After a month or so of an uncertain future, it was announced that the 2008 Atlanta Jazz Festival would take place as scheduled, but at a new location: Woodruff Park. While it was great to hear that the Atlanta Jazz Festival found a new home, the new location brought some unfortunate compromises. For starters, Woodruff Park is much smaller than Piedmont Park. Located on just a couple of blocks in downtown Atlanta, Woodruff Park occupies just 3.3 acres of land and has a maximum capacity of less than 50,000 people. Frankly, I don't see how it can hold more than 20,000 people comfortably. By comparison, Piedmont Park is 190 acres and the main concert area can accommodate over 100,000 people. The following image should give you an idea of the different venue sizes:
Due to Woodruff Park's smaller size, the jazz festival couldn't accommodate the types of crowds that you'd expect with big-name acts like Herbie Hancock. Thus the next major compromise would be the decision to feature only Atlanta-based musicians at this year's Atlanta Jazz Festival. That's right, one of the largest metropolitan areas of the southeast was going to have a jazz festival without a single national touring artist. Heck, even Jacksonville had marquee artists like Terrance Blanchard, Casandra Wilson, and Pancho Sanchez at their jazz festival this year (not to pick on Jacksonville, but it only has a metro population of 1.3 million compared to Atlanta's 5.2 million).
Don't get me wrong, I think it's great that Atlanta's jazz musicians had the opportunity to showcase their music and reach a larger audience at this year's jazz festival, especially since they haven't had much of a main-stage presence in the recent festivals. But I think the Atlanta Jazz Festival works best when both local and touring musicians are featured. To me, the absence of big-name touring acts at the jazz festival gives the impression that Atlanta doesn't take jazz seriously. I know this wasn't the intention, but I'm stating this primarily because I'd hate for the city to think a scaled-back jazz festival is sufficient in years to come. While I'm at it, I'd also like to suggest that future Atlanta jazz festivals should feature local Atlanta jazz musicians on the main stage and in a good time slot (between big-name acts). Since main-stage timeslots are in short supply, perhaps there could be an "Atlanta Jazz Showcase" event where several Atlanta musicians/groups share a set. While it's great that Atlanta jazz musicians have had the second stage in recent years at Piedmont Park, they really deserve a premium billing on the main stage. But I digress…
THE MUSIC THIS YEAR
As mentioned, this year's Atlanta Jazz Festival featured only Atlanta jazz musicians. Actually, they did manage to get smooth jazz artist, Mike Phillips, to play on the final night. I don't follow smooth jazz but I believe he's pretty well known in that world. The rest of the lineup included all six winners of our local Future Of Jazz Competition. Only two of these six acts were straight-ahead jazz. The rest were primarily smooth/contemporary jazz musicians. And depending upon how you classify things, only 3 or 4 of the remaining 9 timeslots at this years jazz festival featured straight-ahead jazz musicians. Consequently, to me it really felt like this was a smooth jazz festival with a little straight-ahead thrown in for good measure. And since I'm not a fan of smooth jazz, I wasn't digging a lot of it (here's the full schedule). I did catch one of the smooth jazz performances, though, and the audience certainly seemed to enjoy themselves. In fact, based on their enthusiastic reaction, I'd say Atlanta could definitely support a separate smooth jazz festival. It would be nice, though, if the real "Atlanta Jazz Festival" was mostly straight-ahead.
Following are some pictures and notes from three of my favorite performances at this year's jazz festival:
KEMBA COFIELD
Kemba Cofield was the winner of this year's Future of Jazz Competition for the "Straight-Ahead Vocals" category. She's also one my favorite Atlanta Jazz Vocalists. Kemba always brings a lot of energy to her performances and she has a natural rapport with her audiences. She's one of those people who you really want to succeed as a musician and she definitely did succeed in singing a great set at this year's jazz festival.
GEORGIA STATE UNIVERSITY JAZZTET
The Georgia State University Jazztet included various members of Georgia State University's jazz faculty, including Gordon Vernick on trumpet, Mace Hibbard on saxophone, Kevin Bales on piano, Dave Frackenpohl on guitar, Robert Dickson on bass, and Justin Varnes on drums. I've heard all of these guys play and in various groups over the years so it was a real treat to hear them all on the stage at once.
MACE HIBBARD
Mace Hibbard won this year's Future of Jazz Competition's "Straight-Ahead Instrumental" category (here's a photo of Mace receiving his award). Mace Hibbard is a fantastic musician and I've seen him play many times around town. If you haven't seen him play yet, you're really missing out. Mace Hibbard is definitely on my short list of must-see Atlanta jazz musicians.
FESTIVAL ATTENDANCE
Even with the smaller venue and lack of national touring acts the 2008 Atlanta Jazz Festival still managed a pretty good turnout, at least for the size of the venue. While there were still several empty pockets around 4pm on Sunday and Monday (the two days I was at the festival), most of those areas were filled in by 6pm. That's fairly consistent with the Piedmont Park venue as well. At both locations it seems like a lot of people wait for the sun to die down a bit before heading out to the festival. Of course, Piedmont Park's "full" is around 100,000 people while the "full" crowd I saw at Woodruff Park was estimated at only 10,000 people or so. But at least Woodruff Park appeared well attended. The following picture shows the Woodruff Park audience on Sunday around 6pm.
LOOKING AHEAD TO NEXT YEAR'S JAZZ FESTIVAL
As of now, it's uncertain when (or if) large festivals will return to Piedmont Park. If the Atlanta Jazz Festival is forced to find another location next year, I certainly hope they don't return to Woodruff Park. I can't really think of a delicate way to say this, so I'll just tell it like it is: Woodruff Park is not a good location for the Atlanta Jazz Festival. I know it was one of the original locations many years ago, but the festival has come a long way since then and they've had much better venues.
The first problem with Woodruff Park is that it isn't very park-like. The best viewing area at this year's festival was on Auburn Avenue, in the middle of a street (traffic was blocked off). Directly behind the street was a plaza covered in granite tile. Both the street and plaza area got VERY hot under the direct sun and the hard surfaces were totally uninviting compared to the grassy field of Piedmont Park, or any real park for that matter. There actually is a grassy section in Woodruff Park, but the way the stage was setup (and the way people were sitting and standing) you could barely see or hear the musicians from the grass so it may as well have not existed. I'm sure some people didn't mind sitting in the road or on the plaza, but I really missed Piedmont Park.
The other major problem with Woodruff Park was the high concentration of vagrants, panhandlers, and other street characters. There is certainly some of this in Piedmont Park, but they usually don't make their way into the festival audience and definitely not in such a heavy concentration. At Woodruff Park, I witnessed several instances where people were forced to move because they were being harassed in one way or another. My wife and I were forced to move at one point because some guy sat down near us and kept yelling unintelligible stuff about the Bee Gees and Michael Jackson. Then he started arguing with another street person who pulled up in a wheel chair (an hour later the wheel chair guy got up and danced… a jazz miracle!). Frankly, I feel a little silly complaining about all the street people at Woodruff Park. After all, Woodruff Park is one of their normal hangouts. If anything, the jazz festival audience was intruding on their turf. Let's do them all a favor and not bother them again next year!
If Piedmont Park isn't available next year, there are definitely better venues than Woodruff Park. The old home of the jazz festival, Grant Park, seems like a great alternative. I'd also suggest Candler Park. At 55 acres, Candler Park is much bigger than Woodruff Park and it just so happens to be within walking distance of my house :-)
SPECIAL THANKS TO FESTIVAL ORGANIZERS
While this year's Atlanta Jazz Festival certainly wasn't ideal by any stretch, I do give a lot of credit to the festival organizers for making the best of an unfortunate situation. I know the change in venue wasn't their idea and I'm sure they would have wanted to book some big-name touring acts. But, things happen and, as they say, the show must go on. Given the circumstances, I'd say the event went really well. Kudos to the Atlanta Jazz Festival coordinators for pulling it all together!
ATLANTA JAZZ FESTIVAL SCHEDULE
For reference purposes, here's the schedule for the 31st (2008) Atlanta Jazz Festival:
May 24, 2008 - 2pm - Youth band competition, 3rd place
May 24, 2008 - 3pm - Future of Jazz Winner: Genetic Drift (Fusion)
May 24, 2008 - 4pm - Future of Jazz Winner: Heather Johnson (Contemporary Vocals)
May 24, 2008 - 5pm - Rua 6
May 24, 2008 - 6:30pm - Bernard Linnette, featuring vocalist Charito
May 24, 2008 - 8pm - Serenata Band
May 25, 2008 - 2pm - Youth band competition, 2nd place
May 25, 2008 - 3pm - Future of Jazz Winner: Bradford (Nu Jazz)
May 25, 2008 - 4pm - Future of Jazz Winner: Kemba Cofield (Straight-ahead Vocals) w/ Melvin Jones on trumpet
May 25, 2008 - 5pm - Gordon Vernick and the GSU Jazztet
May 25, 2008 - 6:30pm - Joe Jennings and Howard Nicholson's Lifeforce
May 25, 2008 - 8pm - The Ojeda Penn Experience
May 26, 2008 - 2pm - Youth band competition, 1st place
May 26, 2008 - 3pm - Future of Jazz Winner: Zon 3 (Contemporary Instrumental)
May 26, 2008 - 4pm - Future of Jazz Winner: Mace Hibbard (Straight-ahead Instrumental)
A few months ago I was introduced to the director of jazz studies at one of the local Atlanta universities. For the sake of anonymity, let's call him Joshua. The person making the introduction told Joshua that I have a website featuring Atlanta jazz musicians, Atlanta jazz clubs, and Atlanta jazz concerts. Joshua asked me for the name of my site, but when I told him the name he didn't recognize it. I then told him that I had written about several jazz events at his school and that he's probably seen my site when he does online searches for "Atlanta Jazz" topics. Once again, he said he wasn't familiar with my site. I certainly wasn't offended that Joshua didn't know about my site, after all there are lots of jazz-related sites out there and I don't expect everyone to know about mine. In fact, I probably wouldn't have given any more thought to our conversation until Joshua said, "You know, I never do any searches for jazz on the Web."
The more I think about Joshua's comment, the more it concerns me. As the director of a university jazz studies program, it's Joshua's duty to prepare his students for a career as jazz musicians. That responsibility shouldn't be limited to teaching them how to play music. For his students to succeed as professional musicians, they need to learn as much as possible about their local jazz scene, including the local musicians, clubs, and events. And most importantly, they need to learn how to promote themselves and their music. In today's world, the Web is unquestionably the most effective medium for accomplishing these goals. And certainly, it's becoming more important every day. I can't help but think that if Joshua isn't actively using the Web to find and disseminate information about jazz, there's a good chance his students aren't either.
I can't speak for other cities, but in Atlanta there aren't any printed publications that cover all of the local jazz musicians, clubs, and concerts. At best, newspapers simply announce national touring acts and a few local events. To truly know what's happening in the Atlanta jazz scene, you have to go online. And even there, you can't simply rely on a single website to tell you all there is to know. You have to continually search for information. Since Joshua isn't searching for jazz online, he and his students are probably out of touch with what's happening in the local jazz community.
Sure, some students will turn to the Web for information on their own, but I don't think their initiative should be taken for granted. As with all of the other important aspects of the jazz curriculum, jazz educators should take the lead when it comes to teaching students about the local jazz scene. Educators should give students a list of websites that feature local musicians, clubs, and events and they should continually search for new online resources so that list doesn't become stale. If you leave it to the students to find this information on their own, there's always the possibility that they'll miss some valuable piece of information and/or fail to make a connection that can help them in their careers.
A major part of your success or failure as a jazz musician stems from your ability to promote yourself and your music. I don't know what Joshua covers on the subject of promotion, but I'm fairly certain there's little discussion of online promotion. I base this on the fact that several of his graduates don't have any web presence at all (not even MySpace pages). Even though I see them play around town, I can't find any information about them online so I don't know where or when they'll be playing next. Consequently, there's a good chance I'll miss their next gig. Their lack of Web presence is odd to me since all of these graduates are young, having grown up in the Internet age. You'd think it would be natural for them to get online and at least create a MySpace page. But in most cases there's nothing. I can't help but think this is because Joshua and the other educators at his school never mentioned anything about online promotion. BTW, for more ideas on jazz promotion, check out my Atlanta jazz - promotion ideas article.
I know there are several music school students who read my jazz blog and use my ear training tools. Perhaps you could shed some light on this subject. What role does the Web have in your jazz education? Do your teachers refer to the Web as a place to learn about jazz in your community? Do they give you lists of musicians, clubs, and event-tracking websites? Is online promotion included in our jazz curriculum? If somehow the Web isn't a integral part of your jazz education, I encourage you to start a dialog with your teachers on this subject. Maybe you can school them for a change!
ONE MORE THING
This is a bit of digression, but somewhat related... Jazz students should regularly attend local jazz concerts (not simply national acts). I'd go so far as to say it should be a REQUIRED part of your jazz studies. I attend at least one or two Atlanta jazz concerts each week that feature local Atlanta jazz musicians and I rarely see students at these events. When I was their age I also didn't attend many local jazz concerts. It didn't seem that important to me at the time so I didn't bother. Looking back, I can see how foolish that mentality was. Attending local jazz concerts is a fantastic way to see what life will be like as a working jazz musician and it's a great opportunity to start networking with local musicians. Any one of them might be the source of future gigs and likewise you may need to call upon those local musicians someday to play at one of your gigs. Start learning about your local jazz scene today. See live jazz!
Emilio Solla, a jazz pianist from Argentina who currently resides in Brooklyn, was in Atlanta recently for a concert with the Emory University Big Band. While in town, Emilio joined Gary Motley, Emory's director of jazz studies, to host a jazz improvisation master class at Emory University.
I've attended a dozen or so master classes during the past few years, and while I've enjoyed all of them, most aren't especially educational. The guest artists typically answer audience questions, and they might make a few suggestions to the students about their playing (assuming the students play something), but there typically isn't a lot of actual teaching in these "classes."
On one level, I don't really care if there's any educational merit to master classes. The opportunity to hear master musicians play jazz in an intimate setting is enough of a draw for me. Throw in some interesting stories the golden years of jazz (e.g. Benny Golson's master class) and I'm thrilled just to be there. Obviously, though, the students at these master classes can really benefit from the educational aspect. Ideally, they'd come away from a master class with a new exercise, a new method of playing, or a new approach to music that propels them to a higher level in their own playing.
From an educational standpoint, I'd have to say that Emilio Solla's master class was one of the best master classes I've attended thus far. It was not only rich in content, but he really gave the students a workout that forced them to confront their own limitations. Here are some of the key points from Emlio Solla's master class:
THE MOST IMPORTANT SKILL FOR JAZZ IMPROVISATION
Early on, Emilio Solla asked the students to tell him the single most important skill they need in order to improvise. The students responded with predictable answers like "know your scales" and "learn the chord progressions." But none of these responses were what Emilio was looking for. In fairness to the students, this is a tricky question with a variety of answers. In fact, I was at a master class no too long ago where the guest artist asked a similar question and "know your scales" was the "correct" response.
When the students failed to provide Emilio's intended answer, Emilio told them that the most important skill for jazz improvisation is the ability to hear. Specifically, you need to be able to hear and identify what those around you are playing (if you're improvising with a group), and you need to be able to hear what you're going to play before you play it. In other words, you need strong aural skills. While the importance of strong aural skills is regularly discussed on this website, this was the first master class that I've attended where the message was really driven home. Ideally, every master class would have a discussion about ear training.
HEAR FIRST, THEN PLAY
Emilio Solla continued his discussion about the importance of aural skills by saying you need to hear first, then play. In other words, anything that you play should first be heard in your head so you know what it will sound like before you play it. Emilio went on to describe how most educational programs produce students who have this order reversed. They play first and then they hear. When I was a music student in college, I was one of these students myself. I was just rambling through pre-learned licks and so-called "safe" notes. I didn't even know what those notes would sound like until they came out of my horn. To truly make music, however, I needed to be able to hear the ideas in my head and I needed the ability to play those ideas by ear on my instrument. Again, strong aural skills are the key.
SINGING CHORD CHANGES
After the discussion about hearing, Emilio Solla put the students through their paces by having them sing through the chord changes to "What Is This Thing Called Love," a tune which the students had already been working on. They began by singing the root note to each chord change. It was pretty obvious that the students hadn't tried this before because they had a hard time moving from one pitch to another. As if singing the roots wasn't hard enough on the students, Emilio next asked them take turns singing the chord tones (1,3,5,7) for each chord.
Singing through the chords like this has (at least) two important benefits. First, it's great ear training practice. By training yourself to hear and sing the sounds of each interval and chord, you're internalizing the pitches and the sounds of jazz. This familiarity will improve your ability to hear and play the ideas in your head. Incidentally, my ear training tool has a "Sing: No Play" mode which allows you to sight sing all of the exercises.
The second important benefit of singing through chord changes is the familiarity you'll develop with a tune. When learning a new tune, Emilio Solla always starts by singing through each of the chord changes. Next he sings the melody. By the time he's finished, he has a much deeper connection with the tune than if he simply sat down and read through the changes. This deeper connection may very well be the difference between playing a boring solo and creating spectacular music.
NOTE-LIMITING SOLOS
After the students sang through the chord changes, Emlio Solla asked them to play solos using just the chord tones (1,3,5,7). Note limiting exercises like this can be very liberating and challenging at the same time. The liberating part comes from the fact that you don't have to worry about selecting from all 12 notes. With only 4 notes to choose from (over each chord change) you can focus more on making music and less about note choice. This can be rather challenging for some people, though, especially if you normally play a lot of pre-learned licks and patterns in your solos. You'll actually have to come up with some new ideas for once!
RESIST THE URGE TO SHOW OFF
Throughout the master class, Emilio Solla stressed the importance of creating music in our solos. He's very critical of players who show up to gigs with an arsenal of pre-learned licks and patterns. While these players might sound impressive to some, they're rarely saying anything worthwhile in their solos. To caution us from becoming one of these jazz robots, Emilio made the interesting suggestion of using restraint over our "easy" chords. For example, if you're really strong in the key of C Major and you see that chord change coming up, don't view it as an opportunity to show off. Most likely, that showoff portion of your solo won't fit in with the rest of your solo and you'll end up with an incoherent mess. Instead, make sure that whatever you play augments the rest of your solo, elevating the overall musicality. And remember, sometimes the best thing to play is nothing at all.
PIANO DUET
At the end of the master class, Emilio Solla and Atlanta jazz pianist, Gary Motley, treated us to a wonderful mini-concert. Here's a video clip of them performing "Stella By Starlight." Enjoy!
A couple of days ago, I watched the HBO documentary, "The Leopards Take Manhattan: The Little Band That Roared." The documentary follows the Louisville Leopard Percussionists from their rehearsals in Louisville, Kentucky, to their performance at the 2006 International Association of Jazz Educators (IAJE) conference in New York, where they opened for Chick Corea, Eddie Gomez and Jack DeJohnette. Opening for Chick Corea at the IAJE conference would be an outstanding accomplishment for anyone, but it's even more remarkable when you consider that the Leopards are all children, ages 7-12!
Led by the award-winning elementary school teacher Diane Downs, the Louisville Leopard Percussionists group is comprised of about 45 children who perform jazz tunes on a variety of instruments including the marimba, xylophone, vibraphone, drum set, timbale, conga, bongo and piano. Before you read any further, listen to this audio clip of the Leopards playing Caravan . Pretty good, eh? You might be thinking this is a super group of especially gifted children, but it isn't. They're just average kids with normal backgrounds, yet they've come together to create exceptional music thanks to the superb tutelage of Diane Downs.
The most fascinating part of the documentary, for me at least, wasn't what these children could play, but rather how they learned to play it. Following are some key points:
LISTEN FIRST
In the documentary, we watch as the students learn the swing classic, "Sing, Sing, Sing." Before doing anything, they sat down together and listened to a recording of the tune. This might not sound like a big deal to some of my readers, but it's definitely a big deal to me. In the eight years that I spent in middle school, high school, and college bands, I don't recall ever listening to a recording of a tune before trying to play it. And if it did happen, it certainly didn't happen more than once or twice.
Why is listening to a recording so important? It's simple: you can't capture music on paper. Take a swing rhythm, for example. Think of all the complex phrasing, accents, inflections, and other stylistic elements that go into a swing rhythm. You could try to squeeze all of that stuff onto a piece of paper, but if the person reading it hasn't ever heard a swing rhythm it won't sound right at all.
Since the Leopards always listen before trying to play music, they begin with a firm understanding of how the music should sound.
LEARNING BY EAR
The Louisville Leopard Percussionists don't use any written music. That's right, all of the music they play is learned by ear. In the documentary, Diane Downs echoes Suzuki's argument for learning by ear. The saying goes: just as people learn to talk before they learn to read, they should learn to play music (by ear) before they learn to read music. I certainly agree with this statement. I also believe that mainstream music education is teaching people how to read INSTEAD of teaching them how to play music, since most music students can't play anything unless it's written down. I don't want to get too carried away on that subject (read this ear training article for more), but I did find it refreshing to hear that the Leopards are learning music by ear. I think the result of that training speaks for itself.
EMPHASIS ON RHYTHM AND PHRASING
In my Learning to Improvise series, I discuss the importance of rhythm and phrasing in jazz improvisation. In short, without good rhythm and phrasing, any group of notes will sound boring and lifeless. While it might seem natural that a percussion group would have a better grasp on rhythm than your average middle or high school band, I believe the Leopards have a leg up due to the way that they learn rhythms. When learning rhythms, the Leopards sing their rhythms aloud, adding words to the rhythms so they internalize both the rhythm and the phrasing of those rhythms. Since they've all practiced the same rhythm and phrasing, they are more cohesive when it comes to group performance. Their emphasis on rhythm and phrasing also carries over to their improvised jazz solos. These young children have a better grasp on rhythm and phrasing than many of the students I've heard in college jazz programs!
PRIDE OF OWNERSHIP AND TEAMWORK
As stated on Diane's page of their website, Diane lets the children experiment and come up with their own parts. This gives them ownership of the music, which in turn helps them to care more about the program and each other. For instance, if one child is having trouble learning something, another will gladly help them to learn the part, offering positive reinforcement along the way. The children know that as a band, they're all in it together and every member is as important as the next. Clearly these children aren't just learning about music, they're also learning tremendously valuable lessons that will stay with them for the rest of their lives.
I definitely encourage you to watch this documentary the next time it's aired, especially if you're involved in music education. With music programs shutting down left and right, it's inspiring to see what can still be done.
VIDEO CLIPS
These clips aren't from the documentary, but they do give you some greater insight into the program.
The above clip is a promotional video for the Louisville Leopard Percussionists group.
This clip was shot by one of the Leopards' parents during their 2006 IAJE performance.
Legendary jazz saxophonist, Benny Golson, was this year's featured guest at the 2008 Emory University's jazz festival. Benny Golson has performed and recorded with just about every major jazz artist from the 50's and 60's, including Dizzy Gillespie, Art Farmer, Art Blakey, Curtis Fuller, Charles Mingus, and Sarah Vaughan. Benny Golson is also tremendously respected for his work as a composer. In fact, he's the only living jazz musician to have written eighth jazz standards: Killer Joe, I Remember Clifford, Along Came Betty, Stablemates, Whisper Not, Blues March, Are You Real?, Five Spot After Dark.
Like previous guests of Emory University's jazz program, Benny Golson participated in two master classes that were free and open to the public. The first master class was with Emory's jazz improvisation class and the second was more of a lecture format. I've attended both types of classes in the past (Kenny Barron, Wessell Anderson, Jon Hendricks), but this year I could only attend one so I opted for the improvisation master class.
The Benny Golson masterclass was a great mix of music and discussion. Benny Golson played three or four tunes with Gary Motley (the director of jazz studies at Emory) on piano, Paul Keller on bass, and Pete Siers on drums. Paul Keller and Pete Siers both live in Ann Arbor, Michigan, and for the past few years Gary Motley has had them come and play with the guest artist. It's always great to hear them play and it's also been interesting to hear how they complement different artists.
Following are my notes from this year's masterclass with Benny Golson:
LEARNING JAZZ BY EAR
Benny Golson learned to play jazz by listening to jazz recordings. He and his friends would listen to recordings and learn the melodies and solos by ear. Oh, I should mention that these friends included Jimmy Heath, Percy Heath, John Coltrane, and Red Rodney (to name a few!). That experience of listening to music and learning by ear no doubt helped all of those musicians to develop great ears for music. It's too bad that learning by ear isn't a major part of music education today, especially during the first years of playing an instrument. Oh well, at least it's never too late to start ear training.
SLOW IS BETTER THAN FAST
Many aspiring jazz musicians believe that the pinnacle of jazz improvisation is the ability to play fast. That assumption makes perfect sense, especially when you consider how challenging it can be for a beginner to play a jazz solo at any tempo. Being able to play fast, however, isn't necessarily an indication of jazz superiority. For example, when people play fast there is usually a greater tendency to fall back on pre-learned jazz licks/patterns because there's less time to think of new ideas. Once you get enough of these licks under your fingers, it's actually pretty easy to string them together. Also, when playing rapidly you can play a lot of "bad" notes in your solo and they'll go by so quickly that most people won't even notice. With the high incidence of pre-learned licks and bad notes, a fast solo may simply obscure poor or uninspired playing.
Slow tempos, on the other hand, reveal every nuance of a musician's solo and therefore represent a true test of a musician's capabilities. If you play a ballad at a slow tempo (not double time), each mistake is painfully obvious. It's also readily apparent whether you're playing interesting ideas vs. a flurry of random notes. Benny Golson summed up the dichotomy between slow and fast when he said, "Good isn't playing fast. Good is playing slow."
Gary Motley continued the discussion about slow tempos by telling us that his students learn new tunes by playing them as ballads. The slow tempos allow the students to lock in on the chord changes and better hear the relationship between the melody and underlying harmonies. Gary Motley then sat down at the piano and played "There Will Never Be Another You," a jazz standard that was originally written as a ballad, although it's typically played up-tempo. I had never heard this tune played at such a slow tempo and I was amazed at how refreshing it was to hear each chord change resonate and linger before moving on the next change. While playing the tune, Motley played a couple of wrong notes in the melody. As soon as he played the notes, he heard that the intervals weren't quite right and he corrected himself. Gary's a fantastic jazz pianist and it's possible that he intentionally messed up to illustrate a point, but it was evident that slower tempos make it easier to hear each note and therefore make it easier to identify how things should sound.
IT'S BETTER TO BE HUMBLE
As I mentioned earlier, Benny Golson has played with just about every fantastic jazz musician of his time. Occasionally, one of these great jazz musicians would let their success and abilities go to their heads. In one of Benny Golson's early bands he played with one such musician. This musician thought the world revolved around him and that everyone else was beneath him. As Golson put it, that attitude was like poison to the band and caused all sorts of tension among the musicians. Benny Golson was eager to get out of that situation and finally had his chance when he landed a spot in Dizzy Gillespie's band. Golson was in awe of Dizzy and couldn't believe how fortunate he was to play in his band. After one performance, Golson went up to Dizzy and told him how much he admired his playing. Instead of beaming with pride, Dizzy, clearly embarrassed by the attention, responded by saying "Oh, that wasn't anything." Impressed by Dizzy's humility, Golson has tried to keep a level head throughout his career regardless of his success or stature. And as he later stated, no musician ever wakes up and says "That's it! Now I know everything there is to know." Even after playing his instrument at the top of his field for 50 years, there's still plenty more for him to learn.
Benny Golson told several more anecdotes about the musicians he grew up with and his early days as a jazz musician. I always enjoy hearing these types of stories myself so I thought I'd pass a couple more along.
HE REMEMBERS CLIFFORD
One of Benny Golson's more popular compositions is the ballad "I Remember Clifford" which Golson wrote shortly after he heard that jazz trumpet genius Clifford Brown died in a car crash. Prior to that tragic event, Benny Golson was friends with Clifford Brown and got to hear him play many times. On one such occasion, Clifford Brown was playing at a nightclub in Philadelphia. This nightclub frequently had top players from New York join the band and on this particular night trumpeter Fats Navarro was scheduled to appear. Fats Navarro was running late, so when he finally did arrive Clifford was already on the stage playing. As soon as Fats heard Clifford Brown playing, Fats was in awe and asked, "Who is that guy?" Fats Navarro then joined Clifford Brown on stage and the two commenced in the fiercest trumpet battle that Benny Golson had ever heard. After the two trumpeters finished playing, it was the alto saxophonist's turn to take a solo. Stunned by the brilliant playing of Clifford Brown and Fats Navarro, the alto player simply stood up there and played the tune's head over and over again when he should have been playing a solo. In his 50+ years as a jazz musician that was the one and only time he'd ever heard anyone that afraid to play.
WHO WAS THAT?
While in high school, Benny Golson often had local musicians come over to his house to listen to music and play jazz. Golson's mother always stayed upstairs while the kids played jazz. She never came downstairs to listen to the music, nor did she bother to see who was playing. Well, one day a friend of Golson's told him about a young saxophonist who played a great version of "On the Sunny Side of the Street." Golson invited the saxophonist over and sure enough he was really good. Just as soon as he finished playing, Golson's mother came downstairs and asked, "Who was that?" Golson replied, "He's a new friend. His name is John Coltrane." Golson laughed as he said, "All those times that my friends and I were playing downstairs she never once cared to come down, and then John Coltrane comes over and all of the sudden she's interested. How's that supposed to make me feel?!"
This post lists all of the updates I've made to the latest version of my ear training tool. The ear training tool is free to use and contains exercises for intervals, chords, random melodies, call-and-response, jazz improvisation, and more!
UPDATE 6/1/08 - As requested by Svetlana, the ear trainer's interval and chord samples now obey your "Root Note" settings. This allows you to specify a specific root note for all of the samples, or you can have random root notes if you select the "Any" option.
UPDATE 5/25/08 - Thanks to a suggestion from George, you can now click on interval and chord names to play a sample. Each sample will adhere the settings you specified in the ear training tool options. For example, if you click on "Perfect 5th" and you have the "Sequence Type" set to "Harmonic" the ear trainer will play the interval harmonically (both notes at the same time).
UPDATE 3/2/08 - I just added cycle-based modulation to my ear training tool. Cycle-based modulation will play the existing exercise over and over again, changing keys through the cycle of 4th's or 5th's. I recommend that you try this with random melodies, jazz licks, and simple song exercises (all under the Melodies tab). By playing the same exercise through a circle of 4th's/5th's, you're challenging yourself to play something by ear, but you're also giving your ears a chance to become familiar with the new melody, thus making the exercise a little easier. You'll find the new cycle-based modulation option on the Advanced tab of the ear training tool.
UPDATE 1/27/08 - I've been meaning to add compound intervals to the ear training tool for a while now, but George's comment today finally made it happen. You'll now see a new "Compound" checkbox on the intervals page!
UPDATE 1/26/08 - I added a "Starting Cadence" feature to my ear training tool (online version only for the time being). Several people have asked for this feature because it gives a reference point from which other notes can be identified. It also allows you to hear intervals, melodies, etc, within a key. You'll see the "Starting Cadence" dropdown on the "Controls" panel. If you don't want to use the cadence, simply set it to None.
UPDATE 12/25/07 - I added about a dozen more simple songs to the ear training tool's random melody feature. That makes a total of 72 different simple song melodies! You can access these by selecting "Key for simple song" under the "Each box is a..." dropdown on the "melodies" tab.
UPDATE 11/4/07 - Version v2_22 introduces simple song melody exercises to my ear training tool. Right now there are about 25 different simple song melodies that will randomly play, but it's my goal to eventually have over 100! You'll find the new simple song melody option in the "Each box is a..." dropdown located on the Melodies tab. I'll update the offline version of the ear trainer once this new version has had a few solid days of testing.
UPDATE 9/8/07 - Version v2_21 of the ear training tool adds three new features. The first new feature is the ability to change the octave range of the exercises. The new octave options appear in the "Key Center" drop-down. This is particularly useful for bass players and other people wishing to expand the lower (or higher) ranges of their ear training. The second new feature is the ability to toggle between treble and bass clef in the staff. To do so, click on the little blue arrow icon located near the treble/bass clefs. When necessary, "8va" or "8vb" will display beneath the clefs. This lets you know that the notes shown on the staff are being played one or more octaves higher (8va) or lower (8vb) than the staff notation. The third new feature is the addition of Major7th jazz licks for call-and-response exercises.
UPDATE 7/8/07 - Version v2_20 of the ear training tool includes Major7th jazz licks as well as a few more Dominant 7th jazz licks.
UPDATE 6/25/07 - Version v2_19 of the ear trainer contains a lot of little updates and one big update. The little updates are mostly GUI-related, so you'll probably find them on your own. The big update is the introduction of jazz licks to both random melodies and the rhythm section's call-and-response feature. Also, you can now select between a short and long call-and-respnose phrase. So far I've only got Dominant 7th jazz licks going, but I'm definitely going to add licks to Major, Minor, Half-Diminished, and Diminished chord types. This will be an ongoing process, so you can expect a lot of "jazz lick" updates in the coming months.
If you've got some jazz licks handy, feel free to send them over. If I think they're suitable for the ear training tool and for the audience of this site, I'll definitely put them in. For inclusion with the ear training tool, they should be 2 measures of eigth notes followed by a single note and the key should be clearly labeled. Also, the lick shouldn't be over a progression, but rather a single chord type (one of the following: CMaj7, C7, CMin7, C7b5, CDim). Here's an example of what I'm looking for (I used finale notepad for this):
UPDATE 5/19/07 - I added interaction between a computer keyboard and the ear trainer's piano. The various keys to press are now shown on the ear trainer's piano. If for some reason you want to disable keyboard interaction, you can do so under the ear trainer's advanced tab.
UPDATE 4/8/07 - I made a few changes to the ear trainer's rhythm section feature today, including a slightly modified layout and some new chord/progression types. New chord/progression types include Half-Diminished 7th, Diminished 7th, Minor II-V7-I, and Minor Blues. Some of these additions are in response to visitor requests, so thank you to all who have helped improve the tool. I haven't had much time to test yet, so please let me know if you run into any problems.
UPDATE 1/24/07 - This past weekend I added a new call and response feature to my ear trainer. I've been using it for a couple of days now and I think it's worth sharing with all of you...
The new feature offers note-limiting call and response with randomly generated rhythms and melodies (there's a new drop-down menu on the RSection tab). When I get a chance, I'll record a clip or two of me practicing along with it, but for now you can listen to examples of similar call and response exercieses in my LEARNING TO IMPROVISE - RHYTHM article. Those clips are done by me with an Aebersold, but they should give you a general idea of how to practice with this new feature.
I have a lot more planned for these sorts of call and response activities. So much so that I'll probably end up creating a new tab just to contain it all. I'll also make it easier to use and control. For now, give it a try and let me know what you think!
ARCHIVED UPDATES
10/1/06 - Today I finished version 2.0 (BETA) of my Ear Trainer. It's hot off the press and lightly tested, so some bugs are to be expected. Also, I've only tested on IE6 (Win), Firefox 1.5.x (Win and Linux), and Opera 8.5 (Win), so I have no idea how well it works in Safari and other browsers.
There are quite a few little new features, and one big one, which I'll let you find for yourself. Please give it a try and let me know if you run into any problems. TRY IT!
UPDATE 10/4/06 - I've heard from a few people that the new ear trainer does work properly with Safari browsers. Apparently there is an issue with Firefox on OSX, however. If you happen to have OSX and a Firefox browser, please give it a try and let me know how it works. If it doesn't work, try this link and let me know if that's any better.
Tonight I also added blues and rhythm changes! I still need to work on the piano part to get it smoother for rhythm changes (especially with leaps in range), but I think the bass is sounding pretty good...
UPDATE 10/10/06 - A few people have reported that it does in fact work in Firefox on OSX, at least with Firefox 1.5.x. The one instance where it didn't work in Firefox and OSX, the person was using Firefox 1.0.3, so maybe it was just an issue with that early version of Firefox.
UPDATE 10/28/06 - I fixed a couple stability problems that occur when the applet first loads. I can't say for certain, but it might even fix the problem with Firefox 1.0.x. I've also noticed that the rhythm section feature seems a lot smoother under version 1.5.x of the Java JRE than it sounds in 1.4.x. 1.4.x may sound a little choppy...
UPDATE 11/11/06 - Fixed a couple of bugs and added II-V7-I progressions to the rhythm section feature.
UPDATE 11/19/06 - Fixed several more bugs, including issues where wide modulations went too high or low. I've now successfully tested the new ear trainer in Firefox 1.0.x (Linux), Firefox 1.5.x (Win, OSX, Linux), Firefox 2.0 (Win), Opera 8.5. (Win), Safari, IE6 (Win), IE7 (Win). Please let me know if you have any problems with different (yet still widely-used) browsers.
UPDATE 11/19/06 - I just added some audio files to my ear trainer 2.0 page. The audio files were recorded during various parts of my daily ear training routine. Hopefully they'll give you a better idea of how I use the ear trainer to practice. Additionally, there are some new auto-configure links next to each audio file which will setup the ear trainer to play the same exercise you hear in the clip.
Also worth mentioning is the new ear training home page. I created it for anyone who wants to link to my ear training tools. On the landing page, you'll see links to both ear training tools, descriptions of each tool, and some background information about ear training.
UPDATE 12/2/06 - I've had a few people ask if they can download and run the ear trainer when they're offline. As of today, the answer is YES! Just DOWNLOAD THIS FILE, then unzip and open home.htm. The ear trainer should work just fine, however I do recommend that you check back periodically for updates (bookmark this page).
UPDATE 12/5/06 - Fixed issue where Root Note option no longer worked for intervals and chords.
UPDATE 1/14/07 - Fixed issue where random melodies were playing notes outside of selected scales. The online and offline versions has been updated with this latest version.
This page contains my improvisation recordings from 2008. As you'll hear below, the recordings feature such highlights as cracked notes, poor note choice, unsteady rhythm, and meandering phrases! And that's why recording myself is so important. It's the best way to evaluate my playing and to chart my progress over time. I don't expect that I'll ever be a great jazz trumpet player, but I am anxious to hear how much better I can get with practice. As always, I welcome your comments and suggestions.
Aebersold #25, My Foolish Heart
A few months ago I was introduced to the director of jazz studies at one of the local Atlanta universities. For the sake of anonymity, let's call him Joshua. The person making the introduction told Joshua that I have a website featuring Atlanta jazz musicians, Atlanta jazz clubs, and Atlanta jazz concerts. Joshua asked me for the name of my site, but when I told him the name he didn't recognize it. I then told him that I had written about several jazz events at his school and that he's probably seen my site when he does online searches for "Atlanta Jazz" topics. Once again, he said he wasn't familiar with my site. I certainly wasn't offended that Joshua didn't know about my site, after all there are lots of jazz-related sites out there and I don't expect everyone to know about mine. In fact, I probably wouldn't have given any more thought to our conversation until Joshua said, "You know, I never do any searches for jazz on the Web."
A couple of days ago, I watched the HBO documentary, "The Leopards Take Manhattan: The Little Band That Roared." The documentary follows the Louisville Leopard Percussionists from their rehearsals in Louisville, Kentucky, to their performance at the 2006 International Association of Jazz Educators (IAJE) conference in New York, where they opened for Chick Corea, Eddie Gomez and Jack DeJohnette. Opening for Chick Corea at the IAJE conference would be an outstanding accomplishment for anyone, but it's even more remarkable when you consider that the Leopards are all children, ages 7-12!
