Give me a reason...

Need a reason for playing? How about this...SUPERHUMAN HEARING! Click on that to check out the latest study.

Back in action!

I don't know why, but I, your blog, feel a certain pressure to post something a little extra special after this long break. I've missed you, and I know you've missed me too. So let's enjoy this moment together. Aaah. That's it. Hug it out. We're reunited, and it feels so good. Now let's cherish the love we have of jazz.

O.K., now that you are in the mood, let's talk about your sound. Think of your sound as your voice. Have you ever lost your voice? It's a really important part of communication, isn't it? Now think about how you can change the sound of your voice. What is your best voice? What do you do differently with your mouth and breathing to create your "best voice"? Could you play with that "best voice" on your instrument? I think you'll like this extra special clip from the Smithsonian I've cooked up for you...

Enjoy your summer!

I'll try and put some stuff on the old bloggy from time to time, but for now I'm just going to take in the skywriting on this beach in India.

"Sing it Jared!"

Odd, in Bb

This link is odd, and will save you a trip to the east village or Brooklyn.

More Muppets!

"What if you and I just get right down to it and do this little beauty, eh?" Zoot Sims is on the honks. "Forgive me Charlie Parker where ever you are." Classic.

Jazztown Heights, NY

Feeling lost now that AP exams are done and the concert is over? Are you a senior perhaps? Before you take up needlepoint check out a few HS jazz band alumni. They were just like you not too long ago.

Let's start with some La Strada, an amazing band in Brooklyn. I feel like I'm listening to the Beatles when I hear this, wow. Devon Press, the bassist and Ted Lattis, the guitarist have both been forced to play the 12 bar blues in their pasts.

Now let's get hip to some Dorian Charnis, a composer, pianist, and all around fun guy to be around. Be sure to visit his music page, you'll be impressed.

Alright, you want to burn on some bebop right? No one is as burning as alto saxophonist Mike Dopazo. This is sickness...listen to Cherokee, listen to Chelsea Bridge, yikes.

On to some of saxophonist Dave Carroll's stuff with the band Love in Stockholm. Dave is an instrumental music teacher in Quincy, Massachussetts right now. I love the tune Allston, but it's all very funky and in the pocket. Pull the shades, or your neighbors will see you getting down with your bad self.

Speaking of your bad self, check out Jason Press's funk band...Joe Mamma's
Jason knows how to break it, break it, break it down.

That's all for the moment, but we'll keep you posted...literally.

The Economy...of notes

This is what beautiful music is all about. Listen to Chet Baker sing (self taught), then listen to Chet play (mostly self taught) and then ask yourself how did he do that?
I'll give you the answer..........wait for it...........wait for it...(put a biscuit on your nose and salivate just staring at it's yumminess, it's more fun that way)...he's a great listener. He's using and trusting his ears! AND...it turns out you have a set of your own. Good job...eat your biscuit. Now start listening to yourself when you play, and create something cool.

"Pretty" Purdie

Bernard "Pretty" Purdie is the world's most recorded drummer. Dig his pfft pfft on this clip. If you are surprised by the pfft, pfft, don't fret. He is surprised too, even after all these years. Pfft pfft. Surprise is where it's at.

Star Wars!

I'm not sure what to say about this one, other than it's amazing!!! Stacy Hedger (a.k.a. Miss Douglas) is playing outside of the changes most of the time on this one. Fortunately, she can win you back with expressive choreography.

Autumn Leaves on the first day of spring!

Enjoy this by clicking HERE, it rules! Look around while you're in there. Remember, 3rds and 7ths, 3rds and 7ths, back and forth. Look at the whole notes in the melody then figure out where those notes are in the scale for each chord and you'll see what I'm talking about.

Hey! Try this little exercise... pick a note and try and stay on that note for as long as you can as the chord changes move along. Jam out on it. Play it a few times to find a good note that works. Discover the relationship of that note to each chord. Make it your note. You own that note. You raised it. You pulled it out of obscurity. You and that note can hang out on the weekends. You and that note have a special bond. You and that note are going to prom together. Then solo, but always go back to your note, because you have history, you and your note.

Graph it!

If "Duran Duran" had a board meeting, this is what you might find on the easel. Click HERE for some wonderful graphs illustrating your favorite songs. There are too many good ones to pick a favorite, but having lived through the eighties, I do lean towards the "Billie Jean" pie chart.

The importance of music

Karl Paulnack is a pianist and director of the music division at Boston Conservatory. Click HERE to get his beautifully worded explanation as to why music is so important. It's an interesting read.. there is a little history, a little anecdotal stuff, and some touching moments that bring the whole point home. Special thanks to Mr. Goetz, master bassist and teacher extraordiare for passing this one along to us in Jazztown Heights.

The "Tristano" school

A lot of players are heavily influenced by Lennie Tristano, most notably alto saxophonist Lee Konitz, who was a pupil in his "New School for Music". He is often considered part of the West Coast "Cool Jazz" movement, but his technique is certainly coming from a different place than Miles Davis or Chet Baker. His lines are are long and windy roads that take your ears on a complex harmonic journey. Not really the laid back West Coast thing that we're used to, right? Check him out.

Baby steps to "Giant Steps."

You're probably wondering what this "Giant Steps" tune is that you keep hearing and reading about. Here is what you need to know...It's one of John Coltrane's most famous recordings, and one you should own a copy of. If a tune were a mountain, this one is a peak improvisers often attempt to climb.

In it, John Coltrane introduced a new way of improvising (and playing over a ii-v) using tonal centers a Major 3rd apart from one another. Let me explain...
If you start on G and go down a Major 3rd, it brings you to Eb. Then go down a Major 3rd and it will bring you to B, right? From there, another Major 3rd down takes you back to G. So it's G-Eb-B-G. Big steps, eh? One might say "Giant Steps." It's a tritonic way of splitting up an octave. (It's also an Augmented triad, but who cares? Not me.) So in his composition he substitutes this tritonic stuff for good old fashioned ii-v's and voila, a whole new thing.

Here is the subtitution for the first move from G to Eb. The regular ii-v would be Fmin7 to Bb7 to Eb. He does this...In the key of G, start with BM7 to D7 to GM7 to Bb7 and end on Eb. Up a minor third, down a fifth, over and over to the target. These are called "Trane changes." Sound complicated? They are and they aren't. Go HERE, this link will play it for you and visually show you what's up.

Listen up!

Where do you hear music? As a deaf percussionist, Evelyn Glennie has a truly unique perspective on how we perceive music. In her presentation she asks the audience to "experience the journey of the life of the sound." Not a bad idea.

Now vs. Now

Music is always changing. As Chris Rock said to the audience at the MTV music awards a few years back..."Don't make no plans for next year 'cause a lot of y'all ain't going to be here.... You know how it is in music: fickle. Here today, gone today!'' I feel like the drummer in this clip is on to something new. He has a garage band-ish sound like Nirvana, Red Hot Chili Peppers or The White Stripes, yet with his unbelievable chops and feel he's taken that sound in a different direction (and a different time signature - this little vamp is in 7). Let this clip heat up, it gets crazy. Notice how he keeps the hits together, despite going loco on his kit. The guys name is Mark Guiliana and he began playing music at 15. I think you might enjoy this little interview of him HERE. So this is jazz now.

Freddie Hubbard!

If you've never checked out Freddie Hubbard before, or if you're looking to buy your first jazz album (and the store is out of Miles Davis's "Kind of Blue,") you should go pick up Oliver Nelson's "Blues and the Abstract Truth." On it you'll hear Freddie Hubbard, the 24 year old trumpeter in this clip, tearing up some blues based modal tunes. It's a classic album, but so are all of Freddie's albums. What I (your favorite blog) love about Freddie is the element of surprise that he brings to every solo. He is constantly challenging the listener- playing fiery, tight and intense one moment, laid back and free the next. He always keeps you wondering...what is he going to do next? Hey, what are you going to do next? Let's have a sandwich.

Duke Ellington and the band

The one and only Duke Ellington. This clip features Cat Anderson on trumpet playing some ridiculously high notes, Paul Gonsalves (more on him later) on tenor sax, and Buster Cooper burning on the baritone. Yes, I said baritone! This tune is called "The Opener."

A super clip for Trumpeters with writers block...

The Pencil Exercise
You're in AP English, staring down at the blank sheet of paper in front of you. Time is slipping through your hands, your mind drifts...Wait! Quick! Stick your pencil in your mouth Jack Kerouac! If your trumpet playing doesn't improve, your kissing might, and just in time for Valentine's Day. Special thanks to trumpeter, teacher and composer Mr. Torrente for this, and the previous two clips.

Shot to the heart, and you're to blame...and by you, I mean the drummer. You give love a bad name?

Do you own one of THESE or THESE? Ever see THIS? I don't know why I'm fascinated, but I am. THIS is easily my favorite though, it's for when "shots are required for accentuating certain effects in a piece of music." Just don't stand too close to the band. Also, is it me or does it look like a fish?

Album Art

Jazz had some of the hippest album covers. Dig them HERE. Oh, by the way... album covers were cardboard sleeves that fit over records...and records were vinyl disks that contained recorded music you could play on a record player...a record player was this thing that had a small stylus that would amplify the grooves cut in the above mentioned vinyl disks as they spun around an axis.

Pure Invention

Wondering what to play on a two chord tune? Maybe George Garzone can give you some ideas, his solo starts about 3 minutes in. This is part 2 of a 3 part clip. This is a modern extension of Trane's work (John Coltrane). Garzone is a favorite teacher at Berklee, and has taught many of the leading musicians of our generation. You'll get a marriage of technique and thought on this clip. If you can't play the ideas in your head, you're finished. Check it out, then ask yourself if you think he's spent a lot of time in the shed.

Hey Hey, I feel alright...Uh!!!

You need this clip. The world needs this clip. JB on Letterman. By the way, when was the last time you saw something like this on a talk show? If you're pressed for time, go to 3 minutes in, I almost fell off my chair. UH! He's about 50 here, the same age as your parents. Maybe you can talk mom and dad into some new moves.

Get down with your bad self!

After a long hiatus, the blog is back in action. My apologies to both of it's regular readers - Ms. Kluga and Mr. Whalen. I figured the blog needed to come back strong. Fortunately the blog has just what you need...the "Camel Walk."

James Brown, the hardest working man in show business...RIP. By the way, he saved Boston, find out how HERE

"We are a physical representation of the music."

This summer, I was fortunate enough to have taken a conducting class with Anthony Maiello, a professor at George Mason University. He was not only insightful, informative, profound and humorous, but warm, caring and humble. In a nutshell, the man is an artist. In the course of a week, he changed the way we think about music, and the way we perform as musicians/educators. Below are some notes and quotes from his class I had scribbled on my legal pad...

On conducting:
"When the orchestra doesn't need you...get out of the way. When the orchestra needs you...be there for them."
"After the cutoff...let it decay."
A big issue, and problem for music teachers "we change our conducting to compensate for the inadequacy of our students"
"Score in the head, not head in the score"
"Use all three planes...horizontal, vertical and sagittal...you don't view every piece of art from the same distance."
"The horizontal plane is like a workbench"
"Maintain eye contact on a fermata"
"I hawked you" a phrase he uses to describe eye contact
"People hear with their eyes...and ears"
On entrances..."the closer to the downbeat the harder the stroke, the further from the downbeat the softer the stroke"

On music:
"You can't have an ensemble without community"
for transposition..."bring the instrument to the music"
from his friend John LaPorta..."In the beginning there was light? Well the Bible's wrong. In the beginning there was time!"

On teaching music:

"Music picks you...you don't pick it"
"Be honest...When you go to the doctor, you don't want him to lie to you - You're fine. (as he's thinking you're going to die next week) Buy a new car!"
"Would you like to be a performance major? Go to a music education school first, so that you understand music. Then if you still want to, go to a cut throat graduate school."
For a kid who misses class and is considering a career in music..."Would you go to a doctor who missed the class on lungs?!"
"When I get to school my tank is empty, when I leave my tank is full."

If you get the chance to see Mr. Maiello perform or teach, seize the opportunity. It's a life changing experience.

Free Flute Choir Arrangement!

This is the same Enur tune - Calabria or something, rearranged from the earlier sax quartet version into a flute choir piece. You can download all the files for free HERE

They are all in .pdf format, the score then a flute 1, flute 2, alto flute, and bass flute part. I hope you enjoy it, let me know if you give it a try.

What are McCain and Obama listening to?

Are you a fan of Javanese flute music? (Odd as it may sound I actually am.) Does ABBA do it for you? What are the presidential candidates grooving on? THIS ARTICLE from New York Magazine will lay it all out for you. Please note in your reading...everybody digs Frank Sinatra. Here's a clip of Frank and Peggy Lee, it's perfect.


Oh, I almost forgot, click HERE...Obama keeps it cool, blue note style

Baritone sax love

Gerry Mulligan. Check this out, you'll learn something about a jazz giant. Three reasons to watch the clip...1. His reed is bigger than your reed. 2. You'll also hear bari sax like you haven't heard it before. 3. He's cool, and if you're lucky the cool will rub off on you.

Remove your ignorance!

Wondering what to practice? Kenny Werner will straighten you out.

If you like that clip you might want to check out more HERE