Jazz context. Tunes we call standards— originally contemporary popular songs that everyone knew, that were a standard part of a working group’s book. These terms arose when there were regularly working bands and an active […]
Alternating triplets, off the 1
Dealing with a lot of small items lately. We know all the big stuff, now we’re getting into how to practice it in a musically natural way, how to fit it naturally into a continuity. […]
Practice video: playing with Blues On The Corner
A few notes on this little practice video I did yesterday on Twitch— hit that link and follow me, please, it helps— working through some things with a medium tempo McCoy Tyner loop. You can […]
Two Reed funk tweaks
A couple of very little half time funk things, just significant enough to be worthy of mention. They’ll be folded into a complete method, if and when I get around to writing it. I’m going […]
Twitchin’ away: Talking about Bellson and whatnot
FYI, I’m not doing nothing while I’m not posting here— I’ve been doing some Twitch streams where I just talk about… stuff. I’m just getting used to talking on camera without a script, essentially picking […]
Reed p. 38 – double time
This is sort of a writing experiment based on page 38 (née 37) in Ted Reed’s Syncopation, double timing each measure. I think it’ll be of limited usefulness, but it’s such a familiar page of […]
Germany wrap-up
That’s it for Germany, I’m home, and in a state of pure jet lag. How am I doing? I’m reminded of this passage from the Vietnam war book Dispatches, by Michael Herr: Entire divisions would […]
THIS WEEK: Cymbal & Gong in Germany
UPDATE: ….aaand you snooze, you lose, a couple of these cymbals are already on hold by another party, so there will be a couple of substitutions! CYMBALISTIC: Here we go, I’m heading out to Germany […]
Best books: The NARD Book
No commercial publisher could afford to print and publish a compilation similar to this work as a commercial proposition. This book represents the unselfish contribution of many members of the N.A.R.D. and is the first […]
Stewart Copeland with Stanley Clarke
Here’s Stewart Copeland playing with Stanley Clarke at a jazz festival in France in 2012. Since I’ve been critical of things things he’s said, and played, in a context he called “jazz”, that was swill, […]
Careers in Jazz
Resurfacing an old chestnut, a piece entitled Careers in Jazz, by Seattle pianist Bill Anschell, which I visited briefly in the first year of the site, with a post called Making any money in jazz. […]