steelstringcheese

I recently came across a forum post wherein a guitarist resolved to write a riff per day. Not a bad idea. This approach could be adapted for various purposes: One could improvise over a new vamp each day, learn a new lick per day, learn a new song per day; if your practice schedule is light, spread out the new learns to once per week.

But why not go one step further? What you learn, especially in haste for a specific momentary objective, is easily unlearned. I certainly have learned songs and licks a couple of years ago that I don’t even know I have forgotten. What you really want to do is not learn something regularly, but test yourself on a new piece of knowledge regularly.

How is this done? Let’s say you want to learn a new lick once per week. Once you get each new lick under your fingers, practice improvising, making sure to use the lick at every opportunity. If you have cause to write a solo, try to find a place for it. If you teach, teach it.

Likewise, if your goal is to learn a new song once per week, then don’t stop at knowing how to play it. Play along with a recording. Play it in a band. Call it at a jam session. If it’s a jazz tune, write a head using the same changes. Then write one using substitutions.

Take your learning beyond the accumulation of data. Seek to consistently validate and reinforce your knowledge.

Here’s another little something from a recent practice session. Try this lick in a Bb7 context:

Now let’s make an exercise of it. Try repeating this a few times:

Here’s an alternate articulation that adds a touch of soul:

And finally, here’s a continuation of the pattern:

In a recent post discussing the problems with traditional head/solo/head arrangements, I said I would share an original piece that challenges this tradition. Here it is, a revision of something I wrote a while ago for a jazz combo:

“Phobos” (PDF)

My intention was to break the formal symmetry one usually perceives in jazz tunes. In my attempt, I employed the following methods:

1. Meter follows melodic impulse. Usually melody conforms to meter, but I wanted this melody to feel more organic and less metric. In progressive music, it sometimes appears that variations in meter are forced into arrangements for the mere sake of sounding sophisticated. I only tend to place meter changes where they are necessary to support the melodic or harmonic rhythms I hear in my imagination.

2. Traditional devices are used in unconventional ways. This piece contains breaks, send-offs and tutti, and has soloists taking turns — all familiar ideas in jazz. But breaks double as send-offs, phrases are irregular in length and at times segmented, and solos do not begin at clear divisions between formal sections.

3. Solos are Highly Structured. Instead of being asked to repeat the same set of changes ad infinitum, performers begin solos at specific moments that are displaced from sectional divisions; and each soloist finds himself playing over a different chord progression. The chord changes are based on root movement in the exposition (read: head), but develop it further rather than echo it.

4. The chord changes don’t cycle predictably. Conventional changes lead the ear to each sectional transition through the use of cadences. This piece avoids cadences that would sound out of place if shifted to the left or right of a double-bar.

5. The recapitulation is not an exact copy of the exposition. Rather than treat the beginning, non-improvised section as a head which simply repeats after the solos, I felt a greater effect could be achieved by allowing the final statement of the opening melody to continue the expected dynamic trajectory set up in the preceding solos.

I feel that even a small piece for a jazz ensemble can (and often should) be treated in a symphonic manner, by continuing development of a theme straight through to the end, and not simply treating the theme as a pair of bookends containing self-indulgent improvisations.

I plan to rehearse this with my new ensemble, yet to be named. I will keep you posted on results. In the meantime, if anyone out there tries performing “Phobos,” I would love to hear your interpretation.

As I began watching this, I felt sorry for the guy. Maybe it’s his first show. Maybe he just replaced someone else and he was rushed into this gig without much time to learn the material. But the fact that he isn’t just making mistakes here and there, but has utterly lost the form, combined with the band’s reaction at the end, suggests that he might have other issues to deal with — things that he was probably warned about repeatedly.