all-levels

“In Your Quiet Place” by Keith Jarrett – one of my favorite songs from Keith and one of the first songs I learned way back when I was studying with Gary Burton. I can still vividly remember the lessons and Gary’s 5th floor corner office at the Berklee 1140 Boylston St. building in Boston. I also fondly remember his vintage set of gold Musser M55 vibe that he used for teaching and gigs. Those bars played "like butter". My lesson time was usually around lunch time and Gary would most often be eating a sandwich while I butchered these songs. Probably gave him indigestion. Ha!Ha!

“Solo Reflection” – A new song for solo vibraphone that I just finished composing (with a nod to the great Italian composer Ennio Morricone). One of my favorite melodies from Maestro Morricone is his theme from the movie “Cinema Paradiso”. The clip features some solo vibraphone techniques that will be covered in the book that I’ve been working on. It’s going to take some time since it will be a very big project. Meanwhile, my book “Voicing Concepts for the Jazz Vibist” (available from Amazon) does have some related topics in the way of voicings, chord melody and reharmonization techniques.

Martina is a young Czech singer who I will be producing an album with on Malletmuse Records next year. She´s amazing and when she sings ballads there isn't a dry eye in the house.

Common chord progressions

Solo version of "But Beautiful" with voicings from my book Voicing Concepts for the Jazz Vibist available on Amazon. The book contains a written out chorus of the melody along with voicings, notated mallet dampening and reharm.

This is one of my favorite exercises. It's about playing lines that connect the chord changes so that you can hear them, no matter how fast you play. As with every exercise that you create yourself there should be a basic goal you're aiming for, such as connecting the chords and making the harmonic movement hearable throughout.Then you can add “mini" challenges, such as note value, tempo, phrasing, accents if desired, etc. I chose as my "mini" challenge a constant stream of eighth notes without rests.

Common chord progressions

This is a quick mini-mini-concert because I only recorded one tune. Had to run after the recording.

"Hark! The Herald Angels Sing" by Felix Mendelssohn - A solo vibraphone rendition of this classic for the holidays. Here's my take on it with some "off the cuff" theme and variations as well as a little counterpoint. Hope you enjoy it. Happy Holidays!