In this week’s post I wanted to talk about a scale that does not get a lot of mention in improvisation classes, but it one that is quite effective and easy to learn. That scale is the Harmonic Major scale. Some of you may be wondering, “Wait a second Jason…harmonic MAJOR? I have heard of…
I had a student recently ask me, “Now that I am on summer break, what should I practice to get better for next school year?” To answer that we should look at what practicing is and what it should not be. By definition, practicing is performing an activity or exercise/skill repeatedly/regularly in order to improve…
The Jazz community recently lost another great musician in pianist Mulgrew Miller. I have been a fan of his playing for years-especially his time with Woody Shaw. While thinking about his playing and some of his characteristics (and there are many) I loved the way he played sequences. In honoring Mr. Miller I thought this…
Lately I have been working on my whole tone scales and wanted to share an interesting sound with all of you. I am sure most of you have worked on your whole tone scales and know what they are. If not, they are rather simple and I would suggest you learn them. Since whole tone…
I have been making edits so I can have short previews of the songs that will be on my Mountain, Move. album and heard something that I thought would be great to talk about. So, in this week’s post we will look at the augmented triad and how we can use it to creatively target…
I know a number of you that visit this site go to school and many of you are finishing up your year around this time. For many that means taking a break from studying, maybe a vacation (or holiday)…even if it is a short temporary one. At the time of writing this post, I…
It is becoming a rarity to find open jazz jam sessions in cities across the world. I am not saying that there are not jam sessions ocurring…quite the opposite. Actually, in the Denver area there are a number of great ones that happen on a weekly basis. However, I have talked with people from a…
Hopefully by this point (if you have been following the series on Fun with Arpeggios) you get the idea of how we can creatively use arpeggios in our improvisations. Before we move on to another topic I wanted to continue the thought process, but introduce arpeggios of different chord quality then just major (which was…
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