11 Modern Jazz Compositions That’ll Transform Your Playing
Beyond standards and bebop melodies lie what what we might call modern jazz tunes – the compositions of musical innovators who pushed the music in a new direction. And navigating these tunes can be pretty challenging… As a musician, you know you want to expand your creative horizons and the musical options for your solos…to ...
FREE PRO PRO & PREMIUM
Inside Mulgrew Miller’s Solo: You Stepped Out of a Dream
A great solo can teach us many things (on many levels) about the way we improvise – from simply finding the “right notes” that fit a progression, to the finer points of phrasing and musicality. And the solos of the great pianist Mulgrew Miller are no exception… His playing encompasses the tradition, the vocabulary, and ...
FREE PRO PRO & PREMIUM
Coltrane Concepts to Dominate Half Diminished Chords
Half Diminished chords are one of the trickiest chord qualities for developing jazz musicians. Also known as Minor7b5 chords, their structure, sound, and very nature are tough to grasp for just about everyone, so they tend to present more of a challenge than major, minor, or dominant chords. So what makes half diminished chords more ...
FREE PRO PRO & PREMIUM
Miles Davis Chromatic Tactics: 3 Key Phrases To Know
When you think of intricate and flowing chromatic lines, you probably think of Miles Davis. In particular, those amazing musical phrases he often played with his second great quintet in the mid to late 1960s… This clip of “Agitation” is a perfect example of this magic with Herbie Hancock, Wayne Shorter, Tony Williams, and Ron ...
FREE PRO PRO & PREMIUM
Herbie Hancock Plays You’re My Everything
As a listener, it’s thrilling to hear world-class musicians improvise flawless solos over crazy tempos & impossible progressions. But one of my favorite things, is listening to my musical heroes play simple tunes… I’m talking about the regular old jazz standards that we practice all the time. It’s all about those times in the club ...
FREE PRO PRO & PREMIUM
5 Kenny Garrett Concepts on Night and Day
Learning a jazz standard or solo transcription can be a tricky process for any musician. But what many players forget is that you don’t have to tackle the entire piece of music at once… The truth is, taking one small section of a tune and studying how your favorite players approach it in a solo ...
FREE PRO PRO & PREMIUM
How To Play Like Michael Brecker For Mortals
Michael Brecker is one of the greatest saxophonists to arise after John Coltrane. Like Trane, he took the instrument places it had never gone before, adding new fingerings, effects, and extended techniques that made him seem like more than a man…… Superhuman. That’s the word that comes to mind when I think of Michael Brecker. ...
FREE PRO PRO & PREMIUM
Hot House – How to Unravel Complex Bebop Heads
Bebop “heads,” what jazz players sometimes call the melody of a tune, tend to be some of the trickiest and most technically demanding strings of notes you’re likely to encounter. Much busier than classic jazz standards, these intricate melodies are generally more difficult to learn, understand, and commit to memory. So what do you do ...
FREE PRO PRO & PREMIUM
4 Kenny Garrett Patterns to Get Outside on Rhythm Changes
For a long time, patterns in jazz have been popular as a way for jazz improvisers to expand their improvisational toolkit. You see, patterns have a natural order to them that make them perfect for many jazz different improvisation applications. But every great musician uses patterns in their own unique way… Today, we’ll be looking ...
FREE PRO PRO & PREMIUM
How to Play in 3/4 Time: Hank Mobley on Someday My Prince Will Come
Of all the time signatures that we encounter in jazz or any other music, the most common by far is 4/4, meaning it has 4 beats per measure and a quarter note is equal to each beat. In fact, 4/4 is so common that it’s actually called “common time” and has its own symbol in ...
FREE PRO PRO & PREMIUM
4 Sonny Rollins Tools to Tackle The V7 of V7 Chord Progression
I can still remember the day I discovered how amazing the ii V7 chord progression could be. After struggling for years, It was as if a locked door finally opened and I was granted access to a secret society… I finally saw what all the fuss over ii Vs was about and why they mattered ...
FREE PRO PRO & PREMIUM
The Secrets Behind Herbie Hancock’s One Finger Snap Solo
Herbie Hancock is one of the most renowned and creative musicians in the world – and for good reason! His career has bridged the gap from the roots of this music, performing with masters like Miles Davis and Wayne Shorter, to exploring the possibilities of improvisation with his own groups…. And for any musician looking ...
FREE PRO PRO & PREMIUM