icemann on 31/12/2019 at 12:00
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scumble on 31/12/2019 at 15:21
Quote Posted by PigLick
Prepare for some guitar wankery though.
Enjoyable wankery though - I thought of Steve Lukather and Frank Gambale when listening to superliminal. Some more ambient reverb in the mix would be nice as it sounds a tad dry. Never actually heard your playing yet. Is that you playing the trumpet as well?
@dema - good playing - how long have you been practicing again? I wouldn't mind learning a bit more Jazz playing - all I do at the moment is try and play minor 11th chords in every key. I seem to be resistant to learning to play actual tunes...
demagogue on 31/12/2019 at 17:27
I got the keyboard and tried to start maybe 2014, but my neighbor loudly complained about the finger tapping (even using headphones) and made any regular practice impossible. So I literally moved just to practice in peace. I'd say end of 2016 I started studying seriously. I first went through some theory books and then I started doing daily scales and voicing practice from mid-2017.
If you want to know my little system, whatever time you can schedule to practice, divide it into 3 parts (like 20 min, 20 min 40 min). Start with scales and technique practice, all keys. An example of scale development is, well first all scales: bebop maj, bebop dom7th, maj-min, whole-half (aka double diminished), chromatic. Each session you start on the next note in the scale. Up-down, down-up, contrarywise (lh goes down, rh goes up and back). Then vary fingering (e.g. alternate 1-2, then 2-3, etc, 1-2-3, 2-3-4, every possible combination). Or whatever the equivalent is for your instrument if it's not piano.
Then the second part is a device, lIke a type of voicing (drop-2, drop-3, rootless, etc.), or walking bass, or block style, or 100 other things you pilfer from books and recordings... You make a list of devices and just go down the list, moving to the next item when you've got the last one down at tempo. One kind of method is hitting the device in all keys on a beat (early on in a circle of 5ths, or standard changes, later on at random by flashcard app), start at lIke 40 bpm then you up the tempo. Another thing that mixes Part 2 and 3 is improv riffs (e.g. stay in a bebop scale with all chord tones on downbeats, then spread them out or mix in riffs).
Then Part 3 is just playing a tune in a perpetual loop. You also have a list of those (like the top 50 standards, then another 50 of your favorites, alternate), again you go to the next when you have the last down, gradually increase tempo, etc. And of course you want to focus on whatever device you just studied in the improv. When you really want to learn a tune actually, early on you play it focusing on all the devices you know and have like 5-10 different riffs ready for each part you mix and match. As you go, you get better at high-level planning of a motive and the mix of devices and styles you want to use part to part.
You do something like this mechanically, just down a list of items in a regular way so "motivation" isn't really a factor. It's just, what's on the list for today's practice.
Do just that every day / few days for like 9 months and, barring musical disability, you'll be a functioning jazz musician, and by 18 months you'll be actually really good at it.
PigLick on 1/1/2020 at 08:07
The trumpet was actually my daughter playing, I suck at brass. Thanks for the lukather and gambale references, they were quite big influences when i was learning.
Pyrian on 1/1/2020 at 19:02
Quote Posted by PigLick
...I suck at brass.
Well, that'll never do. Have you tried blowing?
scumble on 2/1/2020 at 11:07
@dema - useful tips - at one point I picked up a Jazz guitar primer written by Mickey Baker and picked up a couple more chords. I also know I'm capable of teaching myself some bits of Beethoven piano sonatas. The hitch is always with organisation...
Aja on 11/1/2020 at 02:13
I was actually thinking about making a similar thread. I've got a couple different soundcloud accounts for different styles of music I've been working on.
My silly pop project is called Wanda Plaza, and my hit song is (
https://soundcloud.com/wandaplaza/vapin-in-my-4x4) Vapin' in My 4x4. I also wrote a song about the (
https://soundcloud.com/wandaplaza/the-man-from-leshan) Grand Buddha in Leshan and a few others that are on the main page if you're interested.
But my main interest is ambient music, and I've been making it under the project name Sleepmute. I have an album's worth finished, but I don't know what to do with it. I'd like to put it on cassette and play live shows; just working out how I'd actually do that. My favourite Sleepmute track (
https://soundcloud.com/sleepmute/tetsu) is probably this one, and you can listen to (
https://soundcloud.com/sleepmute/) a couple others here. (I'm keeping the rest private until the album is out).
So far I've only listened to dema's which is really impressive, especially considering you taught yourself. I got up to grade 8 piano and my ear is decent, but I've never had the willpower to become as good a player as I'd like to be.
PigLick on 11/1/2020 at 03:50
vapin in my 4x4 reminded of the Flight of the Conchords for some reason. I'm not a huge fan of ambient stuff so yours sounds...ambient ?
demagogue on 11/1/2020 at 08:27
Those were great Aja. I like when some voices slip in then back out of detune. It's kind of disorienting in a good way.
Here's something of mine that's not exactly ambient, but it's good for background music. From about 2:40 it settles into a kind of chill lull of notes.
I wanted to see how well I could emulate a nylon acoustic guitar on my keyboard.
[video=youtube;_28Rnz-toAE]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_28Rnz-toAE[/video]