I'm not up to soloing but I recorded Autumn leaves with a swing feel(I tried) and variation.

I just bought a mixer so here's AL with piano and sound module.

http://www.box.net/shared/pq6si2y0oo

I also practice 2-5-1 voicing in all keys with exercice from Keyboard Harmony book.

Serge

Deeluk, I think I spotted your problem. Don't look at just the one chord, look at each ii-V-I formation as a group since they typically follow the same scale.

What you have to practice to avoid is starting your lines at Beat 1 of each chord. Start off with starting on the & of 4. This forces you to think in a less boxed in way. Don't look at the chords boxing you in. In other words, work out the connection patterns from chord to chord (see my answer to Barb for examples).

It's a bit like sightreading ahead I suppose (although this one you can do with your eyes closed).

Nice job Serge (nice piano sound too!).

I personally think you're ready for soloing. You're the first person here to actually improvise but you just pulled back. Listen to everyone on their first solo and then listen again to the latest solos and you can see the improvement just from working it out.

Keep posting your progress Serge! You're sounding great.

You could work on the Charleston LH next (RH sounds perfect).

Gee Whiz, what's not to like about this thread? I can't imagine why anyone would down rate it. This is just the best information we are getting and a fun group to be with. Why would anyone care anyway, if they didn't want to do it they could just not participate??? and also Deeluk for trying to help me with my recording problems. What's not to like in this thread???
Alene

Hi Serge: That sounded great ...doesn't sound like you have any problems to me
Alene

Thank you, Alene. All of you inspire me to keep plugging away. I love the group effort here-- Hugs to you all :3hearts:

I agree with you - those who don't like jazz can just stay away.

Oh yes you are, Serge. I just listened to you.

Your left hand can take a vacation. Play just the right hand and let your cool back up group do the rest. You need to dive in and try it. Total fun, I say.

Serge, nice work. I like your backing track. It's so much fun practicing with a "band". I think I need to fire my bass player though... I say you should try out the RH only soloing too. You were adding quite a bit of embellishment there. Solo is just a small step away from that.

Alene, have you had any luck with your sequencer? PM me if you need any more help (not that I helped all that much). I think it's a great tool that'll let you ease into improv with just the RH.

I can't believe someone would be so against the concepts here. At worst, it's just fun to noddle with. At best, it allows us to peer into, how did Chris put it, "a pure American art form" while learning some theory and technique along the way.

It's absolutely harmless and in no way was it ever stated or implied that it should replace reading music.

My only regret is that I can't seem to free up enough time lately to participate more!

Hi,

I've not posted for awhile, so need to catch up. It's amazing, how the subject has mushroomed. I have postings still to read!

Jazzwee, this success is mainly down to your tireless effort in taking us by the reins, explaining succinctly the methods required & in a favourable order, that I personally have not found in books. You also have a pleasant & effective way of dealing with our musical offerings, which is pertinent & extremely helpful. However, that may now change, as I am rendering my poor attempt at a part solo & part melody, the latter with rootless voicings;

http://www.box.net/shared/n6ronjn4o4

It is only done over the first 16 bars. I can recognise there is a lot wrong with it (simply looking at a midi file afterwards portrays timing errors), but I await your more expert conclusions & suggestions.

This is my first attempt to solo, so I do not know, if I am approaching it correctly. Next time, I may try & put the notes down on paper first, as it is difficult to play on the fly. Even if I find an interesting pattern, I find it difficult to remember. I also confess to a number of attempts to record this one. I experience the same problems already asserted by others.

I find the soloing difficult, although I understand the theory somewhat. I wish, I could sing phrases on the fly, but I have poor pitch, so I have not really tried to sing during my lifetime. Well, perhaps, very rarely in the bath, if no one was around! Anyways, no one said it would be easy. And that's why it's so fun.

The progress of others is moving in leaps & bounds, which is very encouraging. Keep up the good work everyone & ignore the lone voice of dissent.

Kanga, glad to see you're back and posting your recordings. What really helped me when I started out with this solo stuff were the tips in Lesson 10 on playing long notes and focusing on the 3rd. Don't try and squeeze too much into each bar. Listening to the examples in Lesson 10 several times, and even transcribing bits of them, really seemed to help too. Keep it up and don't be a stranger...

That is VERY NICE Kangamangsuk! You're saying this is a first try? Did you here those melodies you were creating?

All you have to do is get rid of the LH. Use the AL combo MIDI and just play the RH and you're already sounding great.

Removing the LH will improve your rhythm concentration. RH wasn't bad at all actually (time wise).

You're using a different approach here which sounds very musical and succesful for you and that is to create melodies. I would go with that and just keep coming up with variations. It's an alternative approach to the Lesson structure but accomplishes it with a different mindset.

Now as you come up with these lines, listen to the solo examples I gave as well as the other versions of AL by the masters, and pay particular attention to adding the jazz cliche endings. Double eighths, Quarter+short eight, eight+quarter, etc. Those give it a semblance of a jazz vocabulary. If you listen to a lot of jazz lines you'll recognize them and they all swing.

Great job! And thanks for the support.

Hi Kanga and all : I just listened and you sounded good to me....everyone sounds good to me! I'm new at this and struggling too and turning on the recorder doesn't help, LOL!

Thanks to Deeluk's help I have figured out how to do the playing over Jazzwee's combo, at least I think I have. Great bunch of helpful people here.

I need to go back and go thru all the pages on this thread as I was late starting and also need some practice time....I will post a midi later to see if I have the record on top thing figured out.

Alene

Hey Alene, your first try was amazing too.

But it's not 'Jazzwee's combo . You make it sound like I had a drummer and a bass player on hand . Just call them Mr. Left Hand and Mr. Right Hand...(and the help of Yamaha).

Well, Mr. "Whoever it was" has more smarts than I do so I'm still impressed, LOL! And, thanks for the compliment....the encouragement really helps.

Alene

Alene, if you upgrade to a fancy new DP (I just bought this Yamaha Motif XS6), you can do what I did.

I comped the actual full chords in root position on the LH and the Motif took care of creating a very nice bass line and drum track which I then recorded.

Then I took out the chord comping and did a live comping of the melody and LH with rootless voicings. So all the piano parts was 100% live. And this didn't take long. So now I can call up the AL combo anytime I want .

I can easily do this to any tune I'm working on. Since jazz combos are hard to come by in one's living room, this truly was fantastic.

I know how to make a bass line but the bass line on the AL combo was better than I could have ever done by hand.

So that's who Mr. "Whoever it was" is

Jazzwee & this thread + + + + +


Rosa :3hearts:

Well....this is the thread that got me involved in PW.

My first posting is in this thread.

I am so INSPIRED by this thread that I have not had time to post anywhere at all and all my posts have only been here. Shows how much this thread had pulled my heart.

I have never HAD SO MUCH fun IMPROVISING. Gosh, imagine Keith Jarret improvising with music sheets?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?

OK, here's where I'm at with chord tone and eighth note lines:
http://www.box.net/shared/wkuq9tag4o

I can't seem to hit the & of 4 to start my lines. I think I did hit either the & of 1 or & of 2 a couple of times. So at least 3% of my solo didn't start on the 1. Ah well, lots of work to do here...

That Yamaha guy is in my band too. He's pretty good. I did have a talk with my bass player though and I'm going to give him one more chance. He played some non b5 F#m and some Emaj7 instead of Em7 in my backing track. Think I need to hit those in root position like you did JW so he won't get confused

Also, whoever these people are who are trying criticize this thread to stop it, I just want you to know that you had DRAWN so much more people in here since yesterday.

More people are involved as a result and this is a good thing in my book.

Rosa

Yeah that Yamaha guy doesn't know how to do rootless. Not a jazzer. So you have to play rooted first, THEN erase your comping so Mr. Yamaha doesn't get lost.

Have you tried those other chord recognition settings? Mr. Yamaha might be more succesful with that.

I have tried them, just not on my AL practice track yet. It is a bit tedious and time consuming finding the arps you like. I quickly selected arps for the drums and bass on this track. Turns out the bass arp is one of those "ES" ones. From what I've read, the "XS" arps (they have _XS appended to the arp name) have intelligent chord recognition. For now, I just went in and corrected the few misplaced notes. I think it somehow subliminally sunk into my head that the bass track was wrong. It took a week or so, but I finally realized it. Maybe my ear is getting better...

Wow Deeluk! Major improvement there! Sounded great especially at the beginning.

One thing I'd especially like to point out is that the lines are actually swinging. The phrasing sounds jazzy. The swing is natural sounding.

The rest is confidence building so you can maintain it.

Amazing improvement in such a short time.

Rosa, thanks for making me feel better

AL Gang, I'm just amazed at the changes in the solos. From the hesitant moves on the first recordings to the confident playing now. Whatever we're doing here must be right!

Some of the words I've used to evaluate you are the same words I received from my own teachers and by golly, I'm impressed that it works

deeluk - That was a GREAT job with those eighth note lines. You've inspired us all! Keep up the good work

Wow, I'm so far behind (lesson 6) - work is in meltdown - Sailwave is in meltdown - the wife wants DIY done - and I want to solo...

Jazzwee - Here is my latest attempt at Lesson 11 downbeat eighth notes. I'm holding off on doing those step wise moves. So, you will only hear an occasional non chord tone on the + of 4.

http://www.box.net/shared/0azp275kww

If I need to work more on this exercise, please let me know. If I'm OK with the swing feel, I'll go on to the "step wise moves" where I'll be concentrating on learning some patterns as you have already suggested.

Deeluk - I listened to your latest solo over and over this morning at breakfast (the never ending solo). It was inspiration to give it another try this morning.

Kanga - Please post again soon. You do have a natural ability for soloing.

LaValse - Those voicings in Lesson 6 and 7 will take a while to learn. That is more of a long term project. Why don't you spend a bit of time with the scale in Lesson 8. I pretended I was Bill Evans when I did that one. After that, you are ready to solo.

TO ALL - We need to post so we can prod each other along this exciting path that jazzwee has laid out for us.

I just got caught up listening to the recordings.

Serge.....can hardly wait to hear your first solo. Even "I" can do it, so you can for sure.

Kanga....you sound very musical and melodious to me.

Deeluk....wow, you improve in fast speed. You are way ahead and sound so professional to me. You've inspired me to get going with those 8th notes.

Barb....as always, very smooth and pleasant to listen to.

Keep up the good work guys.

Rosa

thanks all for uploading your work.....i'm unable to yet, but want y'all to know that it is inspirational and though i'm working at a bit slower pace, i feel right at home and part of the group.

anyone who wants to learn this type of piano playing will be in 7th heaven when they find this thread....we all know it gets Ten Stars.

Yes you're right, I have to put effort in that.

Serge