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Looking forward to being in Aruba next week to perform in two concerts as well as present a masterclass on jazz improvisation. Thanks to Carlos Bislip for inviting me to headline the jazz festival and give the masterclass. Carlos has assembled a talented group of students who will be playing with me. It’s been a pleasure coaching them the past month via Skype. We’ll be playing some classic standards including “It Could Happen To You” which I’m playing here in this brief clip.

Here's a duo for my student Dan.

I play both parts and then Dan plays to one plays to one part. Lots of times I use a click, but I don't want to any more.

I had a deadline! Listen to it. There's player 1 and player 2. Player one does a good job, player 2 rushes a bit and has to pull back a little bit. Can you hear? Time is so important. However I think the performance is acceptable.

Here is my rendition of number 16!
I appreciate the succession of crescendos that construct the piece dynamically. It has a very logical sense of contour. This also offers some cool way to approach playing chords in inverted arpeggiations. Let me know what you guys think!

“How Deep Is The Ocean” by Irving Berlin. Such a hip song from 1932. Focusing here on playing the melody and lines with only the two inside mallets essentially like a two mallet player. I’m using an open spread fulcrum with the inside mallets. The open spread allows for a high mallet height when needed and the ability to “dig in” with the two inside mallets with strong accents. Notice the motion of the inside mallets are with an up and down motion and the outside mallets are fairly stationary. For more on the “Fulcrum Grip”, please see my clinic videos on my YT channel.