Having taught thousands of Zoom/Skype lessons over the last ten years, I’ve come to believe that Skype is a great way to both teach and…
Read Full Blog PostLesson 164: Yardbird Suite Etude
Here’s an Etude I wrote for Bari Sax player Andrea Edwards. Andrea is an excellent Bari player studying Jazz at KU. This Yardbird Suite Etude…
Read Full Blog PostLesson 163: Blues For Alice Etude
This is an etude I wrote for Alto saxophonist Keegan Kaiser. It’s one chorus of 8th notes and uses the bebop scale, chromatic approach notes,…
Read Full Blog PostLesson 162: Rhythm Changes Etude.
There are very few living Jazz musicians that have not spent countless hours working on improvising over Rhythm Changes. There’s a often retold story that…
Read Full Blog PostLesson 160: Conception Etude
Here’s a fun Etude I wrote for KU Computer Science Major Spencer Addis over Conception by George Shearing. I wrote this in real time during…
Read Full Blog PostLesson 159: Lee Konitz – Sing a phrase – play it back.
When I lived in New York City, I had the transformative experience of taking lessons with Lee Konitz. In his remarkable Central Park apartment, which…
Read Full Blog PostLesson 158: Cycle 5 – Harmonic Major
This lesson covers one possible pattern using the Cycle motion concept through the modes of Harmonic Major. This is a short excerpt from a new…
Read Full Blog PostLesson 157: 96 Melodies from any 4 Notes.
In this lesson I explain how to find and practice the 96 melodies for any 4 note structure or 7th chord. In this example I…
Read Full Blog PostLesson 154: Major 7 b9 Melody
The b9 is not commonly over a Major 7 chord. This melody is one a wrote to help me incorporate it’s use into my melodic…
Read Full Blog PostLesson 153: Minor Pentatonic Warm Up
Pentatonic scales are amazing 5 note sets that are comprised of stacked perfect 5th or stacked perfect 4ths. They can be used in a variety…
Read Full Blog PostLesson 152: Maj Triad add #11 Tetrad
The 4 note cell or Tetrad using 1, 3, #11, 5 has many harmonic contexts and can be used for creating voicings, improvising melodically and…
Read Full Blog PostLesson 148: I Hear A Rhapsody – Etude
Etudes are a great way to work on new material, vocabulary, phrasing and a whole host of positive musical skills. Here’s a one chorus etude…
Read Full Blog Post