I wrote this to isolate some things used in my main uptempo Reed method— which I continue to find an excellent method. This is good if you need to polish a few of those bass drum patterns […]
Category: fast tempos
Latest uptempo drill
I’ll be honest, most of my uptempo things I improvise while practicing, and then work on them maybe a few times over a week or two. But taken together, they give you more than a […]
Transcription: Roy Haynes – It’s Time
Roy Haynes playing behind Herbie Hancock’s solo, on the title track of Jackie McLean’s record It’s Time. There’s a lot of what people call “broken” time here, and meter-within-meter playing. The tune is in 4, […]
Daily best music in the world: Al Harewood fast
Digging around for some Al Harewood— I mostly know him from the 60s Blue Note records he’s on, but he was active into the 90s— I found this killing live track from George Benson, in […]
Reed interpretations: new uptempo method
All right, I found the way to use Reed at faster jazz tempos. My “the way”, anyhow. I’ve mostly been winging my uptempo jazz comping until now— I never had materials I really liked for […]
Velocity stickings for Syncopation, Lesson 10
For a couple of my students I’ve written a set of velocity stickings to use with Lesson 10 (pp. 22-23) in Syncopation. They’re designed to be played fast, hey? These will be a godsend for […]
Very occasional quote of the day: Max Roach fast
“We’d have jam sessions at Minton’s where the tenor players were long-winded,” Roach explained. “Don Byas would play 20 minutes on ‘Cherokee,’ and then Johnny Griffin would play another 20 minutes, and then somebody else […]
Listening: holy shnikeys
A couple of standards from the album The Hub of Hubbard, by Freddie Hubbard. With Louis Hayes on drums and Richard Davis on bass, plus Roland Hanna and Eddie Daniels. Recorded in Germany in 1969 […]
Tootie Heath brush lesson
True old school guys approach things a whole different way from the modern technocratic thing. Here’s Tootie Heath giving a brush lesson: h/t to Larry Appelbaum
Very occasional quote of the day: Fast City
Omar Hakim speaks to Modern Drummer when he was with Weather Report in the mid 80s: RT : How did you learn to play bop so fast? OH : I don’t know. With much difficulty. […]