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You've got to be comfortable putting the LH on any place in the bar, but it is fine tomix it up.
Are you trying it with a play along or metronome? I think play along is best because then it is less boring so you can keep at it for a good while. I am not sure an ostinato in the RH is a good idea because in a real solo that is not what you would be doing. Just really simple but varied phrases would be best.

I was just using a metronome. The ostinato was just a baby step since I couldn't easily identify the 4+ and 2+. When I just did even simple solo's I really couldn't easily hear initially when to hit 4+. As you can imagine, it's easy if there's a beat 1 on the RH.

But it must have helped because even without a piano, I can hear the comp now in my head while I imagine a solo in the RH.

This is one of my biggest weaknesses because my teacher never focused on this at all. He told me that in this style of comping, it's the RH that keeps the time. The problem is that my LH time wavers because I'm not hearing the comp as part of the beat.

Listen to Red Garland he does the 4+, 2+ all the time.

Good tip Klink. I actually listened to a lot of Garland and then even while I was driving I was hearing him with Miles Davis.

So I heard him do a consistent 1+ on one tune. A 4+ 2+ on another, And then a 1 +2. And then when he's comping for another soloist it was all the above.

This is great! I like it when I find something specific to work on.

Seeing that any upbeat can work, I just practiced that a moment ago. It is a lot easier to just think of any upbeat. I think concentrating on this seems to improve my time.

Beeboss, I guess it's just step by step. Last night, I was just soloing (although just simple blues), doing this comping. Might take a couple more weeks to get the LH more stable but it's getting there.

JW, don't be fooled, there is nothing simple about playing a blues well. I look forward to the day when I can do it.

You mean like this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fcFnxi3bI4w

"I got me da blues!"

well yes...

or like Wynton
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sEAMPlaawTQ

or McCoy
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sBwuwZh6G6g

or Bud
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X7G_XQ7vEo4

Interesting Dave B. Would you say Wynton’s and Bud’s blues melodies are harmonic whereas McCoy's blues sound is more modal ?

Certainly McCoy has a more modern sound.

LOL! Is anything ever easy? But at least you don't lose yourself in the form.

Now I don't consider myself particularly good at blues but certainly all of you guys who don't post music here could handle some version of the blues...Wiz?

Glen posted a lot of blues.

I couldn't play the blues to save my life. I can't recall Miles Davis or Bill Evans playing alot of the blues, but I might be wrong.

LOL I remember the first couple of years I learned Jazz, it was Blues, Blues, Blues. LH walking bass on Bb, F, G, D, C blues. Rootless 13th chords. ii-V modifications on Blues progressions. Tons of Blues licks like you wouldn't believe. Memorized blues solos. Yada-yada-yada. So my teacher then believed that the way to learn Jazz was via the blues.

Well, I think Blues is the way to learn Blues and if you do the above, your Jazz playing sounds like the blues. So I haven't played Blues much in years.

But I did enough of it so I wonder if anything sunk in? Maybe I'll give it a try.

I don't know the answer to your question Wiz, since we don't know what these guys practiced, but I know that I haven't done Blues with my current teacher hardly at all. I think once at the very beginning.

I remember looking at a blues chart and it was all V7 chords, then I would look at a lead sheet and wonder why it was all 2-5-1!! So they weren't there in any of the songs I played when I first learned jazz.

Don't limit yourself Wiz. Jazz isn't single faceted. I don't believe now that Blues is the end-all to jazz but it's definitely an important piece.

And there really is a "Jazz Blues" and it doesn't sound anything like regular slow Guitar blues. For one, it's played pretty fast.

When you realize that Coltrane and Chick did a lot of Blues that don't even sound like Blues then you can really take it to the next level. Listen to Chick do 'Matrix' which is almost unrecognizable as Blues. The harmony lessons abound in there.

Take the single I7-IV7-V7 structure. Not only would Chick do subs here (think of diminished cycle), but would also there's the question of where is the release chord? They're all dominants (tension) chords after all. But when do they treat these dominants as a Tonic chord? (They do). Or basic questions like what can you play over a Dominant? (Everything?)

I think this alone can be a discussion.

I really think we can all do blues next. No one has to learn the tune. We just play it. Heck, I'm game even when I know I'm no blues king

Listen to all the blues that Chet uses in his solo, he is a good one to study, I find him relatively easy to follow.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sgn7VfXH2GY

For you lot that have learned Matrix. Have you tried to make it a part of your playing? It kinda doesn't blend in too well with the bop tradition. As I see it you'd have to learn a great deal of pents and quartals to make it work..

You're absolutely right. It's a very modern sound and I see a tiny little line here and there that comes from Chick but it's pretty hard to 'hear'. If you can't hear it well it's hard to apply. Remember he's not just playing pentatonics and quartals on the stated chord. So you have to think of it with the sub too.

I think my ears need to develop (a lot) further to even really hear what's going on. I know it in theory and the transcription exists. But it's not enough.

Just imagine that Chick was pretty young when he played that. I can't think of a young player nowadays with a statement to make like Chick and other masters did in those days. Think of Dolpin Dance being created when Herbie was a teen!

Well except for the entire album Kind of Blue.

But I've read that Evans really didn't otherwise excel in playing the blues. I'd suspect the same from Miles too.

Miles revolutionized playing the blues, not just once but several times.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jFJn4-Cc8kE
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=111N1-vRpX0
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cTfBpKzu6XA
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=00tzcnyDL68