all-levels

Another take on My Buddy, an old classic from 1922 with Billy on clarinet, Mark on upright bass and myself on vibes taped during a session here at the house on 3/22/15. An enjoyable day having friends over to play, hang and have dinner. Special thanks to Gustavo Agatiello for overseeing the audio and videotaping.

Chord Tone Soloing on Coltrane's Giant Steps: One of the concepts that my students and I were working on in improv class this week was Chord Tone Soloing as applied to various compositions including Giant Steps. Practice techniques and concepts included focusing on motives, soloing with chord tones while limiting the range to an octave and Chord Tone Connection in which we go up and down the entire range of the instrument and connect from chord to chord with stepwise motion.

Wonderful composition by Mark titled "And Marvin is Monk" which is based on Blues changes. Fun tune to play on. The melody and changes are the catalyst for spirited and creative playing. Great comment by Mark at the end of the clip. "You guys are really getting nutty". I think that should be the title of the CD. Ha!Ha!

Henry Mancini's The Days of Wine and Roses played by Billy Novick on clarinet, Mark Carlsen on upright bass and myself on vibraphone. Hoping to dub the audio recording to the video footage at some point, but for now this is the clip with the video sound. (Sorry for the buzz).

Playing an old classic from 1922 with Billy on clarinet, Mark on upright bass and myself on vibes taped during a session here at the house on 3/22/15. An enjoyable day having friends over to play, hang and have dinner. Special thanks to Gustavo Agatiello for overseeing the audio and videotaping.

Here's a clip on improvising with Pentatonic scales for the standard Green Dolphin Street. There is a post on the All Things Improvisation blog that includes this videoclip as well as a page listing the pentatonic scales being applied. Vibist Volker Heuken from Nuremberg, Germany did an excellent job transcribing the solo.

Here's the link to the All Things Improvisation blog: http://allthingsimprovisation.blogspot.com/2015/03/pentatonics-on-on-gr…

Berklee Improv Class - Applying the improvisational concept of Four Note Groupings over John Coltrane's Giant Steps. In my 39th year of teaching and it's still a pleasure to teach improv to these talented and motivated musicians. I feel fortunate to be able to pass on the information as well as learn and grow along with the students.

"Danny Boy" for St. Patrick's Day. The inspiration for this rendition came from pianists Bill Evans' and Keith Jarrett's beautiful versions.

This is a past Percussive Notes article from 2000 that addresses a variety of Tension Resolution techniques for jazz improvisation. Tension Resolution is one of the chapters in The Complete Guide To Improvisation Volume 1.

Here's the link to view and download the article:

https://drive.google.com/folderview?id=0B0TwrpqjL6dQfnZ1RGJMSC1wMVJWVzZ…

Here are some beautifully improvised choruses by Gary which were recorded during a 1985 clinic in Argentina. Gary was talking about improvising with motives. Gustavo had this tape of the clinic and transcribed the choruses from the clinic.