Melodic Development Workshop with Stuart King

Melodic Development Workshop with Stuart King

Melodic Development Workshop with Stuart King

Get the PDF and Backing Track for this lesson HERE: https://www.fretdojo.com/pdf 

In this FretDojo episode our special guest Stuart King is back to talk about one of the most important practice techniques for any jazz guitar improviser – melodic development techniques.

This will enable you to sound much more musical when you improvise on guitar and is a technique you should practice daily.

Stuart King is a FretDojo Approved Guitar  Instructor – if you’re interested in getting direct one on one coaching with Stuart via Skype/Zoom please contact us at support@fretdojo.com to book a lesson.

► Become a FretDojo Patreon here: https: https://www.patreon.com/fretdojo

► Start Your FretDojo Jazz Guitar Academy Membership here: https://www.fretdojo.com/signup-offer

Now the exciting bit:

If you're keen to have a structured, step-by-step approach to learning jazz guitar, it might be worth checking out my online learning system, the FretDojo Jazz Guitar Academy.

Here's what you get when you join up:

  • Detailed step-by-step video lessons on new classic jazz tunes and essential jazz guitar skills added to the club website each month. Includes listening recommendations, demonstrations of the melody, analysis of the harmony, and detailed explanations on how to solo over the tune.
  • Key improvisation concepts and techniques for soloing, and classic licks and example solos that relate to each tune, so you can continue to expand your jazz vocabulary and have more options when it comes to soloing.
  • Detailed comping ideas to suit the style of each jazz standard covered
  • Lessons on how to make chord melody and solo jazz guitar versions of tunes featured - play a complete jazz standard completely on your own like Joe Pass!
  • Members only forum - A worldwide community of jazz guitarists from all around the globe.
  • Regular workshops, masterclasses, and Q & A Sessions - get direct answers from me on anything holding you back in the practice room. Replays of all sessions are available to access for all members even if you can’t make it live.
  • Massive searchable database of jazz licks and soloing concepts - the ultimate idea "grab bag" for your solos.
  • Optional monthly challenges where members participate to get feedback on their playing, reach new milestones and be eligible for cool prizes.

Go here for more info: https://www.fretdojo.com/signup-offer

 

Before you go…

Join my 30 Day Jazz Guitar Challenge

Instant access:

•  A step-by-step guide on building core improvisation skills

• Fundamental comping techniques to be a hero on the bandstand

• Discover the biggest mistakes made by aspiring jazz guitarists…and how YOU can avoid them

• The ultimate fast path for establishing a foundation in jazz guitar

• Instant access – find out more and sign up by clicking the button below:

 

What did you think of this jazz guitar quick tip? Leave your comments below…

Peace,

Greg O’Rourke

Founder, Fret Dojo

Innovation in Online Jazz Guitar Education

Charlie Christian – Rose Room Lick

Charlie Christian – Rose Room Lick

Charlie Christian – Rose Room Lick

► Get your FREE PDF Worksheet for this lesson here: https://bit.ly/3juy6Lg

► Start Your FretDojo Academy Membership here: https://www.fretdojo.com/signup-offer

► Become a FretDojo Patreon here: https: https://www.patreon.com/fretdojo

In this session I take a look at some of Charlie Christian’s vocabulary, and how you can easily use this to make a convincing jazz solo that still sounds fresh and relevant today!

Video Sections:
00:00 Intro
00:48 Lick Demonstration – Full Tempo
01:16 Lick Demonstration – Slow Tempo
01:45 Lick Analysis
05:21 Triad Example Ideas over Bb7
07:36 Substitution Analysis
09:07 Triads on Jazz Blues Exercise (with corresponding PDF)
11:01 Exercise Example – Full Tempo
12:30 Wrap Up

This material will instantly spice up your jazz guitar improvisations to make them sound more authentic, and will help you open up the creative soloing possibilities on guitar.

Make sure you subscribe to my channel to be advised when future live sessions will be happening! https://youtube.com/c/FretDojo

Happy woodshedding!

What did you think of this jazz guitar quick tip? Leave your comments below…

Peace,

Greg O’Rourke

Founder, Fret Dojo

Innovation in Online Jazz Guitar Education

Free Sample Lesson: Charlie Parker Ornaments

Free Sample Lesson: Charlie Parker Ornaments

Free Sample Lesson: Charlie Parker Ornaments

Welcome to this month’s free sample lesson from the FretDojo Academy where I’ll show you how to apply some cool Charlie Parker style ornaments to standard arpeggios.

Saxophonist Charlie Parker is considered to be the father of bebop, who has been a key influence of countless jazz players of all instruments ever since.​​

This lesson is part of a series on the classic Charlie Parker tune “Yardbird Suite” which was recently released in the FretDojo Jazz Guitar Academy. To find out more about the Academy and to sign up to get instant access click here.

Video Sections:

00:00 Introduction
01:19 Ornament #1
05:28 Ornament #2
07:31 Combining ornaments

Watch the video above and experiment applying the embellishments you learn to your own soloing and licks.

Note: About Band In A Box 

I’ve provided in the ‘Backing Track Collection’ zip file a Band in a Box file. This is excellent software for your jazz practice as it can speed up or slow down the track to any desired tempo, change the key, style, and even generate a solo for you to play along with. It’s an excellent tool for any jazz student and I highly recommend this. Get it for Mac here or for Windows here.

Enjoy this lesson? Get access to the full Yardbird Suite lesson series (and hundreds of other lessons) by signing up to the FretDojo Academy here>>

How to play a Jazz Solo with Only 5 Notes

How to play a Jazz Solo with Only 5 Notes

How to play a Jazz Solo with Only 5 Notes

► Get your FREE PDF Worksheet for this lesson here: https://www.fretdojo.com/pdf/

► Start Your FretDojo Academy Membership Here: https://www.fretdojo.com/signup-offer

There’s a bit of a trap that you can fall into learning this dark art of jazz (and especially jazz guitar).

The feeling that you need to know everything about jazz…to be able to play jazz.

Think about this:

There’s an often-used analogy of learning jazz like it’s a spoken language, I.e. a form of music which is spontaneously ‘spoken’ rather than reading something already written down.

The logic would imply:

You have to be a ‘fluent speaker’ in the language to be able to hold a decent ‘conversation’.

But:

This isn’t quite how learning jazz works – it’s a good example of where this ‘language’ analogy can get the aspiring jazz guitarist astray.

Here’s the truth:

You don’t need to know that much at all really to pull off a great sounding jazz solo.

“Whaaat? How is that even possible?” you shout, gesticulating your arms wildly at me.

Let’s go further…

In fact, it’s very likely you could make a great sounding jazz solo today, with where you are at already.

Possible? Definitely.

Let me explain. Here’s one of the most useful things ever said to me about jazz playing, by the legendary guitarist Carl Orr:

“Don’t always project into the future. How can I make great music RIGHT NOW, using what I know already?” ~ Carl Orr

Wow. That is profound.

And importantly, approaching jazz in this way will help you to think more as an artist, rather than a just a ‘student’.

Instead of constantly yearning for that ‘special day’ sometime in the distant future when you’ll have enough scales, licks, and 1000 memorized transcriptions under your belt so you’ll feel ‘worthy’ enough to go to a jam session….

Make some good music RIGHT NOW.

Today.

“How?” You might ask (especially if you’re a rank beginner). ‘I can’t even follow the chords in a chart at all yet when I try to solo!’

The answer:

Even if you’re a rank beginner, you still have no excuse.

Here’s a simple exercise to demonstrate.

Step 1:

Take this basic box position pentatonic scale in Dm:

Now 99 percent of guitarists regardless of what style you play would probably know this. If you don’t, take a moment to learn the pattern.

Step 2:

Isolate just TWO of the strings in this pattern. That makes the pattern this:

Why just two strings? You’ll realize why in a minute.

Step 3:

Now fire up the backing track and play this 2 string ‘micro’ scale over the backing track below:

Step 4:

Now start improvising over the backing track, using the 2 string scale.

Try different rhythms, slide into the notes, try different patterns and phrase lengths. Start at different points in the bar. Do anything you like. Experiment!

BUT – the rule if you’re ONLY allowed to use the two strings I’ve highlighted.

Give this a try RIGHT NOW. Grab your guitar and put on the backing track…

Hint: An example of me doing this can be found on the video version of this post that’s at the top of the page.

Hey presto! As you can see, you can make a pretty good sounding jazz solo out of just 5 notes from a scale you probably know like the back of your hand.

In fact, Kenny Burrel uses little more than pentatonic and blues scales on his classic recording Chitlins Con Carne from Midnight Blue (and this happens to be one of the highest selling jazz albums of all time):

Why This Approach Works

The above exercise highlights something very important:

The size of your jazz vocabulary isn’t the most important thing…It’s how you use it that counts!

Even the most accomplished jazz players often just stick to a few key ideas in their soloing. They might have garnered inspiration from many sources, but they play to their strengths first and foremost.

Examples:

<<Pat Martino>> bases a great deal of his soloing on some strong double time lines and the minor conversion concept.

Wes Montgomery had his signature ‘three tiered’ soloing approach of single lines, his famous octave technique, and chord soloing, that features on the majority of his most well-known recordings.

Any great player you study tended to develop their unique sound out of a concise and well-defined set of ideas.

In Summary…

Placing limits on the material you use, and going very deep on that limited material, will quickly open the doorway to building your jazz skills.

Reasons:

1. You’ll learn material more deeply, rather than just ‘skimming the surface’ of a lot of ideas

2. You’ll be able to recall the material you do learn far more easily

3. You’ll learn how to be more creative with the material that you’ve learnt.

Go deep on vocabulary rather than broad.

You don’t need to know much vocabulary. You just need to know a few concepts really, really well.

Don’t get me wrong:

Do your study and get inspiration from a lot of players and transcriptions of their music.

But never forget that at every step of the way:

The priority Is to make great music RIGHT NOW – with what you have already.

Now over to you:

What are YOUR thoughts on this topic? What did you think of this article? Leave your comments below…

A special thanks to Carl Orr for his deep insights on this topic – find out more about Carl at https://www.carlorr.com/

Peace,

Greg O’Rourke

Founder, Fret Dojo

Innovation in Online Jazz Guitar Education

‘Leia’s Love Story’ ii – V – I Lick for JAZZ GUITAR (Valentine’s Day Special)

‘Leia’s Love Story’ ii – V – I Lick for JAZZ GUITAR (Valentine’s Day Special)

‘Leia’s Love Story’ ii – V – I Lick for JAZZ GUITAR (Valentine’s Day Special)

► Get your FREE PDF Worksheet for this lesson here: https://www.fretdojo.com/pdf/

► Start Your FretDojo Academy Membership Here: https://www.fretdojo.com/signup-offer

Welcome to FretDojo LIVE! In this session I’m looking at a cool ii – V – I lick I’ve called ‘Leia’s Love Story’ – one for all you lovers on Valentine’s Day.

Video Sections:

00:00 Introduction
02:18 Lick Playthrough
04:18 Improvisation Concept #1 – Horizontal Approaches
06:51 Improvisation Concept #2 – 4ths Intervals On Relative Minor Pentatonic
11:09 Improvisation Concept #3 – Mixed Tensions on V7 Chord Using Triad Substitution
19:04 Improvisation Concept #4 – Lydian on IMaj7
21:18 Summary and Wrap Up

This material will instantly spice up your jazz guitar improvisations to make them sound more authentic, and will help you open up the creative soloing possibilities on guitar.

Happy woodshedding!

Make sure you subscribe to this site to be advised when future live sessions will be happening.

Now the exciting bit:

If you're keen to have a structured, step-by-step approach to learning jazz guitar, it might be worth checking out my online learning system, the FretDojo Jazz Guitar Academy.

Here's what you get when you join up:

  • Detailed step-by-step video lessons on new classic jazz tunes and essential jazz guitar skills added to the club website each month. Includes listening recommendations, demonstrations of the melody, analysis of the harmony, and detailed explanations on how to solo over the tune.
  • Key improvisation concepts and techniques for soloing, and classic licks and example solos that relate to each tune, so you can continue to expand your jazz vocabulary and have more options when it comes to soloing.
  • Detailed comping ideas to suit the style of each jazz standard covered
  • Lessons on how to make chord melody and solo jazz guitar versions of tunes featured - play a complete jazz standard completely on your own like Joe Pass!
  • Members only forum - A worldwide community of jazz guitarists from all around the globe.
  • Regular workshops, masterclasses, and Q & A Sessions - get direct answers from me on anything holding you back in the practice room. Replays of all sessions are available to access for all members even if you can’t make it live.
  • Massive searchable database of jazz licks and soloing concepts - the ultimate idea "grab bag" for your solos.
  • Optional monthly challenges where members participate to get feedback on their playing, reach new milestones and be eligible for cool prizes.

Go here for more info: https://www.fretdojo.com/signup-offer

What did you think of this jazz guitar quick tip? Leave your comments below…

Peace,

Greg O’Rourke

Founder, Fret Dojo

Innovation in Online Jazz Guitar Education

The Importance Of Learning Jazz Vocabulary – Practice Tips and Approaches

The Importance Of Learning Jazz Vocabulary – Practice Tips and Approaches

The Importance Of Learning Jazz Vocabulary – Practice Tips and Approaches

In this episode of the FretDojo.com Podcast, lets dive deep into a topic that’s critical in your development as a jazz guitarist:

The importance of jazz vocabulary – and how to go about learning it!

 

Check out the podcast here:

What made Joe Pass such an incredible jazz guitarist?

Sure, he had great swing, a tasteful sense of how to shape a solo, and could play any hundreds of jazz standards at the drop of a hat.

But for me, there’s one thing that stands out in particular when it comes to Joe Pass.

It was his complete command – and sheer amount of –  jazz vocabulary that he had at his disposal.

Which is the topic of today’s post, and why mastering vocabulary should be priority #1 when it comes to practicing jazz guitar.

Why Learning Vocabulary is So Important

Learning jazz without learning enough vocabulary is like learning a foreign language without learning many words.

The result:

You won’t be able to ‘speak’ jazz. Your musical conversation will be the equivalent of ‘Tarzan speak’.

Taking this analogy further – improvising is like having a conversation with the harmony of a jazz standard.

And if you don’t know to ‘say’ the right thing at the right time, you won’t leave a good impression!

To ‘converse’ with the harmony effectively, you need to not only know enough jazz ‘words’ and ‘sentences’ (more on this in a moment), but you also know how to use them in ways which clearly communicate your ideas.

Different Types of Jazz Vocabulary

The word ‘vocabulary’ is a pretty broad term when it comes to jazz. There are several types of vocabulary, such as:

  • Pitch Vocabulary – such as melodic patterns and phrases
  • Rhythm Vocabulary – different subdivisions of rhythms, rhythmic motives, familiarity with starting phrases on different points of the bar
  • Articulation Vocabulary – I.e. the way you play the notes on the guitar, such as slides, accents, staccato, and vibrato
  • Chordal Vocabulary – knowledge of different chord qualities and voicings.

I would also class substitutions as vocabulary as well, I.e. knowing how to apply melodic phrases in harmonic contexts different to the phrases original chord progression. But that’s another huge topic…

Anyway, a competent jazz improviser will have a large ‘stock’ of knowledge to draw from in all of these areas, that they then combine spontaneously in a solo.

If you feel like a ‘deer in the headlights’ when it’s time to take a solo, it’s likely you don’t have a large enough ‘stock’ of vocabulary – OR perhaps you do have enough vocabulary but are not familiar with it enough for it to be useful for spontaneous improvisation, as I’ll detail below…

Common Mistakes When Learning Jazz Vocabulary

Mistake #1 – Skimming rather than Diving Deep

Here’s the thing:

You don’t need to learn a lot of jazz vocabulary to be a competent jazz guitarist.

It’s far better to dive deep on just a few elements that really appeal to you.

One teacher told me once that ‘Just keep learning loads of transcriptions and vocabulary, and then see what sticks to your playing’.

But, I now don’t agree with this – it’s not an efficient learning approach, to ‘throw a heap of stuff at the wall and see what sticks’.

You are much better of selecting a piece of vocabulary that you like, and then really working on incorporating it deeply in your playing, so it firmly becomes part of your language.

Mistake #2 – Attempting to increase vocabulary just by learning full transcriptions of solos

Although learning to play a full transcription of another jazz musicians solo is an excellent way to teach you about many aspects of jazz such as overall feel, appreciation of how to structure a solo etc, it won’t directly teach you vocabulary that you can spontaneously incorporate into your own solos, in and of itself.

You need to go further than this with a transcription if the aim is to increase your vocabulary, by taking the time to deliberately extract the most appealing vocabulary the soloist uses, and then work it into your own solos deeply.

See below for some practice methods which I use to get the most out of the ideas I come across in transcriptions.

Practice Ideas For Learning Vocabulary

Let’s take an idea such as a ii – V – I line I’ve studied from a Joe Pass recording. How would I go about studying this line so that it would stick into my playing?

Here’s some of the key ways I go about this:

  • Learn the line in at least a few fretboard areas (e.g. if you know the CAGED system, see if the line fits in at least 2 other positions of that system)
  • Ensure you can play the line from memory as soon as possible, rather than rely on the sheet music – otherwise you might have the illusion that you know the line better then you actually do.
  • Move the line up the fretboard one fret at a time: Play the line in the original position and key. Then, simply move it up one fret and try to play it again, and work your way up and down the fretboard at least a few frets. Yes, it sounds simple – but can be quite challenging initially!
  • Play the line around the circle of 4ths (I.e. the ‘reverse’ direction of the circle of 5ths) – make a backing track that has ii – V – I progressions in the circle of 4ths and attempt to nail the line in every key change. Why the circle of 4ths? It resolves more naturally to each key in the circle.
  • Play the line with a different rhythmic pattern: E.g. if it is in eighth notes, attempt to play it in triplets, or sixteenth notes.
  • Play along with a backing track of a jazz standard you are familiar with, e.g. ‘All The Things You Are’, and attempt to play the line (or parts of the line) as many places as possible throughout the progression.
  • Investigate the nuts and bolts of what elements comprise the line. Extract concepts you find and make them a soloing focus on a jazz standard of your choice. As an exercise, I like to extract key concepts from lines I like the sound of then compose my own original lines based on those ideas.

These ideas are particularly appropriate when studying licks. Have a think about ways you could practice rhythmic vocabulary, articulation vocabulary, etc – so the ideas firmly ‘stick’ in your solos.

Summary

Overall, the approach that I’ve found works well to broadening my jazz vocabulary is to isolate a particular idea (whether it’s pitch ideas, rhythm ideas, articulations or whatever), and make it the sole focus of my practice over a few days, using the varied practice approaches listed above. Focus is the key.

To sum up:

  • Learning to improvise in a jazz style is primarily concerned with acquiring a large stock of vocabulary, and then deliberately practicing that vocabulary to attain ‘agility’ and spontaneity so that you could potentially apply the vocabulary in any solo.
  • Select ideas from recordings, courses or transcriptions that you enjoy the sound of – aim for a select amount of ideas that appeal to you rather than thinking you need to learn every Charlie Parker line to be able to play jazz!
  • Deliberately practice these ideas with laser-like focus using ideas along the lines of what was covered in this article, until the vocabulary becomes a natural part of your playing
  • Go further and extract key concepts from vocabulary you learn, and use that as the building blocks for developing your own vocabulary and hence your own unique sound as a jazz musician.

Tip: My FretDojo Jazz Guitar Academy teaches vocabulary according to this process, where every month you get to study new hand-picked vocabulary from master players and then apply them over classic jazz standards. For more info about working with me in the Academy, click here>>

I hope you enjoyed reading my musings about learning jazz vocabulary today. How about you? Do YOU have ideas or comments on this topic? Leave a comment below and let’s get the conversation started…

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