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Ornithology Simple Solo

Did this for a student. I have gotten really good at going from start to finish with these solos in about 10 minutes or less. That is recording them and turning them into sheet music! It's a good skill!

You should be able to play this and hear the harmony.

If you are going to use the sheet music, mark it up. What's happening in this solo? What are the upper extensions.

The Three Types of Dominant Chords, Part 2: Why does lydian dominant exist?

Hey everyone,

Here's part two in this mini-series. In this one, I focus on dominant 13 (#11) chords, explain where to play them, why they exist, and how to solo over them. And, most importantly, why you have to treat every dominant chord you encounter differently, depending on context.

Let me know if you have any questions!

The Three Types of Dominant Chords (Don't Play Mixolydian over Everything!) Part 1

Hello all,

This is a topic I've been wanting to cover for awhile, and I finally made a video on. I think this is something that jazz education (at least in my experience) hasn't covered enough. It's how, in the key of C, you need to play differently on an E7, compared to a Bb7, compared to a G7, compared to an F7. They all have different scales and extensions that accompany them.

It's not all hard science, but a lot of it is! I heard someone say once that 99% of music is teachable, mathematical facts, and 1% is magic. So learn the 99%!

TOTM - Just In Time - Do This One Day At A Time

Here is how you do this.
4 bars at a time. That for the most part 2 chords at a time. At the end of the tune it's one bar per chord instead of 2 in the beginning.

So what you do is print this out.

  • Do the first 4 bars in every key.
  • Once you have that done, do the next 4

Take your time. Do it also on the piano if you can. Go slowly through all the keys.

TOTM - Just In Time - Part 1

Here is My first lesson on Just In Time.

I think I'll do a video and talk about the tune, but here is my 'Starter Pack'.

Print all this out. Write in the chords. It's so important you write them in as it should make you look at the lines and add upper partials, etc.

Of course you should have melody memorized and the chords memorized.

The solo should be played also without accompaniment. Listen to the song and the chords. Can you hear it in the line and in the solo? The first chorus is just quarter notes. The second is with 8ths and triplets.