Etudes

This is video, audio and a pdf all with etudes for the tune Turn Out The Stars by Bill Evans. 

It's a complicated tune, but I always think even the complicated tunes spell all the harmony out. It all makes sense musicially. 

Here are the videos: 

Attached is the pdf file with all the transcriptions of the videos and more. There is a pdf of all the scales from the tune and an mp3 to hear all the scales. You should hear the tune, which means. at the very least if you stay inside the scales we should hear the tune even if you're monophone.

This is of course based on What Is This Thing Called Love. Although back in my very immature days we put a comma after called. 

It's 3 choruses of the tune. First chorus is mostly comping. The second I solo and mostly play the chords separate from the melody and third is just lines. Notice that by the time you get to the 3rd chorus you really don't need chords. That's if you play it well, so learn it well! 

This is to accompany the etude I posted. But I'll also include the etude here as well. 

Like Someone In Love is a great tune to study. Harmonically it does so many things.

For example the first two bars is a 1 to a 6, however, it sticks a dom 3 before the 6 and it sounds cool. I'll do a video on this and talk about cll the cool things. 

I played it on the MalletKat so listen to the audio for pedaling. It's pretty straight forward with pedaling. 

I usually put a bass in, but I left it out here. Notice that once you play the head you can still here the changes even if you're just playing a line and even if you don't outline the complete chord. 

Here is an etude I did for a student based on Maiden Voyage. I always laugh when I call something like this an etude, but I guess it sort of is. 

I just get on the Malletkat with some ideas I want to pass along to the student and I just play. Then I quantize for notation purposes and then I dump it into Musescore or Sibelius do a final clean up and print a pdf!

My student was playing this tune and was playing minor thirds over the suspended chord. A suspended 7th chord goes with a mixolydian scale. 

Oliver recently did a lesson on playing Misty solo for beginners. It's great lesson!

Meanwhile, I bought the application Staffpad for the Ipad. Where you can write your music using a Apple Pencil. That's what I like about the Ipad, it's that I can write notes and things. I miss that. 

However learning Staffpad is a pain in the is. So I've been writing out tunes that I know like Donna Lee, and here is a solo vibe version of Misty. 

Any notation problems, let me know. I didn't get to pedaling or dampening, but most of you can figure that out. 

I'm working on Monk's Pannonica, which was written for Pannonica de Koenigswarter. Monk spent the last 10 years in the upstairs of her Apartment in New York. 

This is a great tune. I've been working on it for a little bit now. Ballads are great because you can use the pedal more and your sound can be 'wetter'.

Here are two versions of the tune. Of course a Monk version and then a Chick Corea version. He does it a little quicker.

Also is attached is an etude and an mp3 of the etude. I did the etude on my malletkat. I think I have a good vibe sound!

Ok, there's a lot here. Check it out. Some choruses are easier than others. So grab what works for you. 

I put in the chords for the first chorus. You do the same for the rest. Here are things you should do. 

In the tracks below are: 

I made a cool play along and made a sort of etude. It's a chance for you guys to play over 2 simple chords and play some 4 mallet stuff and some lines. I will make a video and talk about the etude very soon. 

But play this, learn this. Play along with me, and then use this stuff on your own. I use neighbor tones, bridges between whole steps. I.E. D Db C. If this was over a Dmin7 the important notes would be D and C and the bridge between them would be Db. Get it????

Can you play this? With a metronome, make it swing and play the rhythyms? Go as slow as you want to!!!! But once you get it down, work on the speed. Also, IMHO, don't use it as a reading exercise. Memorize it. Can you play it in another key? 

I'll give a free lesson to anyone who can play it (memorized) in another key. And you'll have to play it at the lesson as well! :-)