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Short excerpt from a practice session yesterday playing “Solar” which is a 12 bar blues. One of the ways I like to practice is to play non stop with sort of a “stream of consciousness” approach with little planned as possible. Sometimes some good stuff and sometimes not so much. Ha!Ha!

Check this photo out. This was my M55 back in the day and it has the custom pedal, Mbraces and the bladder damper pad. This is the only photo I have of the instrument that I know of. The pedal was very cool. It had a horseshoe-shaped object with two spurs similar to bass drum spurs that were adjustable. The spurs would come down on each side of the pedal (right and left) and poke into the floor for greater stability.

"Skating in Central Park" - A beautiful song in 3/4 composed by pianist John Lewis of the Modern Jazz Quartet. I've been working with songs in 3/4 for my solo vibraphone book that I'm in the process of writing. I'm making headway on the book with many of the music examples finished. I just started formatting the layout of the book along with the accompanying text for the music examples. Still along way to go though. Meanwhile, my book Voicing Concepts for the Jazz Vibist is available from Amazon.

Solo vibraphone version of a new composition titled "Someone Close". The lead sheet can be downloaded here:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1JRJ_f-K74wDDxL2y1gl1w-Uw5ZCW-N0_/view?…

First, this is a short sample of some rough practice time. Be aware. Just being accountable and looking for any feedback as to whether I'm on the right track. I do feel like this is helping.

One of the hardest things for me, personally, as I develop as an improviser, is "hearing" lines inside of the chord structure that AREN'T the actual chord tones, OR similarly....hearing lines that don't follow a diatonic pattern, e.g. up/down the scale. I realize this is probably very common at my early stage of learning, but it's non the less a bit frustrating...

By Richard Rodgers, and featuring new leather mallets.

Hey Everyone,
Check out Good Vibes, August edition, at my website, www.gloriajazz.com. Players from Red Norvo to Joel Ross.
Featured album for June and July has been Anthony Smith's Songs From a Lighter Planet. Have you heard it yet?
Keep cool,
gloria

"It Could Happen to You" - Fun working with vibist Lucas Amorim yesterday on this classic with a focus on playing lines along with left hand accompaniment. Lucas is an excellent vibist who studied with Gustavo and I while enrolled at Berklee here in Boston. A real pleasure to have as a student. Here's a few minutes of what we were working on.

An original tune titled Cream Pie. Slightly inspired by Dexter Gordon's tune Cheese Cake. Joe Zarr - Soprano, Joe Karwacki - Bass, Damian Allis - Drums and Matthew Rockwell Sokolic - randomly hitting some metal!