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This is being translated for Chinese students.

歡迎來到vibesworshop.com，這是“每月一曲”時間，這個月我們要學 Green Dolphin Street和You Don't Know What Love Is。此時，我們已經練習這兩首曲子很久了，甚至已經超過一個月，我要問的是，你知道這兩首曲子的弦律嗎？最近我告訴我很多學生，如果你可以走到樂器前面然後就（演奏出 Green Dolphin Street美妙旋律）如果你沒辦法演奏這個曲子的旋律，你就是不懂這首曲子。對我來說這是第一步：你能夠演奏出旋律嗎？所以考慮到這點，當你每次在練習“每月一曲”時，你要確定，你能夠演奏出曲子的旋律。然後，我說過這件事五百次，你在演奏旋律的同時，要把旋律處理得非常乾淨並且在拍子上，這樣也能順便增進你的技巧。不要覺得你學習這個旋律沒有用，你要想的是，你有沒有把這個東西（弦律）處理好？如果你把旋律處理好，等於你學到了很大部分的東西。

I was messing around with dampening yesterday and discovered a cool trick to make a "bending" sort of sound.

Basically, (1) play any note at a low volume, then (2) play the note a half step or a whole step above at a higher volume and immediately dampen it after with the same mallet you hit it with. The effect is that you hear the sequence E-F-E (e.g.) as three distinct but smoothly connected notes, even though you've only attacked two.

Here's part 3 of lessons where the focus is the process of learning a tune. I'm using Coltrane's "countdown" as the example.

Hi all – sometimes it's intimidating to post – because there are so many GREAT musicians/vibist on this site – but I see it as motivating. Please know: I am practicing an audio software for a class that I teach and thought it would be a good idea to record my efforts on the piece by Tony Miceli titled "watermarks" only up the improv section! anyway there's obviously accuracy issues and this week I'll slow it down get into the woodshed and workout phrasing issues – but let me know what you think anyway. (Especially Tony) thanks for commenting if you have time

In this clip I'm improvising with Pentatonics over "On Green Dolphin Street".

In addition to Pentatonics, there are some Upper Structure Triads (USTs) and Four Note Groupings (FNGs) in there. USTs and FNGS are two of the chapters in "The Complete Guide To Improvisation - Volume Two" that was just released.

The improvised solo in this clip was later transcribed by German vibist Volker Heuken.

To view and download Volker's transcription and the chart that lists the Pentatonics being used in this clip, click on the link below.

I decided that I would try posting some very very short etudes.

It's the conquering of material and ideas and technical things that make us play better and better. It's certainly not a half assed attempt at something that makes us better. I think half ass attempts at things help us be better half assed players. Great attempts at things no matter how big or how small make us great(er) players.

So this should be our goal right? To master something. I tell my students, if you come in with only 4 bars completed, they have to be played really really well!