I’ve been talking with students about the use of vocabulary, “licks”, and learned musical sentences in improvisation in 20th century Black American Music. If we compare music to visual art, I think sometimes it can be helpful to practice improvisation more like creating a collage than trying to paint something completely new on a blank […]
Tag: jazz
Vocabulary
Transcription
Hi all! I think a lot of you have already seen me post this clip elsewhere, but I thought I would put it up here as well. I would like to get more in the habit of posting video of what I’m playing/working on; just short informal bits, nothing too intense. This is the […]
Saxophone Siblings
I started playing music by learning clarinet when I was 9. I had 2 cassette tapes: one of Swing clarinetist Benny Goodman and one of saxophonist Kenny G. That ended up being the only Kenny G music I had, but I did go on to get several Benny Goodman tapes after that. I then went […]
Updates/Listening to the London Scene
Hi all! It’s been an eventful Summer: – Polyrhythmics played across the region, including the Eclipse Festival and the High Sierra Music Festival, where I had the opportunity to share the stage with both Skerik (who I talked with on the blog here) and Karl Denson, a musical highlight for me. We added the finishing […]
More Focused Listening
When David Bowie passed away, I was motivated to listen to more of his music, as I had really only heard his big hits previously. As I have occasionally done with other artists in the past, I decided to start with his early albums and move through them chronologically (I wrote about this approach previously […]
Lottie’s Lounge
Great gig at Lottie’s Lounge with Eric Hullander and Papa Josh the other night. I got a chance to really dig into some standards that I haven’t played in a long time, and all three of us were listening close. I found myself thinking a lot about the old Dexter and Hayes sessions I used […]
Listening
Two tracks I can’t get enough of right now: Claudia Quintet – Keramag, from Royal Toast I love the melody that first shows up at 1 minute 1 second that the vibes and piano play together. It gets moved around and displaced throughout the entire song. Christian Scott – American’t, from Yesterday You Said Tomorrow […]
Mark de Clive-Lowe at Nectar
This is a repost of my entry for my friends over at Rust and Rum: Mcguirk met up with me to check out Mark de Clive-Lowe at Nectar in Fremont. MdCL is not necessarily a DJ as much as a beatmaker, with a bunch of drum machines and keyboards around him on stage that he […]
Earshot
So the Earshot Jazz Festival is about halfway over. The Seattle Times talked about it a bit , as did Lucas Gillan of Accujazz and Jason Parker from One Working Musician. As with every year, I am impressed with the diverse schedule of music and film, and several of the musicians in particular have been hype-worthy for […]
Sasquatch/IO Awards
I’m back with another double post that I’ve been wanting to do for a while, a recount of and some thoughts about Memorial Day Weekend. I was very excited for this weekend for several reasons. There would be great camping with some of my favorite people, a full day’s worth of music that was largely […]