Vibraphone

hey gang .. i just got the official notice that i have been added to the artist roster of Hammondbeat records based out of Portland, Oregon. The label up til now has been primarily B3 players, they are opening a new series, of which ive been selected to be the first.

There are two release dates coming up .. The Mackay Project ( original material project), will be release in June and The Thomas Mackay Quintet ( standards cd ) will be released in september ..

very excited

As you are going along your established route in life playing vibes, marimba or whatever, be aware that you can obtain some serious injuries that you may or may not have heard of. Below is a picture of me just after I got out of the hospital this past Monday. The injury I have is a "Trigger Finger". These are very painful and most of the time it requires surgery for complete relief. I have now had five of these and all have occurred (excepting the very first one) in a very short period of time.

Hello guys, here's a short solo vibraphone clip that was just uploaded to my YouTube Solo Vibes channel. This very brief solo clip shows me working on playing lines along with some left hand comping on Coltrane's Giant Steps. There's also a new clip of Van Heusen's Like Someone In Love. I'll be uploading more solo vibe clips soon. To be notified when new clips are added, you can subscribe to my Solo Vibes channel. Best, Ed

WARNING: if you are not a TRUE vibes geek, this will be boring. :) If you are, please join my journey.

So, about 6 months ago, I owned two sets of vibes. One a Musser M55 from 1977 and the other an M48 from around 1987. I bought the M48 when I lost my car in a spat of poverty and had to find a way to get to gigs in smaller vehicles because my big car died and I couldn't afford a new one. Never really liked it that much because of how its damper got out of adjustment every time I moved it, but I appreciated how it got me through that time in my life.

 Announcing our 2013 summer workshop in Limerick, Ireland. This is a very affordable workshop at the Peter Dee Academy in Limerick. There are practice rooms, pianos and vibraphones. This is a very intense 5 day workshop.

Hope some of you guys can come!!!

For more info CLICK HERE

Here's your final for Satin Doll!

Play it! Come up with a simple version of the tune! Let us see what you've learned. You can post your version here.

To me there are several versions you can do.

head solo head.

For beginners head, chord tone solo, head

if you're more advanced, think about an intro and an ending

Playing playing playing.....

Today I did a smart thing (if I say so myself). For the 1th time I used the Metronome that gives a different kind of tick on beat 1, so now I know if I'm still correct in the measure, and not only tempo.

That woke me up. I must pay attention in not leaving gaps. Keep on counting. This was a major step in doing this, it really helped I think. I still need to work on it, especially more to the end, when I'm supposed to be improvising more and more. 2 times bridge suck. work on it Stefan !