Monthly Archives: January 2015

Harmonic Scale

Not jazz (more like jazzish-R&B), but as I was listening to this song, I heard some harmonic scales in his ad lib. At 4:06, you hear a minor arpeggio. At 4:12, you can hear the harmonic minor scale as he comes down in thirds. When I hear about the harmonic minor, my mind immediately jumps […]

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JJ Johnson: Autumn Leaves

Some things worthy of mentioning that are great here is the sparsity near the beginning (45). Knowing the autumn leaves melody makes this much more enjoyable, because you already have the expectation of what it will sound like, and then we he rests for most of it, it is pleasantly surprising. I kinda hear a […]

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Epistrophy by Thelonious Monk

This is a performance of Epistrophy by Thelonious Monk (piano), Charlie Rouse (saxophone), Butch Warren (Bass), and Frankie Dunlop (Drums). An “epistrophe” is “the reputation of a word at the end of successive clauses” (Webster), which gives some insight into vamp played during the chorus. Rouse starts out his solo with short staccato notes, many of which are non-chord tones. […]

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Herbie Hancock and Roy Hargrove

This is a performance of Butterfly featuring Herbie Hancock and Roy Hargrove and Marcus Miller. One thing I took note of from this performance was the way that Herbie Hancock was comping behind Roy Hargrove (around 6:00). He comes in strong with chord progressions after the each trumpet phrase, and towards the end the measures, […]

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“Wave”; Fast and Slow: connecting ideas

Featured here are both solo trombonists (the masterful Frank Rosolino and Carl Fontana), bass and piano (I thought that was nice for our class. This is a bossa nova in the key of D, and I just love the melody. The countermelody in the second trombone is great it it’s own right too. I love […]

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Welcome to the MUS 340 Blog

Welcome to the MUS 340 Jazz Improv II blog for Spring 2015. Here you will find course information and materials to assist you in preparing for each class. All students are required to post a weekly video of a jazz performance and provide a brief summary of the event. Please use the previously posted videos […]

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