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Siegtrmpt · 12-25-2006, 11:56 AM

Be careful. A lot of the jazz education products that are out there can easily overwhelm anyone with lists of scales and chords and all sorts of advice that, while valid, can take years and years to master and can easily leave you uninterested in continuing. You know the advice....learn each of these 10,000 licks in all 12 keys from memory and know each these 500 songs in all 12 keys from memory. While some of these lofty goals might be attainable years down the road I suspect you want to improvise now and learn some skills that you can use today in the arena you actually will be playing in. Keep it simple early on. As a matter of fact keep it simple later on too. Too much improv that is out there today is needlessly complex and not really very listenable. I liked the example I saw in "Ray" where the bar room piano guy was starting Ray Charles out on piano improvisation. He said something like "just play these two notes" and then got him to groove with the music. Crawl, walk, run. Once you can run you don't always have to. You can take a walk and enjoy the scenery. Good luck.

12-25-2006, 11:56 AM	#26 (permalink)
Siegtrmpt Mezzo Piano User Join Date: Nov 2005 Location: Virginia Posts: 554	Re: Improvisation Be careful. A lot of the jazz education products that are out there can easily overwhelm anyone with lists of scales and chords and all sorts of advice that, while valid, can take years and years to master and can easily leave you uninterested in continuing. You know the advice....learn each of these 10,000 licks in all 12 keys from memory and know each these 500 songs in all 12 keys from memory. While some of these lofty goals might be attainable years down the road I suspect you want to improvise now and learn some skills that you can use today in the arena you actually will be playing in. Keep it simple early on. As a matter of fact keep it simple later on too. Too much improv that is out there today is needlessly complex and not really very listenable. I liked the example I saw in "Ray" where the bar room piano guy was starting Ray Charles out on piano improvisation. He said something like "just play these two notes" and then got him to groove with the music. Crawl, walk, run. Once you can run you don't always have to. You can take a walk and enjoy the scenery. Good luck. __________________ Bill S.- NY Bach 6, 38 Mt. Vernon 43 Bach "C" cornet, NY Bach trombone 6vii Monette mouthpieces Last edited by Siegtrmpt; 12-25-2006 at 11:58 AM.