Wednesday, December 05, 2012

A Day full of Jazz

I listen to a fair amount of music everyday but this day was special. First of all, I read about the bad news of jazz great, pianist Dave Brubeck passing away, one day before his 92nd birthday, via none other than the Facebook feed of classical radio station KDFC! The Dave Brubeck Quartet's original, "Take Five", was considered as the most well-known jazz tune ever. Jazz station KCSM played an interview of him after work. I learned quite a few things from the 10 minutes I listened to it: 1) at one time he had a bad relationship with Paul Desmond, the then-future saxophonist of his quartet who would compose "Take Five."  2) they started the trend of jazz musicians playing concerts at colleges which were more accessible to students because of less expensive tickets and the need to drive or take a bus. I was a beneficiary of this myself: one of the very first jazz shows I attended was at the student union at UT: a Stanley Jordan solo performance. Later that night I listened to the radio show Piano jazz hosted by Marian McPartland on KCSM with guitarist Russell Malone. He talked about the first time he played on stage with Jimmy Smith. He tried to show off his skills but got a lesson from Smith, which was very interesting. Malone offered some advices during the show as well: he suggested instrumentalists to learn tunes by listening to vocalist and paying attention to lyrics for phrasing and interpretation. That was during my drive to Yoshi's to see veteran guitarist Lee Ritenour and his special guest Mike Stern. I am kinda familiar with Stern's fusion style and "signature" sound (on a Fender Telecaster) through previous live performances and his albums. I have listened to Ritenour's playing on the "smooth jazz supergroup" Fourplay (which has its fair shares of criticism for playing it safe) as well as his "6 String Theory" album that featured an "all-star" lineup of guest guitarists. He played 3 different guitars during the show: a Yamaha "Silent" nylon string guitar (for acoustic tunes), a Gibson L5 Archtop (for traditional jazz) and a Les Paul (for rock/fusion). Obviously there were lots of variety during the show. They played quite a few songs from Ritenour's new album called "Rhythm Sessions", which featured several different rhythm sessions (bass/drums). I can't believe the full listing of songs and personnel is so hard to find though! I listened to the whole album on Rhapsody and it is quite enjoyable.

Tuesday, November 20, 2012

Is Smooth Jazz Dead?

I didn't come up with the title. I simply took it from an article in the JazzTimes magazine (discussed here on the Saxophone music forum.) I am really surprised that a type of music that is trying to please everyone and offend no one could go downhill like this [link1, link2] (I was equally surprised when the radio station KKSF dropped the smooth jazz format) I guess the moral of the story is that musicians just need to be themselves and play without worrying about offending or pleasing some audiences. Good players will always find way to be heard, with the smooth jazz moniker or not. (Look at David Sanborn) On the other hand, less talented folks who rode on coattails of others won't last long.

Thursday, November 15, 2012

Electric blues compilation

I have been a big fan of electric blues since the first time I listened to SRV years ago. Just read about a new 12-CD compilation from the Guitar Player magazine. I was in the mood for some blues and listened to some Lightnin' Hopkins 2 weeks ago. What a coincidence!


Wednesday, November 14, 2012

我的結他雜記: The Pentatonic Jazz improvisation system

Check out this video for a good demo of the system:
I came across it from this forum post. Following this system, you won't play any note that doesn't "go along" with the harmony. His fingering is always 2 notes per string, which is "classic" pentatonic fingering. His system has many many fingerings though. Some also said jazz was about playing the "wrong notes" On the other hand, it has a lot of appeal to players like me who are unable to improvise at all with so many note and scale choices. He used only 1 fingering (moved for different keys) in the above demo and it sounds pretty good already.

Tuesday, November 13, 2012

Current landscape of cloud music service

Yes, I intentionally made the title sounded like some sort of research/report from the likes of Gartner. Well, it was 5 years ago last time I wrote a related post. The buzzword "cloud" wasn't as big back then and the industry still refered to streaming services like Rhapsody and Napster as "subscription" Lots have changed though between these 5 years besides of the name. I'm still a user of such service (back to Rhapsody after Yahoo Music Unlimited was shutdown in 2008) but haven't paid much attention to the health of this business until today. I've found:
1) Rhapsody was spun off by Real Network (and partner MTV Network) as an independent company (Real still owns some stakes) in 2010
2) Rhapsody celebrated its 10th anniversary, reached one million subscribers and on track to become profitable last year according to this. The growth was credited to popularities of competitors like Spotify and support on portable devices like iOS and Android tablet/phones.
3) Among the providers I mentioned in my 2007 post, only 2 remained: Rhapsody bought Napster from BestBuy last year. MTV's Urge merged with Rhapsody in 2007. Microsoft's Zune Pass will become Xbox Music soon. And I already mentioned Yahoo shutdown its service in 2008.

Lots of techie disliked Real Network because of its practices (Real Player installations related) in the early dot-com days so I guess not longer associating with it is a good thing for Rhapsody to some potential customers. It seemed quite amazing to me that a business could survive for 10 years while struggling with profitability. It is also surprising that the appearance of a heavily hyped upstart like Spotify actually revitalize the whole sector ("grown the cake" if you will) and benefited "old timers" in the sector like Rhapsody. Hey, anything that's associated with "the cloud" is cool, especially after Apple created iCloud, isn't it? I guess it showed that Rhapsody was way ahead (9+ years) of its time. I certainly would not blame its lack of success on its technology. Not sure how many people knew and remembered the whole saga of Harmony DRM back in 2004 (BTW, finally a class action lawsuit was filed against Apple recently). Rhapsody created Harmony so that their tracks (purchased by user only, not the subscription ones) could play on iPod. Of course, Apple being Apple wouldn't allow this to happen and patched this "loophole" during the next release of firmware. At that point I thought Rhapsody could make a great move by releasing its own iPod firmware that works with both purchased and subscription tracks! (They don't even have to do it officially. Just leak it and claimed it's a hack by the user community!) Well, things come full circle when Apple finally approved Rhapsody's iOS app years later, which works for both types of tracks. IIn fact, the app was another boost to Rhapsody's growth. Looks like this industry is in good shape and we could all go back to enjoying great music.

Thursday, November 08, 2012

我的結他雜記: 即興道

這不是甚麼新興武術,而是一個爵士即興教材的名字,我是從討論區這個得知。練習方法就是聽一個jazz lick(旋律),彈出來,然後按cycle of 4th把該lick轉足十二個key彈出來,教材包括伴奏的CD。可以想像得到,要練成跟到伴奏,必有一定功力;值得考慮試試。

Monday, November 05, 2012

It runs in the family

Listened to a bunch of "new" jazz music last weekend (some of them are released recently while others are just discovered by me) The common and interesting theme is that all of them comes from musical families. The first CD is "Spirit Fiction" by saxophonist Ravi Coltrane, whose father is one of the most important musician in the history of jazz, as most people already know, the late great John Coltrane. John Coltrane died when Ravi was 2 and obviously didn't gave him any input in terms of music directly (On the other hand, every jazz player must have been influenced by John Coltrane one way or the other) Ravi has his unique sound and this CD is one of the his best. The 2nd CD is "Colombe" by guitarist David Reinhardt. Again, he has an instantly recognizable last name from his grandfather, the legendary Gypsy jazz guitarist Django Reinhardt. David also doesn't sound like his grandpa. He plays in a organ trio setting on this CD. The next musician, saxophonist Von Freeman, is different in the sense that I've actually listened to his son, Chico Freeman, before I listened to him. Finally, I discovered a CD by jazz ukulele player Lyle Ritz, "A Night of Ukulele jazz/Live at McCabe's," on which his daughter Emily has also performed.

Friday, November 02, 2012

Find Yourself

It's a track from the album "Disney Jazz Volume 1: Everybody Wants to be a cat" from 2011 that I just "discovered" today. My favorite jazz violinist Regina Carter performed this track:


You could hear a harp-like instrument on the track. It's kora from Africa performed by master Yacouba Sissoko, who also collaborated with Carter on her earlier release, Reverse Thread.

The whole album featured an all-star lineup with players like Dave Brubeck, Roy Hargrove etc. Highly recommended. Here is an insightful review.

BTW, the original song is from the final credits of the movie "Cars" I watched it many times with my son when he was younger but I've never noticed the song. Nice song (of course I like Carter's version better):

Tuesday, October 30, 2012

我的結他雜記: Introduction to Jazz Guitar Soloing

Just came across a forum thread/study group on the MI book "Introduction to Jazz Guitar Soloing" The scale and arpeggio fingering patterns look familiar (CAGED based, also similar to the ones taught by Jimmy Bruno) I plan to look into the application of these patterns later in the book. The book has chapters/exercises of "connecting games", which I think has to do with connecting arpeggios during chord changes and should be very useful.

Thursday, October 25, 2012

我的結他雜記: Robert Conti interview

Just came across a very interesting article reprinted from the Just Jazz Guitar magazine from 2002. It's an interview of jazz guitarist/educator Robert Conti, from whose DVDs and books I've learned a ton. He talked about his days hanging out with the great Pat Martino, and even more interesting was the business side of being a professional performer at hotels and similar venues.

Thursday, September 20, 2012

Pat Metheny

我最喜愛的爵士結他手及學習對象包括Pat Martino及Jimmy Bruno,Pat Metheny不在其中;但作為這個年代影響力極深、唱片銷路甚佳的結他手,他的concert對我還是很具吸引力,但對上一次看他竟然是十年前在Oakland Paramount Theater。Pat Metheny成名四十年,記得廿幾年前聽香港電台的爵士節目(不知現在還有沒有?),常常介紹Pat Metheny Group,Chick Corea及Miles Davis等等,他們到港演出均是盛事。雖然不是所有他玩的風格我都喜歡,但我欣賞他夠多元化:Pat Metheny Group玩的我認為New Age感强烈,和他的Trio/Quartet的現代爵士感覺相當不同。今次他的Unity Band風格是後者,對我來說比較啱聽;事實上色士風手Chris Potter有獨當一面之能,我一向十分欣賞,所以今次非去不可,US$55在SF算是十分貴,但連星期三晚八點場門票也早已售罄,我預先買了十點的票,早廿分鐘開始排隊,排了半小時才能進場,前面那位阿叔和我一樣頗為不滿,不過一開場這些立即拋諸腦後。打頭陣的是Pat Metheny用他那支「奇門兵器」4頸42弦Pikasso acoustic guitar獨奏,在他手中效果尤如一隊樂隊,當世不知有幾人能彈得到?接著樂隊四人full team登場,是唱片原班人馬,在西岸也是罕見,即使是名氣不下Pat Metheny的頂級樂手,很多都找加州本地樂手伴奏。演出的有來自新碟的新作,也有Metheny膾炙人口的作品,現場即興氣氛特別熾烈。最後十五分鐘拉下了兩塊神秘布幕,原來大有乾坤:蓋著的是幾組Orchestrion:靠吹打發聲的機器,由Metheny透過結他來控制,再加上looper(可錄下一段聲音重覆播放),效果相當豐富,只是長了一點難免有些許冷場。總的來說是十分精彩多變的演出,自然encore連連,Pat Metheny最後彈的是意外驚喜:去年acoustic guitar獨奏唱片中玩過的Beatles cover "And I Love Her." 這次演出可算是總括他近年三張唱片的東西,絕對值回票價有餘。

Tuesday, September 18, 2012

Classical and Spanish Guitar music

Recently I'm in the mood of playing classical guitar music again because of my last "big purchase" at Amazon before it charges sales tax. One of the items I bought was "The Huge Book of Classical Guitar Solos in Tab" It has over 150 pieces. Even if I learn 10% of them, it would be a huge addition to my almost non-existent repertoire. I especially enjoy the section for Spanish guitar music, including pieces like Malaguena.

Apparently Pandora could read my mind and played:
1)
Album: 24 Preludes and Fugues, for guitar solo
Artist: Igor Rekhin (Composer), Dimitri Illarionov (Performer)

Rekhin was a student of Aram Khachaturian. Can't go wrong!

2)
Track: El Camino Real
Album: Spanish Soul
Artist: Stefan Schyga

Schyga actually teaches online. Interesting! And the name of the track should be familiar to anyone living in SF Bay Area :)

Friday, August 03, 2012

我的結他雜記: 非學院派教爵士

Berklee爵士科導師教scale及arppegio,我問有甚麼「公式」或「捷徑」可以應用它們,他說沒有捷徑,唯有練熟及多聽名家從中學習。 從該課程學到的樂理及範例,我認為是相當有幫助的基礎。另一方面,我也覺得應從其他渠道在此基礎上發展,所以我才買了Wolf Marshall的Best of Jazz Guitar(附CD,可練聽力又可學學名家lines),及Sid Jacobs的Complete Book of Jazz Guitar Lines & Phrases;雖然Berklee導師不覺得需要這些,聽名家CD已是一大資源。

Jacobs的書有很多配合ii-V, V-I及I chord/progression的短phrases,包括很多爵士語言的典範,我正在很努力的背及練習在不同的key上應用,務求見chord可即彈。背熟彈熟之路固然還有一大段;始終覺得兩個bar轉三個chord要「背」出對應的phrases且要連貫又是另一條長路。究竟有沒有一些方法或教材針對幾個bar的chord progression彈奏長句? 之前跟大師Jimmy Bruno學的即興方法,看的不只是一個chord而是整個key,每一個大調都有五種指法可彈該調的pitch collection。當然,這也不是甚麼公式或捷徑。

經驗中教得更加具體的,是有出教學DVD的Robert Conti老師。他的入門DVD Ticket to Improv把一首曲子的單音solo由頭到尾逐粒音記下,學生只需做copycat 照彈。他的理念是學爵士即興第一步就是要多彈,彈的是充滿爵士語言的完整樂句,踏出這一步之後,才去理解為甚麼要這樣彈,總之是實戰重於理論。我覺得也是值得一試,尤其是像我嚴重缺乏爵士語言遑論創造。Robert Conti進階的教材是The Jazz Lines, 基本上亦是教授一些完整樂句,多了的是如何在不同的chord之上應用,例如適用於ii chord同一條line可用在unaltered的V chord之上,這個道理以前我也學過,不過他也教了transpose後的line可用於altered的V chord之上,亦略為解釋了他的line為何配合這些chord。他教學生練的lines比較長(一般多於四個bars),應付兩個或四個bars的ii-V-I chord progression「綽綽有餘」。此外,第一課我就學了一個以前不識的彈法:以subdominant (IV chord)為基礎,即C major key彈Fmaj7 arpeggio。不能不讚的是Robert Conti教學編排頗為循步漸進,The Jazz Lines教的lines和Ticket to Improv的甚為相似,彈過後者的再練及背前者就事半功倍。(當然,可能純屬巧合,他教的當然都是他彈得最熟的lines)

十分巧合地,收到結他雜誌Guitar Player介紹網上版,其中一文The Fast track to Bebop chops打正旗號介紹爵士「公式」「捷徑」!亦提到major scale中subdominant的用法,各位不妨讀讀。

Saturday, June 23, 2012

The month of metal: Suicidal Tendencies and Death

That's a funny title: Suicidal tendencies often lead to death but that's the two concerts I attended this month.

The last time (and only time) I saw S.T. was in 1991 when they toured with Queensryche and played in Austin (What an odd combination! Hardcore thrash and prog metal? I liked both bands and their performances though. Metal fans could be quite open minded to different styles) S.T. still sounded as aggressive as ever after all these 21 years and their front man, vocalist Mike Muir, is still as angry as ever. As long as there is injustice in the system, we rockers have reasons to be pissed and revolt against The Man. I always felt the power in their music but this time I also appreciated their musicianship. The guitar and bass solo were awesome.

I am surprised that I have never been one Death concert considering I've been a fan for 20 years. I jumped on the death metal bandwagon kinda early and Death was the pioneer of the genre (along with Deicide, Obituary and Morbid Angel, the Death Metal Big 4. Ironically, I've been to concerts of all Big 4 of Thrash: Metallica, Slayer, Megadeth and Anthrax) There were many band names that contain the word "Death" (e.g. Napalm Death, Death Angel, Christian Death) but they truly deserve that one word. Granted, their main man Chuck Schuldiner (lead vocalist/guitarist) met the real grim reaper because of brain cancer (but the real cause of death could be found here. Hint: a certain greedy industry. Man, another great death metal guitarist James Murphy, who played for both Death and Testament, was also diagnosed with brain tumor, albeit a non-cancerous one. I'd better go to one of his concert when I get a chance) in 2001 but I should have been to one of their concerts before that. (I was curious and checked their past tour schedule and found one that was near where I lived back then: the Sound of Perseverance tour stop in SF's Maritime Hall on Dec 4, 1998. I guess I was mired in relationship issues then. They also played at Madision in 1995 but I guess that happened right after I left) Fortunately, 11 years after Schuldiner's death, his former bandmates teamed up for a multi-city fund raising tour that benefits fellow musicians so I got a glimpse of what Death's live performance was like (other than Death's live in Eindhoven 1998 DVD that I had) The opener was another death metal band Gorguts. I was OK impressed. I just didn't feel much developments (twists and turns) in their music. Death to All (this is the band name the collective former Death members used) got on stage at 10:30pm. They sounded just like what I expected of Death. Gotta give some credits to the sound engineer: all instruments and vocal sounded loud, clear and balanced. I could hear the solos very clearly. So glad to see Paul Masvidal on guitar. I heard him before not just on Death's album but also his own band: Cynic, a very unique and progressive sounding death metal band. And Masvidal played a Steinberger! (Me too! Well, I played its 2nd "label," the Spirit) His seemed to be a GR4 model from the "Golden days" of Steinberger and custom painted. Another great reason to see the show was legendary bassist Steve DiGiorgio who played for some of the biggest names in metal. His 6-string custom bass by Thor was great looking and sounding (Coincidentally, S.T.'s Stephen 'Thundercat' Bruner also played a 6-string bass!) The lead vocalist/guitarist Charles Elliot successfully recreated Chuck's vocal style of Death's earlier albums. Then the band switched to another group of musicians, fronted by Matt Harvey. He sung in the style of Chuck in the later albums. He was also more notably animated than Elliot and reminded me of the late great Ronnie James Dio and Bruce Dickinson. Both frontmen of Death to All are great vocalists/guitarists. This tour certainly gave more visibility and exposure to their own bands (Abysmal Dawn/Bereft and Exhumed) I wish all of them great success.

Last but not least, Chuck Schuldiner rules! He may be with Death but his music of Death will live on forever.

Tuesday, April 17, 2012

我的結他雜記: Berklee Jazz 101後感

期待已久的爵士結他101課程已於上月完成,十二堂教得最多的是chord scale theory,即各種和jazz chord progressions有關的scales, arpeggios, approach notes等等。這些基礎知識算是學會,但要應用在即興solo,感覺和上了四堂後寫的一樣:前路漫漫,單單是見chord彈到arpeggios已不容易,再加上彈對應的scale是難上加難,遑論由root以外的chord tone開始再由chord tone結束樂句,即使勉强預先寫下彈出以上,導師的評語是:彈的音是正確但無爵士語言(not using jazz language)

不過,與其沮喪下去,倒不如對症下藥,第一步是調整心態:原本以為上完101我應做到低層次的即興solo;但想深一層,爵士即興就是難,學了一兩年(Bruno + Berklee)而做不到,也不太過差勁。記起大學時代讀完各科的101,也僅是略懂皮毛矣。以我的能力,短期內求成有點不設實際;目標已重定為五年甚至十年,就算還是失敗亦無悔。

第二,要持續練基本功,做到見chord即彈到arpeggios,再加上對應的scale及approach notes,並由root以外的chord tone開始上行及下行。我的信念是:這些唯有多做才會上心上手,別無他法。經過數個月,我找root note已比以前進步,希望假以時日,其他也能做到。

第三,要吸收爵士語言,每天都要聽一段名家solo抄下來(transcription);以及試彈一些名家常用樂句(licks) 前者用Wolf Marshall的Best of Jazz Guitar一書(附CD);後者則用Sid Jacobs的Complete Book of Jazz Guitar Lines & Phrases

即興尚未成功,鄙人還須努力!

Saturday, March 24, 2012

我的結他雜記:Acoustic Blues - Rock Me Babe

In the mood of learning more blues, especially after watching James Cotton last night. Here is the tab. Also found a few links ([1], [2]) for slide guitar instructions

Tuesday, March 13, 2012

Grisha Goryachev and Jérôme Mouffe


There were 2 concerts I'd like to go to in SF at the same time last Sat. SFJAZZ had a salute to jazz harmonica master Toots Thielman while Omni Foundation had a classical/flamenco guitar one. I am a big fan of the 2 instruments and 3 styles. They are not performed very often, even in a big city like SF. Traditionally, singing and dancing were both way more important than guitar playing in flamenco performances until several great guitar virtuosos raised the bar during last century. Since then a lot of guitarists have incorporated some elements of flamenco, i.e., the so-called "Nuevo Flamenco" style. I enjoy this style a lot too and have seen key players like Ottmar Liebert, Jesse Cook, Strunz and Farah played live but this was the first time I got a chance to see traditional flamenco guitar performance so I chose it over the SFJAZZ one.

The concert began with Grisha Goryachev and Jérôme Mouffe playing several duets, including an arrangement of a piece by Falla. Then Mouffe played several classical solo pieces to conclude the first half. The 2nd half featured Grisha Goryachev playing flamenco pieces by Paco de Lucia and Sabicas (he had recorded a CD of the latter's work) I enjoyed both halves a lot. It's about elegance and emotions. Another thing I like was that they didn't just "rehash" the typical guitar repetoire but try arrangements that you don't hear often.

BTW, the SFJAZZ concert was actually in the same building, Herbst Theatre. Originally the concert featured Toots Thielman himself but he was sick. That's why it became a salute concert. Hope he get well soon!

Saturday, February 18, 2012

我的結他雜記:reuse 5 major scale fingerings for harmonic minor

The 5 shapes taught by Jimmy Bruno have been very valuable to my playing of not just major scale but also arppegios (major 7, minor 7, dom 7, min7b5 ) Even for minor (aeolian) scale,  it's just the matter of finding the relative major. However, playing mixolydian b9 b13 scale (or 5th mode of harmonic minor ), it requires more thinking. For example, to play the scale over G7b9b13, consider we are raising the 7th (Bb to B) of the C minor scale, which has Eb major as its relative.  So,  with G as the root,  it's basically playing the major scale 2 whole step down but start with G and raise the b3 to 3rd (i.e. Bb to B)

Tuesday, February 07, 2012

我的結他雜記:swinging 8th notes in jazz

When I started the Berklee jazz class, the first forum post by our instructor was about how to swing 8th notes. Actually, the first thing he mentioned was how NOT to swing 8th notes. The common way of treating them like tripplets with the middle missing usually ended up with choppy sounding dotted 8th plus 16th note, which is OK for other styles but not jazz. For jazz, the 8th note should be played evenly (same duration) Here's another good explanation I found on the web. His suggestion is the same as our instructor: it's better to play even 8th note slightly behind the beat (i.e., the 1 & 2 & 3 & 4 &) even if it is not the ideal or "perfect" swing. It works out great for me because of my inability to stay ON the beat. I mean, I'm usually behind anyway. Our instructor thought I did that intentionally and liked it!

Also check out what renowned jazz saxophonist David Liebman said about the same topic.

Saturday, February 04, 2012

我的結他雜記: Berklee Jazz 101

在Berklee今個學期終於上期待已久的主修課堂:爵士結他101。短短一個月(即四堂)所教的內容可謂十分緊湊,目標就是在chord progression伴奏下,彈單音solo lines。第一堂練chord tones( root, 3rd, 7th),要彈不是最低那個八度,主要練第五把DGBE 弦上的音。接著三堂分別是練maj 7, min 7, dom 7的arpeggios, approach 。其實和Jimmy Bruno 教的差不多,只不過用較多的樂理名詞概念來解釋,亦提供大量練習曲,包括比較『抽象』純為練熟chord tones/ approach notes 的,也有一些jazzy licks可『即抄即用』的;這些都是Bruno 所無的。當然,Bruno的宗旨是no nonsense, 所以樂理名詞可免則免了。至於範例,Bruno 的網站包括學生上載彈奏及他回應的短片(我只用過他的舊教學網,不知新的是否如此),跟片學彈是學習過程一部份,只是沒有譜可跟而已,其實也是練聽力的好機會。

目前最大的難題倒是和跟Bruno 學時一樣,就是未能把這些chord tones/ approach notes 組成jazzy 樂句。問過Berklee 的老師,他說是沒有公式可跟的,他能教的只是『工具』,必須練熟這些工具,熟到即可應用,再加上多聽多抄(transcribe),累積咁上下經驗,才能即興solo。以前Bruno 也只是叫我多點跟片學彈 。總括他們所言就是:前路漫漫,連Berklee 也無必『掂』秘技可授,實在有點沮喪,恐怕彈爵士此夢難圓。

無論如何,今日我在Berklee勉強能跟得上進度,當年跟Bruno學的5 shapes 居功至偉。5 shapes 其實就是由CAGED 五個open chord 衍生出的五個major scale fingering patterns 。從中可以『抽出』I ii V chord ( maj 7, min 7, dom 7 )的arpeggio fingerings,在結他頸上任何一處都可彈以上任何一種arppegio,並即知對應的major scale,再由此可彈major scale 的modes 。(雖然Bruno 不主張從scale/mode 的角度思考,他教的是考慮ii-V-I整個progression的pitch collection,正正就是shape之中每一粒音)

其實Berklee和Bruno教的很多殊途同歸,例如:
1) Berklee教maj 7或min 7 chord tone可從scale中下一個(較高)音去approach。Bruno教solo時可以由低至高彈arpeggio,然後由高至低彈scale;其實這樣彈的話正包含這些scale approach tone。
2)Berklee教dom 7 arpeggio的b7音,可從root去approach;Bruno也教dom 7 arpeggio可從whole step之上去approach,b7上一個whole step正是root!(不過Berklee有教dom 7 arpeggio的3,不宜用scale tone去approach)
3)Berklee教min 7 chord伴奏時,可彈低whole step之maj 7 arpeggio來solo,就是dorian sound。這個maj 7 arpeggio正是該min 7 chord的b7, 9, 11, 13音。Bruno一直教I ii V任何一個arpeggio都和整個progression夾,無需刻意I arpeggio配對I chord,也是這個道理。

上過這些課,想起十二年前買Herb Ellis《All the shapes you are 》一書,教的其實也是這些道理:練熟ii-V-I progression的arpeggios及scale tones,聽熟他示範配合數十個chords的licks。書中介紹了多個fingerings,他稱之為major scales, minor scales及dominant scales,其實和Bruno教的fingerings同出一轍。不過名字就有少少誤導:他的minor scale fingerings其實是dorian mode而非minor scale一般指的aeolian mode(他用minor一詞是指配合ii min 7 chord吧);而dominant scales當然就是mixolydian mode。Ellis的建議是認熟每一個fingering對應的chord形(他也叫這做shape,但此shape不同Bruno教的5 shapes),solo時多用chord tones及approach notes。和Berklee及Bruno教的都是同一回事。唉,如果十二年前有人解釋給我聽就好了!不過其實我在08年分別請教過一位結他老師(爵士非其專長)及網上論壇,結果還是靠自己搞清楚。現在我用這本書的CD來練transcription,畢竟特地為教學示範而彈的lines比較易聽易明。

Saturday, January 28, 2012

我的結他雜記: Samson Go Mic

It's a tiny USB condenser mic. I bought one since my new guitar doesn't have a pickup. When I use it with Audacity for recording purpose, I could hear the background track from the headphone out of the mic. Nice!