Jazz players here! Help me please!

[raggedymike]

I am going to second the Fred Sokolow recommendation. I have a couple of his lessons from Stefan Grossman's Guitar Workshop. My first recommendation would be Playing and Understanding Jazz Guitar. This will give you a basic understanding of chord progressions and song construction. It might well be titled Playing and Understanding Pop Music of the 30's and 40's with forays into jazz technique. This will teach you to play "I've Got Rhythm", which is the beating heart of jazz.
One thing Fred does is use his thumb to fret the low E string on many chords. You will have a hard time doing this on a classical guitar (the neck on a typical classical guitar is 2" at the nut, wider than almost all other guitars). You should not copy that. You can fret all the chords with your fingers only.

However you go about learning, you should not try to learn individual pieces before you understand chord progressions.

[Dalegreen]

any genre of music will help you to understand jazz. I went the classical route years ago and when I did my berklee program I found the classical training so helpful in almost every aspect.
I play jazz daily on my classical guitar, does not really matter what guitar you use, it is what is comfortable in your hands. Some of the chord fingering is definitely a little tougher on the hands compared to lets say, a tele,
but you adapt your chord forms based on the guitar you are using.

[Davis Webb]

There are 4 albums that you must listen to inside out to learn jazz. That's the way it was taught to me.

Oh and regarding reading music, Miles Davis "Kind of Blue" had no sheet music, only a page of hand written chord changes. And even that was improvised, things just happened. They did the whole album in 7 hours, using only the first take for all songs. It remains the most influential jazz album of all time.

So here is your assignment, should you choose to accept;

Miles Davis, Kind of Blue
Dave Brubeck, Time Out
Charles Mingus, Mingus Au Um
Ornette Coleman, The Shape of Jazz to Come

I would contend if you really dig into these albums for a long time and emulate the "feeling and motifs" in these 4 selections, you will understand all you need to know about jazz. If you can create these sounds, play the guitar like these instruments, you will be "there".

[JonPR]

Originally Posted by Davis Webb

There are 4 albums that you must listen to inside out to learn jazz. That's the way it was taught to me.

Oh and regarding reading music, Miles Davis "Kind of Blue" had no sheet music, only a page of hand written chord changes.

That's a slight exaggeration .
Certainly it was the case for Flamenco Sketches - which has no composed melody, and no formal structure other than the order the five modes were played in.
All the others have composed melodies and structures.
It's true they might not have needed much (if anything) actually written down, because at least two of the tunes (So What, All Blues) had been worked out in live performance before.
Freddie was a blues - very easily taught by ear on the spot, even if it was a new tune.
Blue In Green was at least jointly composed with Bill Evans, before the session.

Originally Posted by Davis Webb

And even that was improvised, things just happened.

Well, the sketches themselves weren't improvised in the studio. Miles (and Bill Evans to some extent) had clear ideas about the tunes to be played, and how they would be played. Miles picked up on anyone who put a foot wrong, here and there (although that was rare). I.e., the other musicians often had to be guided in how to play in this new way. But once they were on track, yes - no "correcting" of solos or anything like that.

Originally Posted by Davis Webb

They did the whole album in 7 hours, using only the first take for all songs.

The first complete take, yes. According to the book, with most tracks they had to cut the first few takes short due to mistakes or extraneous noise during the opening head.
IOW, although things were a lot looser and more open than jazz typically was before that point, there were still melodies and structures to be followed.
It was the musicians' experience, more than the nature of the music, that allowed very little to be actually written down on paper.

Originally Posted by Davis Webb

It remains the most influential jazz album of all time.

Agreed.

Originally Posted by Davis Webb

So here is your assignment, should you choose to accept;

Miles Davis, Kind of Blue
Dave Brubeck, Time Out
Charles Mingus, Mingus Ah Um
Ornette Coleman, The Shape of Jazz to Come

I'd go with that, although it is somewhat biased towards the latter half of jazz history. Nothing on those albums would be possible (or even comprehensible) without a good understanding of the previous 40-50 years.
At the same time, they can be seen as representing a pinnacle, a watershed, when that history had been fully absorbed, and jazz began to bloom into a real art form.

It's similar in that way to some classic rock albums of the late 1960s or early 1970s - where the musicians had grown up with rock'n'roll, blues, pop etc, and built on that intuitive foundation to produce an essentially new, more sophisticated genre.

Originally Posted by Davis Webb

I would contend if you really dig into these albums for a long time and emulate the "feeling and motifs" in these 4 selections, you will understand all you need to know about jazz. If you can create these sounds, play the guitar like these instruments, you will be "there".

Again, I agree.

As Hal Galper has said, "make it sound like this" is the basic rule of learning music, in any form.

If you can "make it sound like this", you're there. (Easier said than done, naturally... )

[artistic]

The beautiful album "unforgettable" by Joe Pass was also recorded using a nylon strung.Check it out, I play fingerstyle jazz on an archtop,Tele,steel string acoustic and 335 style Epiphone and I'm waiting delivery of a classical nylon strung.Anything goes.

[EoE]

Funkkifying the clave is one you need its a bass and drum book but you need this to understand the idiom and how it works into jazz.http://www.amazon.com/Funkifying-Cla.../dp/0769220207

[mr. beaumont]

Originally Posted by NewGuitarist

Thanks alot for the great help everyone. Really appreciate it.

Gotta say, I own a classical guitar and i play my own thing on it, that's it!! no classical training here or anything..
I'll go and check the nylon string jazz players mentioned above for sure.

Not sure if I need to ask this, but since mr. beaumont recommended I practice chords by learning songs, does it matter much if i picked, to start with, say Jobim's "Wave" or "All The Things You Are" or "Minor Swing"? Jazz is a very broad genre as y'all know..

Now reading music.. that's one thing i didn't wanna hear someone talk about

Pick songs you like.

I suggest an investment in two books--Mickey Baker's Volume 1, and a Real Book.

There's people everywhere who will tell you to "burn your real books" and a whole bunch of that crap. That's just because they haven't been taught how to use one correctly. They are great as training wheels, and that's what you need as a beginner--training wheels. The problem with real books is when hacks never internalize a song and they're on stage looking at a chart to "All of Me."

SO the MickeyBaker will get you started on some Real chords in Real movements. Read his advice on how to approach the book. The examples in the book are in G. You will transpose them to all 12 keys.

The Real Book is basically a song skeleton. It has melody and chords. Can't read? No problem, you should try learning the melody by ear anyway. When starting out, categorize chords into 4 "families"

Majors (this includes maj7, 9, 13, 6, 6/9)
Minors (m6, m7, m9, m11)
Dominants (7, 9, 11, 13, 7b5, 7#5, 7b9, 7#9, you get the idea)
Half Diminished (m7b5, m11b5--minor with a flat fifth, important enough I make it it's own category)

The gist of these chords can usually be pared down to 4 notes (and even less, eventually)

maj7 R, 3, 5, 7

m7 R, b3, 5, b7

7 R, 3, 5, b7

m7b5 R, b3, b5, b7

Here's some easy places to play those...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FtZFfd-fel4

Now grab a song..."Minor Swing is a fine place to start...first chord's gotta be a minor 6 though, you'll hear it...here's one way to play it.

5x4555

Let me know if any of this helps and I'll keep rambling...

[Dan Lampton]

Most of the jazz guitarists I enjoy learned by playing songs. mr. beaumont beat me to it, but I also recommend getting a Real Book. Try to learn a new song each week. Once you learn the chords to the song learn to play them in a different part of the neck. Try playing a song with only three note chords.

You'll get there and you'll have a great time! Enjoy the journey.

[Davis Webb]

John PR

I agree, I included those because they all happened in 1959-60, when Jazz turned a new corner. Of course reference to the "Count", Louis Armstrong and so many others in the guitar genres is there too, but I felt those albums really would bring a player nicely into modern jazz, they seem like a repository of the key bits.

I agree from my reading that there was some structure in Davis' early work, it was not really charted though in the way we think of now, ie., there was no "reading of notes". More an agreement of how the song would go. The drummer added a crash cymbal in the first cut, that really opened up the song after its rather pensive and mysterious start. My point is that jazz is not as unapproachable as it may seem at first. A few standard changes, II, VI's, Autumn Leaves, and learning how to slur the notes and emulate a horn player, should get most of us on the right path.

A big yes to the Real Books, great resource.

[EoE]

yep a real book. and get yourself over to the jazz guitar forum great lessons there and they will help you learn to read you do need to learn to read.

[janmulder]

Originally Posted by NewGuitarist

Now reading music.. that's one thing i didn't wanna hear someone talk about

I wouldn't worry about it too much ... there are lots of levels of reading music ... like just reading chord charts ala real books to full blown scores ... and although none of them are that difficult, you don't need to learn every level of reading.

For jazz, knowing chords and being able to read chord sheets is already a great help. Personally, I like to be able to read the basic melody off the sheet as well but it's not strictly necessary. I think there is a lot of fear out there about reading music being some amazing difficult to attain skill for the selected few ... it's not ... if learnt/taught properly, it's just like any other skill.

[EoE]

do not let reading intimidated you but learn to read .. I am totally against the idea you do not need to learn to read. really you can do it read 20 minutes 2 times a week it will come. do not rush it do not worry about how fast you are learning. just the fact you are learning will get you a lot of respect. no matter how well you can read the cats will jump in and help.. it is so easy there is no reason not to... go here you need advice from the cats over there. http://www.jazzguitar.be/forum/

Quote Originally Posted by JazzinNY View Post

sight-reading, which seems pretty optional unless you have pro aspirations.
Not true, in my opinion. Avoiding sight reading is a sure way to never get very far in jazz guitar. You don't have to be great at it, but if you don't have much sight reading competence you need a a whole lot of talent if you are going to become even a semi competent bedroom solo jazz guitar player. And forget about ever playing with others.

I'm no pro, have no pro aspirations, am at best a mediocre player, but I would never have had any of my memorable playing experiences if I hadn't put in a certain amount of work learning to read early on.

If I had to give any advice to the many people who have a hard time getting started in jazz guitar it would be: commit to about three months of just sight reading practice: everything you ever tackle after that will be much easier. Imagine if you could have read that page at a reasonable tempo in say 10 minutes instead of 1.5 hours. That's what a few months of sight reading work can accomplish

Wes did move around a lot, someone explained it to me by saying he moved "diagonally". I think that playing and practicing octaves forces you to thing outside positions since you have to move up and down the neck to get octaves to flow." end quote from a thread there and this is a common opinion on that thread ........................... also was said here "Oh and regarding reading music, Miles Davis "Kind of Blue" had no sheet music" that is misleading . miles was always at the fore front of jazz... for example during the free jazz era not only was nothing written down they did not decide on a key even. they just played what they wanted random notes even. the stuff is hard to listen to. Miles was a great reader and the vast majority of the work was charted out. you have to take what Miles did in context to a era as he lead us . he was always on the cutting edge.

[JonPR]

Originally Posted by Davis Webb

John PR

I agree, I included those because they all happened in 1959-60, when Jazz turned a new corner. Of course reference to the "Count", Louis Armstrong and so many others in the guitar genres is there too, but I felt those albums really would bring a player nicely into modern jazz, they seem like a repository of the key bits.

I agree from my reading that there was some structure in Davis' early work, it was not really charted though in the way we think of now, ie., there was no "reading of notes". More an agreement of how the song would go. The drummer added a crash cymbal in the first cut, that really opened up the song after its rather pensive and mysterious start. My point is that jazz is not as unapproachable as it may seem at first. A few standard changes, II, VI's, Autumn Leaves, and learning how to slur the notes and emulate a horn player, should get most of us on the right path.

A big yes to the Real Books, great resource.

Again, I agree.
Jazz doesn't have to be complicated. But it does need a good body of knowledge of the history: familiarity with the sound of lots of old standards (played by various people), if not their actual details of notes and chords. That gives you the right vibe, feel and attitude. Get it into your blood, then break out the Real Books and learn to actually play the tunes - melodies first, then chords.

Miles's attitude for that Kind of Blue session was - more or less - to try and forget the old ways - to clear the decks, start fresh. IOW, the simplicity of that stuff didn't come from scratch, it was a reaction, a way of escaping the frantic chord changes of bebop, the old "hot" jazz. In a sense, they needed that background in bop to know what not to do. (And of course they needed the inspirations from African music, gospel, Gil Evans, George Russell, to point them in a fertile direction. It was open and loose, but it wasn't "free jazz" - that came later... )

And of course the simplicity of something like "So What" is a trap. Those old tunes stuffed with chord changes at least gave you a route map to follow: hang on to the chord tones and you couldn't go wrong - it was like being on a roller-coaster, but at least it stayed on the rails! When you have one chord for 16 bars, what are you gonna do? Noodle aimlessly on the scale? (That's what beginners in modal jazz tend to do, I know, I've been there .) That's where you need the experience of playing melodies, so you can construct logical phrases without leaning on guide tones in the sequence. Or you find single notes you can hang against the chord for colour.

[JonPR]

Originally Posted by EoE

do not let reading intimidated you but learn to read .. I am totally against the idea you do not need to learn to read.

For jazz at least, I totally agree. The fact that a tiny few managed (at least to begin with) without reading is not an argument for avoiding it.
So, Django and Wes couldn't read. But they were geniuses. Are you a genius? Have you been learning from records (or older musicians) since you were a kid? Do you have a great ear?
If not, why not give yourself an edge; join the community of "real musicians" and learn notation. Then you can play anything you like - limited only by your technique. (Oh yes, make sure you know your instrument properly too...)

Anyone doubting the power of notation only needs to consider classical music. It couldn't have existed without notation. (Could Beethoven, say, have taught every member of an orchestra their individual parts by ear? For a whole symphony?)
It gives you enough information to be able to play a piece of music accurately that you have never heard before. For a beginner that might seem a pointless activity (they just wanna play their favourite songs), but it's extraordinarily powerful. And of course, you can write your own compositions down too, equally clearly and precisely.

[EoE]

Yea I was giving free jazz as a example the point was Miles was breaking molds trying new things but had the theory and skills to do that.