Christos came over and shot some video lessons today. So I asked him to say something about himself.

Alright...I said I wouldn't post again until the end of the week, but here I am hogging up the blog newsfeed because...I am excited that I just figured out this third part of the intro!!!

So here's how this has been going:

Day 3:

I was just sitting here listening to some practice tracks I recorded. You know I say all the time that I might be a teacher on this site, but I'm also a student. And I've listened to many of you and learned something.

I just realized while listening to these practice tracks that I learned a lot about solo playing during our TOTM. And it was from listening to little things some of you did. Even if you didn't do it perfect, I saw what you were going after and got it and learned from it.

Over the past month I've been preparing for a John Coltrane tribute in Eugene Oregon. When we chose the music for the gig we selected two tunes, 26 2 and Freight Trane. Both of these tunes have definately seen the woodshed, which in turn, I've been reminded of past articles in PASIC notes by Ed Saindon and David Friedman.

On to sticking .. 26 2 is one of those tunes that if you play throught the tune alternating, it's a game of Twister by the end. So, with that in mind, I use variations of LRLLR and also LLRR in order to get more of a melodic horn articulation.

I think this is one of Chick's best tunes. I've got a download file of the piano accompaniment and a pdf leadsheet available at http://tedwolff.net/armandos-rhumba-playalong.html so you can work it up and play along. Enjoy!
Ted

This is what woke me up this morning: beautiful!! My vibist friend Norbert Lucarain used to play in a band like this with flamenco rhythm section, vibes/marimba and a dancer. Victor is obviously having a great time and showing all his talent there!! I love the part with the dancer, the way she mixes flamenco with a bit of ballet, and the way they 'play' together: a lot of fun!!! Enjoy! – M

Here's another composition of mine, "Dream Dance", and a rough mix recording. When I was writing this I thought it'd be easy to perform, but it turned out to be quite difficult. My original idea for the solos was to play once through the mode cycle, spending as long as the soloist wished on each mode. We decided that'd be too many cues to make reliably, so I switched it to this chorus form, 8 bars on each mode.

I often practise montuno because I love that music. I used to play them only the melody with the left and right hand. In this montuno I finally manage to work on how the left hand can accompany the montuno played by the right hand. Studying solo vibes really gives you freedom to do stuff many styles.

Thanks

Dimitris

This is a series of performances about Tune of the Month – Solo vibes. You can criticize my performance or you can even use these posts as lessons since I play step by step the development of solo vibes according to what I practiced so far.

It’s up to you…

Performance 1: The left hand plays a 2note comping but it has more but it has a more rythmic accompanimment idea than harmonic one. It is some kind of a ghost note thing that I took playing the piano.
The right hand only soloing with one mallet.

Feel free to comment or post

Thanks