So it's official with my new phone. I wussed out and got a Palm Pre instead of cancelling Sprint and getting the Iphone. The Pre however so far is really cool. It might not quite hang with the Iphone but it's up there.

It took me a week, but I moved all my data to Google. That means my life lives in the cloud now. The cloud is what geeks call that area where we have all our data and we don't quite know where it is, but it's there. If you use flikr for your photos then your photos are in the cloud.

Watch this and imagine doing this on the vibes. It works right? This is what I talk about when I say to me the vibes are very similar to the guitar. Conceptually this style and approach is in a big way (although not the only way) how we can play solo on the vibes. I learned so much from playing classical guitar which I did for years when I was younger.

So I took my usual daily walk, my meager attempt at exercising and a chance to listen to music. Classical music is the most difficult to listen to on the streets of Philly. Those damn trucks. And then the cab drivers and their horns. I wish it was legal to carry and use a shot gun, if only to blow out tires.

I get a bunch of email with people having questions about playing. At the University of the Arts we're supposed to have office hours. So I've decided to have office hours here for subscribers.

I'll do this on livestream.com. I'll announce the link where it will take place later.

You can set your cam up and play and I (or any other one else online) can critique you. You can bring up a topic and we can all talk about it. Anyone with a cam can take the spotlight and talk about the subject as well.

So, we're starting a trumpet site, just like this site featuring Joe Magnarelli and Matt Gallagher. That means I'm hanging out with trumpet players these days. That's cool when you hang out with trumpet or sax players, because you're talking to musicians who ONLY play lines. In other words they have to use lines to make harmony. We can hit a C chord and then play a G and the world knows what's happening! Trumpet players have to hit the G and then fill in. This is a real learning opportunity hanging with trumpet players.

I've always loved marimba-vibes duos. When Double Image released their first album I was knocked out. (That was some time ago!). The innovations Friedman and Samuels came up with were truly amazing.

This version of "The Night Has a Thousand Eyes" tries to utilize the beautiful blend of sounds you can get from these 2 instruments. I've included a PDF of the lead sheet.

This is a practice vid of "But Beautiful"  w/ some examples of the "stair climbing" thing I spoke about at the Philly workshop.  At  approx 2:43, I used stair climbing exactly as I explained it at the workshop (Bmi7b5 / E7alt / Ami7).
At approx 4:50, I begin stair climbing on Ami7  and continue it through C#dim7 (using dim arpeggios). At 5:00, the same idea as at 2:43 reappears (again, over Bmi7b5 / E7alt ).

It's really important to practice the modes in a way that helps you learn the sounds of each. Paying C Major and then D Dorian will still sound like C Major. Play C Major and then C Dorian and hear the difference!

今天要講調式音階（Ｍodes），練習調式最好的方式是練習把七個調式建立在同一個根音上，有些人會有錯誤的觀念覺的Ionian就是從Ｃ音開始，然後Dorian就從D開始。

所以最好練習的方式：
左手演奏根音和五音（設定好一個固定低音）
右手演奏不同的Modes，例如Dorian的聲音, 是major scale降3音降7音(bE, bB)，你也可以想成C是二級，
所以往下推就是Bbmajor scale.
然後來回互換七種不同的調式，讓耳朵適應各種不同的聲音色彩。

好處：等你熟悉各種調式之後，你會容易的就聽懂更多東西。

（Tony示範按照順序轉換七種不同調式）