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LOL - sometimes we all feel hopeless!

The problem with solo playing is that you could lose the form and no one is there to complain. So for this reason, I've done most of my practice using backing tracks.

Something has to force the form. Metronome alone does not. Though once form is rock solid, then metronome is fine again.

My bass player commented that he has so much difficulty with piano players playing in a combo because of this. He also gets mad at the piano player's LH (keep away from my turf he says...LOL).

At the moment, I haven't focused much on solo piano stylings since I play mostly in a combo. Definitely LH walking bass is getting ignored...

My thinking used to be that the bass player (or the drummer) had the responsibility to keep me from rushing. I reasoned that when I play with Band in a Box, the tempo doesn't increase.

However, now I go with Monk's advice "Just because you’re not a drummer, doesn’t mean you don’t have to keep time."

Perhaps it's OK to get ahead of the beat now and then, but only intentionally.

Just a little blog post from me about rushing....


When I listen to recordings where I rush, clearly the bass player and drummer are trying to hold me back and I just ignore them. I realized that if I just listened a bit and break up my lines so there's enough of a pause, it should be easy to sync.

It isn't like rushing is some fixed beat. Rushing sounds like acceleration and is uneven sounding.

In recent recordings, I can hear the rushing, but I'm not sure that would be obvious to everyone else. I think that as one gets better, one can detect even a small amount of rushing. The better players can spot it.

Of course part of this is just a technique issue, which is why after a certain level of speed, one can't remain even with eighth notes. For me this is a number past 230bpm now and been creeping upwards slowly. The other part of this, I think, now that I think back, is hesitation in note selection.

For awhile I thought to be conscious about every note choice. But this is why we learn vocabulary since there's some patterns one can follow that don't need much thinking. I was practicing this today. I played tunes at very high speed with continuous eighths to see if I can do it without stopping (no space). This means my fingers should automatically seek the notes. And then I just guide it with the big picture and not worry too much about what's being played. I found that I made a lot of progress.

It was Bill Cunliffe that said this to me. Vocabulary allows you to do things without thinking. So it's a combination of common vocabulary vs. one's own. He says. Just focusing on the "without thinking" part, I realize then that top players can play without using too much brain power through this method.

This kind of fast automatic note playing I think is important to removing the hesitation in fingering, reach, articulation, evenness, swing, etc. Jazz is so hard. So many things to think about.

I hardly ever practice playing without a stop. Usually, one thinks of melodies and space. But this was more of a technique practice thing. It was liberating. I don't think I was doing this continuous thing more than 180-190. It's pretty hard at the very fast tempo.

One other thing I noticed today while practicing, after this very hard workout, with the constant pounding on my fingers, I didn't feel a strain at all, not like at other times. I feel like I've just gotten a little technique bump today. Been waiting a long time for this.

Unfortunately, with all the gigs, I've really been behind in focusing my practice. Mostly it's about learning new tunes and new heads but not focusing on playing anything better. I'm glad that I'm finally accomplishing something.

Here's an interesting exercise.

PLay with a metronome and record yourself. No backing track. Just left hand. Anyone can swing like heck with Jimmy Cobb in the back, but by yourself only can you bring to light how well you stay in control.

There's usually this tempo where we can play our best, make beautiful line, mix arpeggios, scales and everything you can think off. Then as the tempo increases, click by click, the quality of the lines diminishes. And then comes this tempo where it starts slipping a bit. And as we increase, we can still play, but it slips more and more. And then finally everything collapses.

It's amazing how many world class musicians start rushing or losing quality of lines around the 220 mark.
One guy that is amazing with speed is Sonny Rollins. Even at 240, his tone remains clear as day and his lines as still perfect and melodic.

So here's the exercise.

Start at 104bpm, and increase one click at the time 108, 112, etc...
PLay 16 measures or so of a comfortable tune, whatever that is. Something you can play inside out.
and record each snippet. Then play back and see if you can identify what happens.

I'm going to try and do that today.

I share your pain, as rushing is a big issue for me, as well. One thing that helps me is to focus on accenting notes, particularly the ands. I think when we accent, we feel for the right rhythmic spot to punch out that note, and it makes us listen to the drum and bass more carefully. If we're really listening to the drum and bass, we don't rush; rushing is a symptom of the underlying disease of getting too absorbed in our own playing and not properly listening to the other players.

Amen to that.

Good one Knotty.

I use this technique too. I was in fact listening to recordings and whenever I accented heavily, the rushing was eliminated.

But as you know, when you're playing near 200, it's impossible to accent (for me at least).

On Knotty's Point:

And Knotty's point is good too. There is clearly a point when our brains begin to hesitate at creating lines. I've defined this point for me at around 180. Anything above this and the quality of the lines diminish greatly.

My teacher would always say anyway that the approach is different at higher tempos. There's no need to play exactly the same (which is the assumption in the Knotty method). At higher tempos, the style tends to be more syncopated typicaly.

Syncopation allows breaks in the thought process and allows some simplification of the lines. So if the goal is to play EXACTLY the same notes at the higher tempos, then yes, that is geometrically more difficult.

In fact, isn't the advice given that at fast tempos you need to think in half-time? Lines change greatly then. More quarter notes too (aside from syncopation).

Interesting though that Keith Jarrett can play at the very fast tempos without syncopating. Certainly Herbie syncopates. It shows how advanced KJ has gotten with this.

Wow, we really think alike.



Yes. I've found that if I'm playing something I'm not familiar with, I have more of a problem with rushing. My brain is otherwise occupied, and the "listening" and "not rushing" things get thrown overboard. This is true with a lot of aspects of my playing. When I get in trouble, more things go overboard.



Yes, this helps me also. One bass player recommended that I swing really heavily -- and that does the trick -- as long as I remember to do it.

It's totally ok for my little exercise to play differently at various tempos. Leaving more space is one thing.
However, sometimes we stop playing certain things at certain tempos simply because we can't... Wide arpeggios can become hard to do. It just kind of gets challenging past a certain point to narrow and widen the hand fast and accurately.
But comes a tempo where no matter what, it stops swinging.
And one where no matter what, it's not even on with the beat anymore.
And then at some point, it just totally collapses.

Anyway i did my own exercise this morning on Another You and I'm not about to post the result !!!

If others are brave, go for it.

if you listen to some of the landmark Bird recording, and when you slow it down to mid tempo, you can hear how beautiful and clever the lines are. Moose the Mooche is a good example of a perfect solo. Parker's Mood, Perhaps are also great.
When the tempo gets higher, the lines are less clever and interesting, imho. Donna lee for example.

oh that's an interesting observation of Bird. At the moment, I'm only studying his slower ones - Now's The Time and Perhaps. Each line is so complete and perfect, like Beethoven or Mozart.

And on your point about Sonny, his brain is amazing. He even manages to keep doing thematic improv at the really fast tempos.

Of course this is absolutely true. And technique is certainly going to suffer. But you also know that being melodic requires thinking time. At fast tempos, it's all about patterns. No one but KJ will have the brain power to create melodies.

But there's no argument about any of this though.

Rushing though specifically is about not paying attention. I think this is different. It's when we cocoon our thoughts in ourselves and loss track of the environment around us.

There's this guitar player that played with me a few times and I watch him start to rush in his solos. He is oblivious to the rest of us. He was far off on the beat. His lines were non-stop.

I never called the guy back to play.

All he had to do was look around and see what everyone is doing. I used to solo with my eyes on the keyboard and oblivious too. Now I'm looking at everyone else while I solo.

Knotty/Chris, there's a picture of me playing on facebook where you can see my face turned, ears are pointed at the rhythm section. I'm not looking at the keyboard. That picture was during my solo actually.

So hopefully I'm developing good habits now.

------

BTW Knots, though you won't post the recordings, at what BPM did you feel you lost it? Just curious.

I lose it backwards too (if too slow). My magic range is probably 150-170. I feel my brain is completely in control then. Going forwards or backwards, there already be some reduction. I know this from Giant Steps which is difficult to get melodic on.

Just for fun, I tried to see how fast I can go playing with eighth notes and sensible lines. I haven't tried this in awhile. Well I was SHOCKED. I was playing Solar.

I was still surviving at 280 (mostly) and never got lost in the form at all. Of course, it's more sparse. But I didn't really feel technically limited until 240. I was still churning out the same type of lines until 235.

This is a huge improvement for me from last year. This is because my bass player is always setting tempos that are way fast and I guess I'm starting to relax and get into it.

From 240 on, it was about getting a line started and getting in the groove. So I couldn't play fast immediately. But I could build up to it and then play normally.

288 is about the speed of some versions of Chopin 10/1 Etude. (around 144 with 16ths). Yay!

To illustrate what you guys are saying, check out my recording of Solar at 240 BPM:

https://www.box.com/s/jodrza7sdqx9dh1nrsm3

Of course, there's a major cheat here: I recorded it at 94 BPM, bassline separately, then sped it up.

The point is that at a slow tempo, we have the processing power and technique to play good lines, swing, have good time feel, not rush, etc.

It also shows that swinging could happen, and sound good, at higher tempos, if it were physically possible.

And here's "Another You" recorded in the same way:

https://www.box.com/s/gmqxqknlrhl4ia8vbpsr

If I could only play like that at that tempo! Maybe drugs would help?

Wow that was quite interesting. And really nice lines at 94. I would find that kind of articulation impossible. And I'm not sure I need to hear it swung like that at 240. My expectation is that swing is a varying thing made to fit the tempo.

But having said that, KJ still has a swing at that tempo. Not that extreme but still some. I know from transcribing and slowing him down.

i choose to play like modern players though where at 200+, everything is played like classical music. Completely straight. I'm not even sure I can drag back a little at that tempo. Probably not consistently yet.

Over the years as I try to increase my tempo, I realize that I stiffen up when I hear a higher tempo. Partly it's because I can't hear the lines that fast. I like to construct the lines in my head and I can't do it. Then physically there's a resulting hesitation and that puts the time off.

I'm pleased to report that I've overcome a lot of that. I'm really focused on the form stil and before, I couldn't do that at a superfast tempo.

The other thing that I noticed is just the relaxed nature of my fingers. More relaxed than ever. I've already developed speed in 16th note runs. But playing sustained eighths in a continuous manner requires a different mental effort since a lot of thinking still has to occur.

But to repeat, I think for me, hearing the fast lines clearly, with every note recognized, is important to be able to play at that speed. Otherwise it's just random pattern repetition and there's a limit to that.

wow, I read this briefly and thought at 240, the solo was freaking unbelievable.

I'll catch up on reading in a bit. Quick gig tonight, and very busy at work ...

>>BTW Knots, though you won't post the recordings, at what BPM did you feel you lost it? Just curious.
Hey JW,
I didn't take the time to listen back. I really should. I stopped at either 138 or 144 on 2 and 4, I'm not sure. But to answer your question, I really need to go back and listen. I'm sure there's a point at which I won't like what I hear anymore ...

Al,
those samples are really great. It's very interesting. Of the 2, I prefer solar, you seem a lot more in control there, but overall, the lines are really great. The phrasing and space is very nice.
Earlier you said you were more confortable at 170 than 120 but I would really challenge that. First off, 120 is not a slow tempo at all. Slow tempos can be hard, but 120 isn't one. For example, someone might say "let's play a slow blues". And then go somewhere around 40 or so. Now that slow. That's where you see how great the greats are.
But anyway, it's hard for me to imagine that someone would be more comfortable at 170 than 120.

Also, I think it's really key for the tempo exercise to play completely solo, no bass or drums. Because, imho, you gotta be able to swing all by yourself.

No, no, I said it's easier for me to maintain the tempo at 170 than at 120. IOW, I am much less likely to speed up, presumably because I am already going pretty fast.

I'm definitely more comfortable at a slower tempo.