Angelo the 91 year old vibe player (maybe the oldest professional working vibe player) write me now regularly. He always asks me to post the letters for everyone to read!

here's the latest. he's really interesting and his advice is good! He always reminds me to eat from all three food color groups as in this letter.

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Here's an interesting study. Print this etude out and learn it. At some point you should realize what tune it is.

Then realize that there are no roots in the chords except at the beginning and at one spot where I added it by mistake. Hopefully this should give you some insight into some of the things we've been talking about. That is playing chords without the roots and using the upper extensions to make the harmony.

Hi all, new to the website it's fantastic!

Abit about myself:

I'm entering my third year of percussion studies at the University of Lethbridge under Adam Mason. I started playing vibraphone about 7months ago by volunteering in jazz band.

My question is how to approach all of this material.

I also own the wondeful book The Art and Language of Jazz Vibes by Jon Metzger.

Do you think it would be better to go through 1 source at a time, or try to work out some way of practicing alot of concepts from this website as well as the book.

thanks,

Hi Everyone,

As part of the Berklee Percussion Festival, Dave Samuels, Gustavo Agatiello, Victor Mendoza, Nancy Zeltsman and me will be teaching vibes and marimba during June 22nd through the 26th. We have group lessons and ensembles scheduled during the days and various clinics and concerts scheduled throughout the week. Gustavo has a concert featuring a nice band in the Berklee Performance Center on Tuesday. Gustavo and me will be playing vibe duets during the registration period on Monday. All in all, it looks like a fun week.

Ok for subscribers, here's the PAS article.

Ok. So I just finished watching Tony's video series over Stella and I realized something.... I rarely work things through 12 keys. I once tried to learn Stella in C and failed miserably.

I keep hearing over and over about working in all keys but I keep being stubborn and not doing it. I really don't know the best way to go about it.

i´m a little upset.i got relative good recording mics and euipment and the sound of my video´s in the uncompressed original format is always good.but if i compress it to make it fit to youtube the sound always gets bad.anyone of you has any idea if it´s possible to compress just video quality but leave the audio at best level.i tried different programs but couldn´t get anything for free which makes the job.tonys videos always have a good sound qualitiy.

Here's another etude over the tune 'My One and Only Love'. You put the chords in. It's a chord etude based on quarter notes.

You can see the top note of the chord and the up and down of the melody. You can see where there's a chord and maybe it doesn't have an important note in it, but then on the next beat that chords there. You'll be working on inversions and voice leading.

Tony recently put up a dampening exercise based on the changes for Stella. Ensuing comments on his posting examined the E-7b5 chord at the beginning of the tune. Tony suggested I start a post with a challenge for us to find as many tunes that start with a minor 7 flat 5 chord as possible.

Rules: you cannot use your fake books or browse any lead sheet you may have. Just think through all the tunes you've memorized and find those that fit the description. Here are some to get you started. This is to challenge yourself to see how many tunes you know.

1. Beautiful Love

I have a suggestion: Since this isn't a teenage chat sight, or a lonely hearts,"Hope to meet someone nice" site, why don't we all go by our real names? I find it a bit irritating if I want to say something to a specific member, or answer a post, without having to check, "Am I writing to Vibraman, Vibraphoneman, vibratorman, or whatever. We're all serious musicians, right? What do you all say we drop the "chat" names and start fresh? What does everybody think?