Vibraphone

This is an exercise that i decided to write down, in order to share with everyone here. The title " Keeping It Close," is a reference to a concept i try to keep in mind when i improvise, especially on fast tunes with many changes. In essense what i set out to do it play all of the changes of the tune with in an octave of the vibes, without jumping around at all. this concept came from listening to horn players like parker and coltrane, taking notice how fluid there lines are in a very small range, but yet they place the notes so the harmony of the tune and also a line is created.

Man...I think this blog thing is really helping me. Tonight I wasn't going to spend a ton of time on Afro Blue, but then I said "No, I've got to work on that transcription so I can post!!!".

Had the chance to see Chick Corea and Gary Burton and the Harlem String Quartet in Burlington VT last night. What a show. Great tunes, beautiful arrangements and unreal musicianship. The best part of the show, besides Gary Burton's unbeilably fluid lines (how can lines be so smooth?) was that all the musicians really wanted to share their music with the audience. They were into it! Thank you to Chick Corea and Gary Burton for continuing to Tour!

thomas Mackay on vibes, John Zalabak on bass and kelvin underwood on drums, this is a tiny wine cellar that we play at twice a month. the place is so tiny the one nighter vibraphone barely fits in the place .. this is a tune by tmackay called herky jerky, improvisation over a D and Db tonality ..the melody is stated at the end of video

Alright...I need some motivation. Many times I have said to myself "Carolyn, you should transcribe more, it's great for your ear!" so I'll start working on something...AND NEVER FINISH IT.

Crazy and healthy Mozart-inspired funk by very good musicians....

My students love this book. In this video, one of my students plays the number 2 and I thought to post it here in order to hear the opinion of the person who wrote it (not just me) and ofcorse from other players. He is a very hard-working guy and also a great drummer. So, Mr Friedman...what do you think. He is going to work more on that etudes and hopefully make his own ones.
Thanks

Dimitris

Tonight at 6pm pacific time the debut gig of The Mackay Project will be live streamed over www.lostforestrecordings.com copy and paste it to your browser. Mostly originals by tmackay, along with some tunes by sting, elliot smith, and Monk.

its a pretty small wine cellar so ill be bring the one nighters out for this gig.