I've been playing the tune Israel. I really like it and discovered some cool things. So I thought I'd do a tune of the month on it! 

So start learning it! 

Just got a new Malletech marimba I'm totally in love with the sound. It's Padauk, not rosewood, so it has its own sound, which appeals to me after playing rosewood marimbas for so many years. The bar spacing is a little different so that's why I decided to practice a solo tune which I previously recorded on vibes. It's certainly a challenge on the new marimba!

In a recent post, I was asked about how I would keep the drums out of the vibes mics.  It's an age-old problem that nearly all of us have experienced.

Obviously, in a recording studio, the answer is to banish the drummer to a booth.  Situation resolved. Any bleed beyond that can be removed with software in post production.

Randy just sent me this. 

I can't imagine playing with this band, it sounds loud. But you can hear Billy! 

I was just blown away looking at our Vbooks section. That is Virtual Books. 

I was putting something in the chords section and I couldn't believe how many lessons were in there! 

The thing about vibesWorkshop is you just look for stuff to practice. I don't think we necessarily need a sequence, we just need to learn and practice. Yes with a teacher it's more about sequence I guess, but here you can just look around.

Here are three, two five, one progressions. 

Good voice leading for the most part is lazy voice leading. That means: 

1. you usually won't move the note if it's in the next chord.
2. you will move whatever voicings have to move but to the closest note in the next chord. 

With that in mind you figure this puzzle out. I'll attach the answers, but don't look until you're tried this out! 

Here is the challenge: 

These exercises go along with Behns video which is linked here under 'Check this Out'.

Here's a simple solo I did for a student.

All the things you are. 

He's doing the following: 

1. Learn the solo (don't write it down)
2. play it along with the recording every day
3. play each chord and then play the part of the solo that goes with it. This will help him associate the chords with the solo.
4. Play the solo on the piano as best he can, in time out of time, whatever. Left hand plays {Pinky:root, middleFinger:3rd, thumb:7th }

Don't write it down until you can play it. 

Can you play it in another key? 

I tried to make the easy one easy. The other has two choruses, one easier than the other. 

I also tried to focus on some things like a scale or a target note.