Jazz Humor: You Don't Know Where One Is

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[Sung to the tune "You Don't Know What Love Is"]

You Don't Know Where One Is

You don't know where one is.
You never know the changes or the form.
Your playing is so far below the norm.
You don't know where one is.

You don't know what beats are.
You cannot tell beat one from that of three.
Just how lame can one poor fellow be?
You don't know where one is.

Don't you know the key or chords
For tunes that you claim you are knowin'?
No wonder you sound so lost
Once you've started blowin'.

I can't tell from your line
Whether you're in three or in five four.
I tell you this and tell you one thing more,
You don't know where one is.

More Giant Steps stuff

Here's a nice post celebrating the 50th anniversary of the release of John Coltrane's Giant Steps. There are links to some entertaining and enlightening videos plus some cool info to go along with my previous posts regarding this wonderful, challenging tune.

Watch, Listen and Learn

Despite all of the challenges facing us politically and economically, we are living in a fine time to enjoy expressing ourselves as jazz musicians. There's a wealth of great new music being created at this very moment and, because of contemporary technology, we have almost instant access to it. We can listen across a broad spectrum of genres and styles as I pointed out in my post about Pandora.

We are also fortunate in that we have easy access to the great tradition of jazz history. Jazz enthusiasts used to have to haunt record shops and spend a fortune collecting LPs of favorite artists. Now I can go to iTunes and purchase 70 minutes of great music for under $10 without putting on my shoes. We could certainly have a heated discussion about many aspects of the current paradigm, but there's no ignoring the fact that, as students of jazz, we have it much easier than did previous generations of players.

Along with easy access to audio, there is also a rich assortment of historic video footage available online. It is very enlightening to see the masters performing, not to mention a huge kick. There is a great benefit in actually seeing your favorite players doing what they do. Listening and transcribing is essential, of course, but the visual component can add a whole new dimension to your understanding of a musician's technique.

Musician and educator Brad Sharp has spent some time scooping up links to jazz videos at YouTube. His Jazz Video Search page has a ton of links, organized by instrument and then by musician. He's got the musicians listed chronologically by date of birth, a very interesting way to view the history of jazz. I don't remember ever seeing a list that includes both Buddy Bolden and Chris Potter. If you're in the mood to do some research on your instrument, Brad's links are really helpful. You'll probably see some names you don't recognize, so it's a great way to expand your knowledge of styles, techniques and different ways of approaching improvising.

Warning: Only go there if you have some time to burn, because there are many hundreds of jazz videos represented on that page. And you WILL get mesmerized, I guarantee.

Here's some rare footage of Charles Mingus' Quartet I found via Brad's list. The band is Clifford Jordan-tenor, Jaki Byard-piano, Mingus-bass and Danny Richmond-drums.

ii/V/I Lesson by Randy Hunter

Saxophonist and teacher extraordinaire Randy Hunter has kindly allowed PJN to post a very informative lesson on playing the most common jazz progression: ii/V/I. This lesson explains very simply what the progression does and how to go about internalizing the sound of it. Randy also gets into some basic chord/scale applications that work with the ii/V/I. If you're just getting started improvising I highly recommend that you check it out.

Randy Hunter's ii/V/I Lesson (audio)
(PC users right click, Mac users option click to download)

Randy Hunter's ii/V/I Lesson (pdf examples)

PJN's very first two sets of tracks were created to help you learn the ii/V and the ii/V/I/VI progressions in all 12 keys. Please visit our HOME PAGE and click on your instrument to put some of Randy's concepts into practice.

More Giant Steps Resources

Our compatriot Evan Tate has written a couple of etudes based on the chord progression from Coltrane's Giant Steps. The two versions, for tenor and alto saxophones, are NOT identical. I'm sure any instrumentalist would derive great benefit from studying and learning these etudes:

HERE are the Bb choruses.

HERE is the Eb study.

Of course you can use these etudes with our newly released TRANE TRAX, featuring Giant Steps changes at three tempos (slow bossa, medium swing and uptempo swing).

Giant Steps (One Step at a Time)

The January 2009 issue of Downbeat magazine has a nice introductory article on practicing John Coltrane's seminal tune Giant Steps. The piece is called Making the Connections and was written by saxophonist David Demsey.

Demsey's article got me thinking about approaches to studying Trane's famous chord sequence. These changes have become integral to modern jazz playing and are an essential ingredient to any serious study of improvisation. Please see the end of this post for a brief list of transcriptions and other material available to musicians who want to explore Giant Steps.

PlayJazzNow just released a set of playalong tracks that will help you work on this chord sequence. We call it TRANE TRAX, and it contains Giant Steps changes at three different tempos, plus the changes to Countdown, 26-2 and Trane's version of Body and Soul. There are no shortcuts to mastering Coltrane's harmonic language of this period. You just have to take it one step at a time.

Giant Steps Resources:

This Song Trellis post is a good place to start.

Here is Lucas Pickford's online transcription of Coltrane's solo.

A nice descriptive piece from JazzStandards.com placing Giant Steps in its historical context.

A sound clip and transcription of Tom Harrell's solo from JazzTrumpetSolos.com.

Michael Brecker and Bob Mintzer solo transcriptions from ibrecker.com.

Dan Adler's exhaustive "cycles" study of Giant Steps changes in 12 keys.

Jazz Etude Books

Evan Tate, tenor saxophonist and instructor, has published a couple of excellent jazz texts, both of which will benefit beginning and intermediate level jazz musicians. They also happen to be great resources to use with our tracks.

250 Jazz Patterns is available in print and digital editions. The exercises are very hip and musical, unlike some other pattern books out there. Here's a list of contents:

• Preliminary exercises
• Major Patterns
• Minor Patterns
• ii-V7-I Patterns
• iim7b5 - V7b9 - i Patterns
• Tritone Substitutions
• iv - bVII7 – I
• Turnarounds
• Pentatonic Scales
• "Bebop" Scales
• Blues Scales
• Symmetrical Scales & Patterns
• Jazz Solo Etudes on: Blues, "Rhythm" Changes,
Cherokee, Giant Steps and Lady Bird for Bb and Eb instruments
• 5 Solo Transcriptions

Tate's other excellent book is Blues and Rhythm Changes in All Keys. In this one he writes out a full two choruses of solo material in each key for two of the most used jazz progressions.