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It Could Happen To You

"It Could Happen to You" - Fun working with vibist Lucas Amorim yesterday on this classic with a focus on playing lines along with left hand accompaniment. Lucas is an excellent vibist who studied with Gustavo and I while enrolled at Berklee here in Boston. A real pleasure to have as a student. Here's a few minutes of what we were working on.

Cream Pie!

An original tune titled Cream Pie. Slightly inspired by Dexter Gordon's tune Cheese Cake. Joe Zarr - Soprano, Joe Karwacki - Bass, Damian Allis - Drums and Matthew Rockwell Sokolic - randomly hitting some metal!

Practice: diatonic/chromatic passing tones and anticipation notes

I've been spending a little time each day with Ed's book 1. The early info on passing tones is great. I figured for accountability's sake, I would just record a short segment of my practice this morning...

Clearly one of MY biggest issues as I work on becoming an improviser is creating pleasing melodies and lines that have a momentum to them - and that are interesting to listen to. The great players make this look so easy, right? In fact, almost everyone ELSE I listen to makes it look easy. haha.

God Bless The Child - Solo Vibes

"God Bless The Child" - one of my favorite ballads composed and sung by the great Billie Holiday. Some exploration with dampening and solo playing techniques that will be covered in the two books (solo vibraphone playing and dampening) that I've been diligently writing. The books will include etudes and exercises well as solos on such standards as Mandel's "Emily" and Gershwin's "Someone to Watch over Me". It's a lot of work but rewarding at the same time. I'll be working well into the Fall since I'll be on a sabbatical from Berklee.