How to Solo on “Confirmation”: Guide Tones

In recent months I set myself to tackling a project that I had put off far, far too long: getting my arms around Bird changes. In one way or another, the Charlie Parker tune “Confirmation” has been a regular part of my practice sessions these days. Recently I finished transcribing a Richie Cole solo on “Confirmation,” and of course that was enlightening. I’m currently in the process of memorizing both it and a Parker solo on the changes. It has all been profitable in unlocking the logical but nevertheless challenging harmonies.

guide-tones-for-confirmation
Developing a set of guide tones is immensely helpful in mastering Bird changes, particularly in the first four bars. The exercises on this page will help you do so. Click on the image to enlarge it. Note that the exercises are written for Eb instruments. If your instrument is pitched differently–eg. Bb tenor sax or C flute–you’ll need to transpose accordingly.

In exercises one and two, I’ve stripped the guide tones down to a whole note for every bar. You can modify them as you wish, but I find it helpful to start by keeping things as simple as possible.

Exercises three and four take the form of boppish etudes that utilize the guide tones.

I highly recommend that you practice these exercises with some form of harmonic accompaniment so you can hear how the pitches sound in context with the actual chord progression.

That’s it–gotta scoot. I hope you find these little nuggets profitable. If you enjoy them, you’ll find plenty more on my jazz improv page.

June 3, 2012 by
Filed Under: Band, Jazz, Jazz Improvisation and Technique, Saxophone, Uncategorized Tagged With: , , , , , , ,

Confirmation: A Richie Cole Alto Sax Solo Transcription

I am not the world’s most accomplished jazz solo transcriber, but every time I tackle a project, I discover anew just how beneficial the discipline of transcribing jazz solos is. This latest transcription has kicked my butt. Richie Cole is–to put it in words you’ll rarely hear from a sedate, late-middle-aged Germanic male–one bad mofo on the alto sax. He has carved his niche as a bastion of bebop, and as such, his language is largely accessible. However, Richie has a way of interpolating material that requires serious effort to figure out exactly what the heck he’s doing.

So it is with his rendition here of the Charlie Parker standard “Confirmation.” Some of Richie’s rhythms and trills caused me to sweat blood for hours trying to at least approximate in a measure or two ideas that flew glibly from the man’s horn in the matter of a second.

The solo is transcribed from Richie’s 2007 CD The Man with the Horn. A quintessential bebop tune, “Confirmation” rips along at 246 beats per minute, providing Richie with a perfect vehicle to demonstrate his formidable chops and his broad bop vocabulary. Anyone who wants to gain mastery of Bird changes will profit from working on this one.

Note: I transcribed Richie’s solo for Eb instruments, specifically the alto sax. I haven’t attempted to show all of Richie’s slurs and nuances, just a few that I felt needed to be indicated. To get a real feel for his articulation, you’ll need to listen to the recording.

[Show as slideshow]
May 25, 2012 by
Filed Under: Band, Jazz, Jazz Improvisation and Technique, Jazz Solo Transcriptions, Saxophone, Uncategorized Tagged With: , , , , , , , ,

Picking Up the Horn Again after Being Sick

Thursday evening, April 12, I left Grand Rapids to go chase storms out west. It was a great time and a successful chase, but on the way home Sunday night I began to cough, and the cough blossomed into the worst case of bronchitis I’ve ever had. For two weeks, I languished. My activity was limited to coughing, and coughing, and coughing some more; prostrating myself before the vaporizer for extended inhalation sessions punctuated by periodic steamy showers; slurping down massive quantities of fluids; and sleeping like I never planned to wake up and didn’t want to (which, indeed, I didn’t).

Over the past three days, I’ve finally begun to feel human again. Today I woke up feeling pretty good, with just a remnant of a cough and my voice returning to some semblance of its normal self. What a relief!

Naturally, I was pining to get at my saxophone. Three weeks away from it is way too long. I’d been in top form when I left for Oklahoma and Kansas, and now I’ve got some ground to recover.

So this evening I grabbed my horn and headed to my beloved railroad tracks, where it’s my wont to park my car, work over my horn, and wait for the trains to roll by. Out by a crossing near the rural community of Alto, I assembled my beautiful Conn 6M Ladyface and began to blow the rust out of my fingers and the cobwebs out of my head.

It felt so good!

There is something about reuniting with my saxophone after an extended period away from it that feels at once awkward, restorative, frustrating, cathartic, and encouraging. The awkwardness and frustration come from having spent enough time not playing my instrument that it feels a bit foreign to my hands, not quite the comfortable extension of me that it normally is. My technique isn’t as smooth, and material I had recently been practicing has to be called back to memory. The encouragement arises with the discovery that, hey, I don’t sound all that bad, regardless. In fact, I sound pretty good. Something about the time away seems to tap into reservoirs of creativity I didn’t realize existed, and if my playing isn’t quite as facile as I’d like, there’s nevertheless a compensatory freshness to it. My fingers don’t fall as readily into the same glib patterns, and so instead they find their way toward new ideas.

As for the restorative and cathartic aspects of picking up my saxophone after a lengthy period of illness, do I really need to explain? It’s just such a marvelous feeling to play again, to experience the physicality of making music: the balanced resistance and give of the reed in conjunction with my airstream, the feel of the keys beneath my fingers as I practice patterns and craft spontaneous melody lines. There’s nothing like it.

With the arrival of spring weather, I’ve been pretty consumed with storm chasing. The chase season is here for a limited time, and one must make the most of it while the opportunity is there. But the musical part of me doesn’t at all go dormant during storm season. I prioritize chasing over musical engagements, but not over the music itself. I continue to practice and push myself as a saxophonist, even if the bulk of my blog posts during this season focus on severe weather.

Tonight I’m taking a hiatus from the weather to reflect on this other part of myself, the musical part. How good it feels to play! Thank you, Lord, for the gift of music–for this amazing instrument you’ve placed in my hands, and for the passion and the drive to continue striving for the mastery of it. It is such a joy to play my horn once again!

April 28, 2012 by
Filed Under: Jazz, Life, Music, Saxophone Tagged With: , , , , ,

Practicing “Giant Steps”: Static and Chord Tone Sequences

giant-steps-static-and-chord-tone-sequences
Here are some more exercises on the Giant Steps cycle. (Click on the image to enlarge it.) While it might not be immediately apparent, the linear patterns shown here are actually a continuation from my previous post on isolating V7s in the cycle. Note that the V7 chords are still spotlighted by emphasizing them with quarter notes, which are led into by the preceding grouping of eighth notes. Think of the dominant harmonies as target tones preceded by a walk-up.

In these exercises, I’ve elected to focus on the treadmill-like cycle of Coltrane changes rather than the full eight-bar A section of “Giant Steps.” As is typical of so much of the practice material in my posts, what you’re getting here comes straight from my own current explorations and discoveries in the woodshed

Don’t be cowed by this post’s heady subtitle, “Static and Chord Tone Sequences.” I’m just not sure how else to describe this material. The goal I’m after is to work with linear sequences that will drill the shifting tone centers of Coltrane changes into my fingers. (Geeze, that still sounds murky as all get-out. Oh, well. Deal with it.)

Since I’m an alto sax player, I’ve written these exercises in the Eb transposition. If you play a Bb or a C instrument, you’ll need to transpose accordingly.

Exercise one proceeds through the entire Giant Steps cycle in three bars. The first three-bar cycle starts on Ab; the second, on E; and the third, on C. In each series, I’ve kept the first note of each measure as static as possible, shifting it by just a half-step in the third measure to accommodate the change in key.

In exercise two, the harmony continues to repeat itself (i.e. AbM7 to B7, back and forth) while the starting tone for the eighth-note groupings shifts, progressively, from the root to the third to the fifth.

In both exercises, pay attention to which target tones you arrive at in the dominant seventh chords.

And that’s enough of me talking. Dig in, engage your analytical thinking along with your fingers–and, as always, have fun!

Oh, yeah–if you enjoyed this post, please check out my many other articles, practice exercises, solo transcriptions, and video tutorials for improvising musicians.

February 17, 2012 by
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Practicing “Giant Steps”: Isolating Dominant Sevenths

giant-steps-v7s
I’ve recently been focusing on the Giant Steps cycle during my practice sessions, with the thought that at some point soon, once I’m ready for prime time, I’ll record myself. It seems only right that a guy with the audacity to write a book of Giant Steps licks and patterns ought to furnish some evidence that he can actually play the tune. So I’ve been getting myself up to snuff.

But it’s one thing to play “Giant Steps” and another thing to play it creatively. As you know if you play or have attempted to play the tune yourself, the A section in particular is a challenge. So I was pleased with the breakthrough of sorts that I experienced the other night, which I continued to explore during this evening’s practice with good results.

In the changes to “Giant Steps,” bars 2–3 and 5–6 alternate tonic major chords with dominant seventh chords in a framework of rapid modulations through three key centers spaced a major third apart. For the Eb alto sax, the first two bars proceed thus: AbM7 B7 / EM7 G7; and bars five and six are as follows: EM7 G7 / CM7 Eb7. You can distill all of that into a single cycle, thus: AbM7 B7 / EM7 G7 / CM7 Eb7, after which the cycle repeats itself.

I’ve tended to focus on the major chords–in other words, the first chord in each measure. But I’m finding that spotlighting the dominant seventh chords is helping me to improve my command of the changes. For practice purposes, my approach–or at least, part of my approach–is to omit the major chords entirely, forcing me to think exclusively about the dominant chords and what I want to do with them. Right now I’m keeping it simple, sticking with essential chord tones. In a while, I’ll start altering upper extensions and probably incorporating tritone substitutions. But first I want to get basic chords drilled into both my fingers and my mind.

On this page I’ve included a few simple patterns that I’ve been working with. (Click on the image above to enlarge it.) They’re nothing fancy, and they’re not intended to be. But if you work with them when you practice “Giant Steps,” I think you’ll find that they make you think in a different way which will help you wrap your mind around the changes better.

These patterns are just to get you started. I encourage you to make up your own patterns, and don’t be shy about using wider intervals such as fifths and sixths. I should add, at the risk of stating the obvious, that you should transpose the patterns according to the dictates of your instrument: up a minor third for flute, piano, and other concert pitch instruments, and up a perfect fourth for Bb instruments such as the tenor sax and trumpet.

Practice hard and have fun!

February 12, 2012 by
Filed Under: Jazz, Jazz Improvisation and Technique, Saxophone Tagged With: , , , , ,

How to Flutter Tongue on the Saxophone

Most days back when I was in elementary school, my friend Pete Rogers brought his submachine gun to school. It was a formidable weapon that Pete employed with withering effectiveness during the war games we boys played at recess, and it possessed the added advantage of instant disassembly into just two components which bore a striking resemblance to Pete’s right and left hands.

As the enemy approached us on the battlefield, Pete would make pistols out of both hands, jam the barrel of one pistol into the other hand behind the base of the thumb, and presto! Instant Tommy gun. “D-D-D-D-D-D-D-DOOOWWWWWW!” Pete would yell, doing a convincing imitation of a kid simulating automatic weapon fire. “D-D-D-D-D-D-D-D-DOOOOOWWWWWWWW!!!” And into the fray he’d charge, he and his handufactured submachine gun. Pete was impressive.

I envied him. Like the rest of the boys, I had to consign myself to plain old bolt-action–until one day, I figured out Pete’s secret for making his machine gun sound. The sound, after all, was the thing. There’s no point in having a machine gun if you can’t fire it. I discovered how.

By placing the tip of my tongue lightly but firmly against the roof of my mouth–not directly behind my teeth, but more toward the center of my palate–and then directing a steady stream of air against it, I could get my tongue to flutter, generating a rattling t-t-t-t-t-t-t-t-t-t sound. Mimicking Pete’s machine gun was then just a matter of adding my vocal chords to the mix.

Now that I was onto Pete’s secret, naturally I customized it to fit my taste. Pete’s sound was loud. I opted for a subtler approach–a Tommy gun with a silencer, if you will. A stealth machine gun. By fluttering my tongue right up against the top of my clenched teeth, and by not using my voice, I managed to produce the coolest, most convincingest machine gun fire you ever heard. It outclassed Pete’s prototype hands down. From then on, my lunch hours were littered with the bodies of scores of enemy soldiers who fell under the subtle but deadly chatter of my .50 caliber finger.

Years later in high school, long after my boyhood war games had ended, I discovered another use for my machine gun sound. By employing it while playing my saxophone, I was able to produce a wild, burry kind of effect. I didn’t realize that what I was doing had an actual name–flutter tonguing–or that R&B saxophonists such as Junior Walker incorporated it as part of their trademark sound. I thought of it as simply an interesting but useless curiosity.

Of course I was wrong. Flutter tonguing can be eminently useful depending on the kind of sound you’re after. I don’t use the technique often, but I can and do pull it out of my pocket occasionally, and so can you whenever you wish. Flutter tonguing is not hard to learn.

Here’s How to Flutter Tongue on the Saxophone

Actually, if you were paying attention, you already know how to flutter tongue. Re-read the fourth paragraph. It describes the basics. Give it a try. No saxophone–just make the machine gun sound (leaving out the vocal part). You want to use my buddy Pete’s approach, not my refinements. Your tongue needs to touch closer to the center of your palate rather than directly behind your teeth.

Once you’re able to produce the rolling, machine-gun-like effect I’m talking about, try it with your horn. Bear two things in in mind:

• You’ll probably need to take in less mouthpiece than you normally would.

• You should not let your tongue touch the reed. Flutter-tonguing isn’t really tonguing in the usual sense; it is not a form of articulation such as single-tonguing or double-tonguing. Rather, your tongue flutters rapidly against the roof of your mouth as you blow into the mouthpiece. If your tongue actually touches the reed, it will choke off the sound.

Flutter tonguing is easiest to use in the middle register of your horn. With practice, you can work your way higher. And with practice, you can also play reasonably in tune. I say this because flutter tonguing can flatten your pitch if you’re not careful. So while the basic effect isn’t particularly difficult to produce, getting it to a point of usefulness may take a bit of work. Overall, though, flutter tonguing is in my experience one of the more easily acquired effects. Compared to mastering double-tonguing or the altissimo register, it’s a cinch.

I may create a video clip of my own to demonstrate the flutter tonguing technique. Meanwhile, this one by Phil Baldino does a great job of letting you see and hear how it’s done.

January 20, 2012 by
Filed Under: Jazz, Jazz Improvisation and Technique, Music, Saxophone, Tutorials, Video Tagged With: , , , ,

My Father’s Horn: The Final Note

(Continued from part 4.)

Over thirty years have passed from the days of God’s Family Band until today. Dad’s horn has been a constant companion in that journey, though I have not always been constant with it. There were times when I set it aside for a season, and other times when I thought how much simpler life could be if I put it behind me forever. Yet every time I have set down the saxophone, I have returned to it. I have kept at it–because I must. It is more than a passion; it is a calling, integral to the way God has designed me.

There are many other stories besides the ones I have told in this brief series, more than I wish to share here. The long and short of it all is, Dad’s horn has shaped me both as a player and as a person.

Thus far, I have talked about the journey my father’s horn has taken me on. Now I would like to tell you a little about the horn itself. I own two other saxophones beside it: a Conn tenor that is even older than my alto and has long been in drastic disrepair, and a Yamaha soprano that I sometimes play. But the alto remains my voice, and I have always owned only the one, Dad’s. I’ve had no need for any other.

Not that I haven’t tried other horns. I’ve sampled a fair cross-section of altos over the years. But the one I learned to play on is the one I play today and the one on which I will someday play my last note, and then, I hope–though I have no children of my own–pass it on to someone else as a legacy, just as Dad passed it on to me.

Of all the saxophones I have played, my father’s horn sounds the most resonant, offers the greatest flexibility of sound, and blows the freest. It is an amazingly open horn. It will take as much air as I can supply and convert it into a sound that fills a room. Not that the Conn 6M is a miracle horn; it has its drawbacks. While I can get around reasonably well above high F, the altissimo is not as responsive as on other saxophones. Manufactured before the introduction of the high F# key, Dad’s sax does not feature uber-high notes as one of its strengths. Also, my repairman tells me that the rolled tone holes–a hallmark of the 6M–are beastly when it comes to getting pads to seat properly. When I have pads replaced, I usually need to visit the shop more than once to get the sax sealing tightly.

But once that job is accomplished, oh, man! Dad’s alto is a dream to play, and I fall in love with it all over again. It has a sound and a response like no other, and it has served me well for over four decades.

Dad was always the greatest fan of my playing. During the last three years of his life, he, like me, had an encounter with Jesus that changed him–not a little, but drastically. The anger that seemed to lurk below the surface disappeared, and while his feistiness remained, it was tempered with humility, even a sweetness, and above all, a peace I had never seen in him before. The ghosts that I think had haunted him from World War II seemed to lose their grip. There is a verse in the Bible that reads, “If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. Old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.” (II Cor. 5:17) Whenever I read that verse, I think of Dad.

I was 28 years old when Dad passed away. That was nearly thirty years ago. Several years ago, I wrote a letter to my father. I thanked him for all he had done for me and for our family. I told him how, now that I was older and wise enough not to know as much as I did back in my twenties, I wished I could sit down with him and listen to him tell me about his life–how it was in the Great Depression, and in the War, killing and watching his friends be killed. I told him that he was my hero, and how glad I was, how very glad, for the peace he had found. The transformation that had begun in him when he first encountered the Lord was now complete. When next he and I would meet, Dad would no longer be a white-haired man crippled by a back injury, short-winded from a chronic heart condition and breathing from an oxgyen tank. I envisioned him striding toward me, grinning, his arms outstretched, his face that of a vibrant young man, his eyes filled with a spark that can only be found in one who has looked into the very face of Love and Life, and in its Presence found his home.

On Memorial Day, I took my letter to the small cemetery out in the countryside where Dad is buried. A tiny American flag fluttered by his marker beneath a tall fir tree. It is a beautiful little place, and Dad, who loved trees, would have been pleased with the location. I cleared away a few sprigs of grass that were encroaching on his modest gravestone, and I dusted off its surface. With a piece of Scotch tape, I attached my letter to Dad’s marker.

Then, standing up, I fulfilled one last, important part of the letter. “Thanks for the saxophone, Dad,” I had written. “It was your legacy to me, and I’ve brought it with me. Perhaps, just for a minute, the Lord will roll back eternity and let you get an earful of me playing it just for you.”

Taking the horn, setting its mouthpiece in my mouth, and wrapping my fingers around the golden, pearl-covered keys that I had first seen and admired when I was a little boy, I began to play. With his old Conn alto sax, I played for Dad the song I had performed on the day when I was baptized at Bethel–the song that over the years had become my theme song and was a fitting description of Dad’s own life.

Amazing grace! How sweet the sound that saved a wretch like me.
I once was lost, but now I’m found; was blind, but now I see.

A saxophone cannot verbalize those words, but it most certainly can communicate them. That day, I played them with all my heart.

Through many dangers, toils, and snares I have already come.
‘Twas grace that brought me safe this far, and grace shall lead me home.

The legacy of my father’s horn lives on. I love to play it, and while I am no Kenny Garrett, I continue to practice regularly, and thus to grow as a jazz musician. Today, I realize that Dad’s gift to me of his saxophone was ordained by my heavenly Father–by my father’s Father and mine. I am his son, his man, and his musician. And with gratitude, until a day known only to him when my last song shall end, by his grace, for his pleasure, and in honor of the Master Musician, I will continue to play my Father’s horn.

December 7, 2011 by
Filed Under: Band, Christian Music, Christian Spirituality & Inspiration, Jazz, Life, Music, Saxophone Tagged With: , , , , , , , , ,

My Father’s Horn, Part 4

(Continued from part 3.)

Writing this article has opened my eyes to just how immense a legacy my dad left me when he put his alto sax in my hands as a boy. I never intended to pen a lengthy, multi-part personal history, just a brief tribute to Dad and the shaping force his old Conn 6M has been for me. Now, four parts into “My Father’s Horn,” I realize that I could write a book and still not tell the full story. But writing a book was not, and is not, my intention. I see a need to condense, to say much in few words.

Yet I am not sure how to do that. Dad’s horn has been as pervasive an influence in my life as yeast in bread dough. It has been a source of tremendous satisfaction and great frustration; a creative outlet; an intellectual challenge and stimulus; a doorway of faith; a parable portraying truths about God’s kingdom and how He designs individuals; a song of joy, a wail of pain, a voice of my soul; a catalyst for insight, choices, and growth; a blessing to many listeners and, first and foremost, to the player; a gift, a discipline, and most certainly, a calling.

When I was 24 and playing in the Aquinas College Jazz Band, I got a call one evening from a guy named Rick Callier. Would I care to play in a musical that the Bethel Pentecostal Choir was presenting called “The Beautiful Story of Jesus”?

I learned that Rick’s cousin, Kimball Owens, had recommended me to Rick. Kimball was my buddy in the jazz band–a non-stop chatterbox, funny, super-likeable, a fine tenor sax player, and my friend. I knew nothing about either Rick or Bethel, but, while I wasn’t a Christian, I had grown up knowing about Jesus and was glad for an opportunity to offer my talent in His service for an evening.

That event was my introduction to Rick, to Bethel, and to a number of talented black gospel musicians and vocalists: David Jennings, Chico DeBarge, James Abney, Craig Tyson … the list goes on, too many to name. Even more important, playing for the Bethel musical ushered me into the beginning of my walk as a disciple of Jesus.*

Back in the 1980s, white churches in West Michigan didn’t have much use for the saxophone. Not so black churches. I knew nothing about the foibles of religious culture and cared even less about racial distinctions. All I knew was, I had fallen in with some people who loved Jesus, loved music, projected joy, and welcomed me and my horn wholeheartedly. And my heart was open. I had been seeking God for a long time, searching for meaning; searching for something bigger even than the music; searching for Life. And I found it. Or rather, I found Him–because throughout the years, He had already long been seeking me.

Thus it was that a few days after Christmas in December, 1980, I was baptized at Bethel Pentecostal Church. On that day, I had an encounter with God. It was, as best I can describe it, a sense of being overwhelmed by joy and praise. The experience was almost physical in nature and one I have never forgotten.

From there, I played often with the Bethel Pentecostal Choir. As a white kid from a German family, I was a salt grain in a pepper mill, but it didn’t matter. Love of the Lord and of music made ethnic differences something to be appreciated and enjoyed, and a source of insight.

At that time, I also joined the horn section of a gospel group called God’s Family Band. The band was co-led by Rick Callier and David Jennings, with Rick doing the arranging and David working with the vocalists. Both of these guys were incredibly talented. In partnership with a friend named Larry Rhodes, Rick also used the horns in studio sessions for other gospel artists, notably the Grammy-Award-winning group Commissioned. It was under Rick and Larry that I gained experience both as a horn section player and as a studio musician. I’ve never played for more exacting producers. They would do take after take, striving for perfection. Rick and Larry set a benchmark for excellence. Working with producers of their caliber was an eye-opening, rewarding, and hugely valuable experience.

All the while, I continued to study music at Aquinas College and play in the jazz band. My college education equipped me with the tools I needed to grow as a musician. To be honest, though, I wasted my first years in college, and I only really began to learn my horn after I got out of school. As a result, I’m mostly self-educated as a jazz saxophonist.

One influence from my college days to whom I will always feel a debt of gratitude was Mel Dalton. A wonderful Grand Rapids area tenor player, Mel was the closest thing I ever had to a musical mentor. For a brief but memorable semester or two, I use to get together with him on a weekly basis at his home. Mel didn’t exactly teach me how to play jazz; mostly what he did was spend time with me listening to Coltrane records, talking about music, playing with me through solo transcriptions, and encouraging me. Mel modeled what jazz musicianship was about. He was a beautiful player and a warm, wonderful human being, and I wish he was still here today.

At this point, I need to fast-forward. There’s a lot of story I could tell, but it wouldn’t serve my original intent in writing this article. It’s enough to say that my father’s horn has opened up doors of relationships, opportunities, and experiences.

That’s enough for now. I’ll save the rest for part 5, which I think will be the conclusion of “My Father’s Horn.”

————————————

* I’m cautious about using the word “Christian” to describe myself. I am a Christian; however, these days the word has become a label freighted with meanings that have nothing to do with what it means to follow Jesus. The word “Christian” has become politicized. It has become a marketing niche. It has come to stand for a subculture that in some ways misrepresents what Jesus and Christianity are truly about. So I prefer to be thought of as simply a disciple of Jesus–a fallible man who seeks to know Him, love Him, and live in a way that reflects his Lordship in my heart.

December 3, 2011 by
Filed Under: Band, Christian Music, Christian Spirituality & Inspiration, Church Worship, Jazz, Life, Music, Saxophone Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Master “Giant Steps” in All 12 Keys with The Giant Steps Scratch Pad Complete

Excuse me while I deviate from this blog’s generally non-commercial tone into a bit of blatant self-promotion. As you know if you’ve followed the musical part of Stormhorn.com for any length of time, I’ve self-published a practice resource for jazz musicians titled The Giant Steps Scratch Pad. Without going into details that I’ve already covered on the Scratch Pad page, the original editions provide 155 licks and patterns in the standard key for concert pitch, Bb, Eb, and bass cleff instruments.

This new edition takes that effort to the ultimate level for those who want to master John Coltrane’s jazz rites-of-passage tune, “Giant Steps,” in every key. Available now as an instant PDF download,The Giant Steps Scratch Pad Complete gives you a grand total of 1,860 exercises written in treble clef.

Speaking modestly but plainly, this is a terrific resource for jazz musicians. It gives you enough theory to help you understand Coltrane changes in the context of “Giant Steps”; however, its focus is on getting you actually playing through the changes comfortably and creatively. To the best of my knowledge, no other book like it exists that provides a practical and comprehensive means of mastering “Giant Steps.”

Written in treble clef, The Giant Steps Scratch Pad Complete is 252 pages in length and costs $21.95. As I’ve already mentioned, it is currently available as a PDF download only. That seems to be what people prefer, and I’m reluctant to invest more time and effort preparing a print edition unless I know there’s a reasonable demand for one. I’d have to charge more to make it worth my while, and you’d have to pay for shipping on top of the purchase price.

However, given the size of this new, complete edition, there may be an interest in a print version, so let me know. Enough requests can make the difference. And I will say that the cover which I had professionally designed for the standard-key editions looks very sharp, better than most of what I’ve seen in music stores.

To place your order, or to learn more about The Giant Steps Scratch Pad and check out printable page samples, click here.

Also, if you like what you find, please tell your fellow musicians. Self-publishing means self-marketing, and the best way to accomplish that is through word-of-mouth. Nothing means more to other musicians–and to me, personally–than the recommendation of a colleague.

Thanks for your interest and for spreading the word!

–Bob

December 2, 2011 by
Filed Under: Band, Jazz, Jazz Improvisation and Technique, Music, Saxophone Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , ,

The Giant Steps Scratch Pad in All 12 Keys Is Nearly Finished!

A quick report on the upcoming all-keys edition of The Giant Steps Scratch Pad. It’s almost finished! In fact, I had hoped to publish it today, but I ran into one of those inevitable last-minute snags that I won’t be able to fix until tomorrow.

However, while the problem is irritating, it’s easily resolved. So assuming that nothing blows up in my face, I should be able to make this new edition available for sale as a PDF download sometime tomorrow.

I’m titling it The Giant Steps Scratch Pad Complete: 155 Licks and Patterns in Every Key to Help You Master John Coltrane’s Challenging Tune. Right now my plan is to sell the book strictly as a PDF download. However, at 250 pages, it may be practical for me to also offer it as a softcover print edition. I’ll welcome your feedback on this, so please click on the “comments” link if you wish to share your input.

November 30, 2011 by
Filed Under: Jazz, Jazz Improvisation and Technique, Music, Saxophone Tagged With: , , , ,
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