Using Composition to Improvise Great Jazz Solos

Learn Jazz Standards Podcast

Brent Vaartstra: Jazz Musician, Author, and Entrepreneur

Music Commentary, Jazz, Jazz Improvisation, Jazz Saxophone, Jazz Theory, Jazz Bass, Jazz Piano, Education, Music, Jazz Guitar, Jazz Solo, Jazz Standards, Jazz Trumpet, How To

4.8 • 536 Ratings

🗓️ 1 March 2024

⏱️ 12 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

In this Fast Track Friday episode of the Learn Jazz Standards podcast, Brent reflects on the week's discussions, focusing on the theme of turning theory into practical musical expression through improvisation. He introduces composition as a powerful tool for jazz musicians to internalize musical language and develop their improvisational skills. By likening composition to slowed-down improvisation, Brent underscores its role in facilitating the creative process and fostering musical growth....

Transcript

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0:00.0	This episode is sponsored by the Learned Jazz Standards Inner Circle.
0:03.8	If your goal is to level up your jazz playing this year and feel confident improvising over
0:08.5	jazz standards, the inner circle has everything you need and more.
0:13.0	With monthly jazz standards studies, a library of powerful courses, and a vibrant community
0:17.3	of like-minded musicians, you're guaranteed to improve your playing every
0:21.7	single month.
0:23.1	Podcast listeners can get 50% off their first month when you go to LJSinnerCircle.com.
0:29.5	That's LJSinnerCircle.com or find the link in the show notes.
0:34.8	Now, on to today's episode.
0:52.3	Music the show notes. Now, on to today's episode. Hey, hey, everybody. What's up? Brent here from Learn Jazz Standards. Welcome to another episode of the Learn Jazz Standards podcast. Excited to be here answering your jazz questions five days a week. And today is our fast track Friday episode. That's where I look back at this week's episode and questions that were asked and look for some underlying
1:12.0	themes and a great strategy that's been working well for my students and of course for myself
1:17.0	in the past. Looking back at this week, we talked a little bit about theory, right? We talked about
1:22.2	diminished arpeggios of redominate sevens, why that sounds great. We talked about the use
1:27.3	of triad pairs,
1:28.9	talked about, you know, how to know what the real melody of a jazz standard is. And yesterday we
1:34.0	talked about do pro jazz musicians actually improvise? Like how much of it is ideas that were
1:39.4	thought ahead of time and ideas that were just simply played organically, right, without being conceived before.
1:47.8	And today I wanted to offer you a strategy that is definitely no stranger here to the podcast
1:55.0	or at least the 400 plus episodes that were season one of this podcast. But really addresses some of this stuff
2:03.3	here. It addresses the idea of what do we do with theory after we've learned it? Like, how do we
2:09.1	turn that into music? But it really also addresses this idea of, you know, how do we get the ideas
2:15.6	that we're learning into our improvisation?
	...

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