Here's a video where I talk about just that, playing too many notes. It's a problem every vibe player has. It's a tough one to solve since we don't have to breath to play!
Listen carefully, I mess the time up in this video in one spot. It's not too obvious. Can you hear it?
Here are a couple ways to work on lines. Using only two mallets you can create 2 continuous lines.
Here’s a technique I use called “hammers” – it’s a guitar embellishment technique that works nice on the vibe, giving a sort of note bending effect.
Early Gary Burton records such as “country roads” show him using this “sound”- that’s how I learned of it
It’s one of those “sounds” you use sparingly. The audio here is pretty lo-fi but you’ll get the idea
Part 1 shows the technique
Part 2 shows the technique used over Blackbird, and Bluesette
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Here are some more charts from Ed. These go along with his videos.
Me and Marc Przbalowski talking about comping for bass solos.
Mike Pinto is a 3 mallet player. He was doing some really cool things today on Blue Bossa with the 3 mallets. A sort of parallel 5th thing that was totally cool.
Check it out here.
This is a great lesson. Just go through all the tunes you know see where you can put this. Pull out the real book, whatever!
Also check out Behn's comping. He plays really clear rhythms IMHO.