Skip to main content

Hard At Work

Two things are on my mind. One is an etude of a tune that I wrote called 'Vince Guaraldi'. It's a waltz and I decided to make a study around it. So i'm writing a simple version of the tune and then we'll talk about it. Then I'll write a more involved version and a solo section.

I'm also thinking about Donna Lee and Blue Bossa (one's easy and one's hard) and making a study out of that. All this should happen next week.

I'm excited about the 'vibe hang' next wednesday night and eager to make that a regular event where vibe players can all come and hang out.

Donna Lee in Ireland

On the last day of the workshop here in Ireland, we took Donna Lee and Analyzed it over 2 hours. Everybody was really into it and we barely scratched the surface so I'm thinking of doing a weekly lesson when I get back and we can all just tear apart that tune. Bar by bar.

We took each lick and worked on it, studied the harmony and tried to worked on the chords.

So I'm thinking of spending a few months studying that!

Workshop and Rehearsal

All the English accents! Pretty funny to hear all the accents in one room and all the slang and all the curses! I had a student who was from London and it was very hard to understand him.

The 3 musicians I'm playing with are real pros and sound great. You know you're always worried about that when you're far away. That is how is the band going to sound. It can be a disaster, but this worked out well. The trick is to bring really good charts with everything laid out well. I didn't but it didn't matter cause these guys were great players.

Ireland Workshop

The workshop in Ireland is great. I have some footage i'll upload probably when I get back. I do have audio from the workshop that I'll post when I get back. I'll have to edit some of the mp3s to make them more concise.

A Few New Subscribers!

I saw a few new subscribers! That's great. I haven't started to promote the site yet. Just working out a few kinks. One member barryk has been combing through the site and helping me tie up the loose ends!

There's a lot more coming, I have etudes to put up, more vids and audio!

I'm in Ireland for the next 10 days, and will try to do stuff from there, however when I come back, I plan on setting up a couple 'masterclasses' where we can hang and talk about stuff.

I Gots the Blues!

I love independence on the vibes. I like making things work that shouldn't work. A bass line is usually something I don't waste time on, however there's a trick here. It's an illusion. Once you set the bass line up you don't have to keep it going. Just come back to it once in a while! The only other thing is that the line has to make sense and also sound good. You can't just work out some stuff and play it. It has to accompany what the improvisation. That means the bass line has to be improvised as well!