Hi all~~I'm a rocker and now into some jazz shit,haha.can anyone give me some advice on learning jazz stuff?? and a big problem to me is what is the f'ing scale tat jazz music is using? and whose song should i learn to improve it Thx^^

if you're looking to go into jazz then you really have to know your theory. Nothing else can help. Transcribe every piece of music you listen to. Study about key centers. Listen to everything that comes your way (classical music included ). Study your fingerboard until you can find notes on them without having to think at all.

Miles Davis is a good listen. Ray Charles also comes to mind.

The more modern guys on piano like Chick Corea or Michel Pettruciani.

Bebop and big band stuff by the Buddy Rich band. Charlie Parker.

And also any band with "New Orleans" in the name

Just google jazz and you will see all the greats listed there.

EDIT: there is no fixed scale for jazz. It's just a big mish mash of notes done properly.

This post has been edited by Bassix: Jan 26 2008, 09:45 PM

EDIT: there is no fixed scale for jazz. It's just a big mish mash of notes done properly.

actually there are rules. . . and when you say a big mish mash of notes then you're wrong. . . that is what jazz musicians call atonality. . . go wiki it. . .

but you should start off with basic be-bop scales and jazz minor scales. . .

get a hang of it then move on to whole tone / half tone, super locrian, and all that other stuff. . .

atonality also requires you to have good sense of timing and polyrhythm. . .

im more to learning the chords 1st
and get some theory on tat

having a strong theory background cud speed things up

Well, for me jazz is a big mish mash of notes kind of like how poetry is a big mish mash of words.

And the rules in jazz is like grammar in the language world. You learn it so that you can go about bending it and screwing it up as badly as you possibly can while still staying within it's boundaries. But like poetry where the choice of words is the writers alone, choice of notes in jazz is the musicians alone.

But of course the very fact that most jazz musicians are masters in music and have studied music to a certain level shows that Equilibrium777 is right.

As for me i still hold on to my description one of my modern jazz heros Chick Corea. He's just playing random notes. Just that he can repeat exactly what he just played.

Yep i'm an ignorant rocker

This post has been edited by Bassix: Jan 27 2008, 04:06 AM

wat was that saying again?
think goes something like this.

jazz musicians play 10,000 notes for 3 ppl.
blues musicians play 3 notes for 10,000 ppl.

on the random notes thing. . . if you actually ask a jazz musician what was it he plays. . . he can tell you exactly what he just did. . . so technically its not mish mash. . .

example i met a sax player who does the later miles (where he went electric) he studied in UK and he would play stuff that are just insane. . . when i asked him what he played he can show me the breakdown exactly and explain in detail why he choose those notes. . .

you can't just randomly hit notes and expect it to sound good. . . it ain't blues where the scales are always perfect and safe. . .

even when it comes to atonality there a strict rules and boundries to it. . .

it may sound wierd cause people are not used to the scale. . . hearing a foreign scale will sound alien to new ears. . .

and jazz musicians work around the chords too. . . there are unlimited ways to approach a chord so sometimes you have different keys in a single bar. . .

Get the basics down first I guess... Major/Minor Scales -> Arpeggios -> Modes. If your foundation is strong, it would much easier to get into the 'jazzy' scales.

There are lots of dedicated jazz guitar sites around, try Google (I don't have the links with me now, currently in ofc. )

xien, how's the jazz books helping? I just bought a jazz book too but haven't really gone through it.

Darren, I've got few free jazz ebooks. Will post them once I get home.

Haven't read. Left unopened in my HDD ever since I got them.

Which did ya buy?

This post has been edited by led_zep_freak: Jan 28 2008, 09:48 PM

I want jazz ebooks as well. EBP mind to email em over darrenlau@msn.com?