Hey, guys. My name is Marc from Jazz Guitar Lessons. Welcome to this 90 day challenge, where I will guide you through a structured practice routine to explode your skills in jazz, improv, Jazz technique and comping in the next 90 days. So stay tuned. This is going to be Rapid Fire video. Welcome to Jazz Guitar Lessons, where we help guitarists learn jazz faster to express themselves more fluently and have fun along the way.
My name is Marc and if you're looking to learn jazz, form better practice habits and especially if you enjoy a French accent, make sure to subscribe. Here's a very practical application of everything that you can see on YouTube thus far and on the fellowship. So first I'll recommend you join the fellowship because each month you can scroll here and there's a pinned post for the tune of the month.
The challenge You can pick that tune and just be surprised or you can pick one of the tunes you'd like to work on. First step I'd like to think of the next 90 days. Put this down on a piece of paper pinned to your wall. Put a tune every month. That's your practice routine for now. All right? What we'll be doing is effectively running through each of the steps that you have to run through each standard, which I'll give you in detail at the end of this video.
First off, what are the steps? The steps are are built to make you a competent player, doing a minimal version of each of the song in the comping improv and playing the melody record melody to parchment. Okay, so the first step is really to figure out the chords called as the staples, what chord voicings you want to use out of time.
Second step will be to play these chords in time. Third Step is concerned with chord melody. That term would be minimal or thin chord melody, something you can play at. Tempo number four, we're going to make the changes, which is pretty specific to jazz soloing in five. We put it all together in what I call this synthesis step beyond the step five.
After you achieve this with one of your songs, your songs now fall into the retention category, meaning, you know, you had the problem. I learned a tune and then two days later I forgot it. Now we're going to make sure we don't forget it. So I would like to have your playing for the next 90 days subdivided into 80%, acquiring new tunes and 20% maintenance.
Beyond the point of three tunes, you will aim at five or ten. Then retention is going to start to be a bigger issue as well as the other steps in the process, which would be increasing your vocabulary. I just recommend you go to this page right now. Check out our lessons on that slash process. This is the exact process I use with myself, with my private students in the program.
Link in description. And this is where we can really quickly ramp up your competence in learning standards, which we're doing with the 90 day challenge, is we're not getting concerned with the technique, with scales, with the arpeggio or anything. We're getting concerned in the question, how do I play jazz standards, How do I perform jazz standards? And this question is answered with the first five steps.
Ultimately, it's going well. Like I'll play the chords in the song and improvise minimally, and then I know the song, right? So how do I play jazz standards? How do I play three standards in 90 days, which is perhaps more than you've done your entire life, right? If you're watching this, then that's a really good quick win, right?
And then the second part of this, which would be process step six and step seven, the different phases here are how do I how do I get better at meaning, how do I increase my jazz vocabulary so I get better at performing the tunes I already know, but it's really hard to implement step six and seven when I don't have anything to apply it upon.
So if you don't know Stella by Starlight, All the Things You Are, Blues in B-flat and all these beautiful, nice standards, Blue Bossa, Autumn Leaves, Days of Wine and Roses. If you don't know those, you don't have a laboratory to implement your chops, so you may work chops in the empty. So last two words before we get into the process.
Number one, this is typically how guitar instructors or especially jazz teachers of all instruments go about this. They will say, Here's a technique. You put it in the foundation and go, You've got to learn all this technique first before you do the thing you want to do, right? All the scales, all the theory, all the positions, all the exercise, all the chops.
And then maybe after you're good enough, we're going to start to tackle the songs, which to me doesn't make sense at all. So I flip this around. I go, Let's start with the song. Let's have a solid routine. 8020. Remember 80% work on the new tunes, 20% retention, and then let's be competent on that and let the need for the techniques we need emerge from work on these standards.
If you don't know scale, you're going to be well aware that you don't have the skill for Autumn Leaves in this bar. You know, work on it right? So this is my teaching philosophy, which is, which is a little bit reverted. And last notes before we get in this five steps. I'm doing this a bit selfishly. I want to help people write to have a bigger impact.
So if you're watching this and I never talk to you and you never take lessons with me or whatever, it's fantastic. But also, if you do have the intention of meeting with me as your one on one coach, I have proof that it works. You know, take the coaching with Marc. How do I know it will work? Well, it already has, right?
If you follow that process on YouTube and you get the results, you can only benefit from more coaching, more hand-holding and getting your video feedback and precise reviews and getting one on ones and whatnot. Right? So let's get going with the process in five steps. Okay? What I want to do here is start with autumn leaves because it's a rite of passage.
We're going to do it in the key of E minor. So the first notes of the melody are E, I'm sorry, G and C, and the first chord is important not to be misled with Autumn. Is that a minor that's actually in G. Major Auriemma All right. So the first step is called Staple Voicings, and you can find a link in the description for the full training on the fellowship on this.
I will encourage you to grab a lead sheet and you will replicate this with all your tunes. Look at the symbol and pick one voicing for each symbol. I recommend the staples root on the six string. Root on the fifth string with movable coordinate. So let's see my A-minus 727, the G six or G major 76 Logic six C Major line after five to be seven sharp line or plot line to an E minor up just to plain opening minor.
That's the first aid bars. So your job in step one to scratch it off is to have a full version of the song out of time that you just plucked a chord. It sounds clean, beautiful and complete, and you can transition to the next quite easily, avoid this mistake, avoid going right. We don't want that to be one of the court and go, It's ringing.
Where am I going next? Next one. Boom. Where's the next one? Boom. We avoid the gap. Yet we don't really count on playing time. That's it for step one. Please do this on three songs in the next 90 days and you can use a little checkbox like a to do list to make sure you do it. Film yourself doing it, post it to the fellowship.
Hey, everyone, just a quick break here. If you're loving this episode and you want to elevate your own jazz guitar skills, reach out to us. We've guided thousands of guitarists in becoming accomplished jazzers beyond their wildest dreams. So check the link in the description or visit jazz guitar lessons dot net to get started today. Okay, now back to the episode.
All right, on two steps two. So step two, we're going to take our staple voicings and we're going to take them through what I call the conveyor belt. This is where we do it in time. And I recommend say you're doing our needs. For instance, I recommend you do it simply with a chosen rhythm throughout the entire form.
Count yourself and you can use I really you can use your metronome or friend comping for you. I love tapping my foot and discounting, so I'll give you a demo for the first day box. Ready. Also, there's a link in description for further training on that where I fully go through the entire thing at one, 2341, two three, four.
One, two, three, four, two, three, four, two, three, four. Don't let the simplicity fool you. Record yourself and do it to the right. So that's the song. Step two is simply playing the chords in time. If you can do both, you are 2/5 of the way of completing that song for that that 90 day challenge. So I think you can probably work on a song per month or perhaps faster if you're more advanced, if you do three songs in three months, that's a win.
If you did five songs in three months, man, that's amazing. Let's move on to the next step. The third step of the process. I like to call it chord melody, although it could be another label on it because I'm not referring to full fledged, really complex chord melody. I mean, a process where we can hear the melody and we hear some carping.
So I recommend again, you follow the link to the fellowship. There's a version of Autumn Leaves by yours truly, which is a I call it the essentials version. It has a chord melody that sounds approximately like this, right? Like that. But it isn't time. And then the second time around, it goes like, So we have a top melody that's held up with the chord punches under it.
You can learn it verbatim, or you can pick the song that you are working on and create a minimalistic version of your chord melody. Call it the same chord melody, if you will, right? And the purpose here is not to be bogged down with something that's so arranged and so complex that you have problem transitioning. We want to hear the melody and I think that's melodies on top strings is pretty boring.
If it's just naked like this. Crickets. I think there's plenty of space that we can fill with space, so I avoid teaching students just the plain melody, but also avoid the extreme of the chord. Melody is to find a balance, right? So call it a thin chord melody and a test of a thin chord melody. Something simple is putting on the time and seeing if you have to cheat yourself.
If you put I real pro, I will just carries on, doesn't care. It's all waiting for you. So I recommend you do that at a relatively slow pace and you can create your own arrangements. You can grab any of my essentials for free right on the fellowship. Or you can grab another book, say a Barry Galbraith solos book or any good old standards.
Look at this thing and make it as simple as possible while we still retain the melody and the harmony. Okay, now that you can perform the chords out of time, the chords in time and a chord melody minimus minimalistic in time you are 3/5 of the way to doing the full thing of your 90 day challenge. The fourth step is concerned with making the changes, and it's not what you think.
If you've never been exposed to this, you will find out that what I love to do is start simply with the note that gives us the most bang for a book. And that note is third, third, third degree. The third degree is the most chord defining note, especially if we resolve well into it. So there are multiple layers.
If you're just getting acquainted with this and you want to do the 90 day challenge and post your videos, I would say plenty of stuff is going to come out of just seeing the third playing it right home beat one. Autumn Leaves happens also to have the third on Beat one. So third, that's a sort of G, right?
So that's going to require a bit of legwork in your mind, but that's really good. Let me just do Autumn leaves with no bass notes. I'll just count quickly and play the third on beat when you're ready. I want to get ready for one, two, three, four, three, four, two, three, four, two, two, two, three, four. Right. So that's just putting the right on beat one.
So don't be the first layer. Where are my threes. Can I play them in time. Can I wing this. But I will not skip a beat and just know where do you. The next step will be to add one note targeting into it. I like to see it like a plane landing. So I go third is there and I go from above.
From above every one together into the third from above. So if I'm on that chord, go look at that. That's my third call. What's above that. See, that's just go up a everything to typically it's two frets or one thread depending on where we are in the key eyeball. It's an ear ear ball. It's not a word you're about to go.
This is on four and this is on beat one. So I'll do the first advance of the progression. Quickly, to give you an example, again in the Fellowship, there's a full demo of this in which I run the gamut of all the thirds connections. So third, right on a beat and one note approach. I want a two, two, three, four, one, two, three, four, one ticket for one, two, three and four.
Do you want to move on to. Right. So that's like, oh, beginning to target. And there are several different milestones and cracks or tweaks. You could go like seven levels on a metronome to crank it up. I'll give you a good milestone by the end of your 90 days. If you've never done this, the maximum is three Note approaches from above in eight notes.
All right, So if you've never done this, this may feel overwhelming, but it's fine to slow the time down, to work on this for a week or more and then submit your video to the fellowship. Because at this point, you will have all the different components of the tunes almost. We're almost there. That's step four out of five, right?
So playing three eight notes will sound like this one, two, oh one, two, three and four and one. So playing at the end, four and one. So there's three targets to three approaches. And the targets meaning that we start a line on the end of three, there's three eight notes in the end of the line, just tipping my hat to a helper with four motion, which introduced that concept in his book, which is fantastic.
So I'll give you a bit of a rundown of how we could sound with three at note approaches. Not too fast. A one, a212, three and two, three, four. One, two, three, two. Well, sorry, it's slow. Mistakes are bound to happen. You know what matters? Keep going. The form keeps going. I really is not catching up to you.
I will is just going to keep going. Your sort of keep going. So keep going and build up that tolerance again. That's a good milestone. It's not I wouldn't say it's advanced, but I would say it's a good place to be to go, Yeah, I got my foundations once you can do targeting from above three eight notes on any chord and you can wing it, then there are plenty more ways to do that.
People say, I'll want to use an enclosure. You might guess you want to do an arpeggio up, resolving down. You want to do this or that or that. They're all work, they're all fine. But now I'm segmenting the work to go, What's the minimal thing you can do so you have an impact? That's the goal. So just to recap, you got your chords down out of time.
You got them in time with a little Charleston on the form, you got a minimal chord melody. Now you're able to make the change on each. You're not concerned with shredding on blue scales or learning all arpeggios and scales in all positions and then shredding with the flat lines. You're not you don't have to do that. You can just resolve properly and then you're fine.
And let's move on to the fifth and final step of this 90 day challenge, Step five of our process. You've made it. Congratulations. You want to achieve step five on at least three tunes within the next 90 days, and then you can shoot me an email mark at just guitar lessons like that or, you know, semi flowers or something, because you can say, Oh my God, this works.
Yeah, it works. It does, it does, it does with me, does with students. It's fantastic. Plus, it's like air. The most beautiful things in life are free. It's just a segmented process in which you can divide and conquer due to work. My Step five I like to call the synthesis. So we synthesize by saying, Well, if I'm able to achieve step five, I don't really need to look at step one, two, three, four anymore because I will notice on here, step five, I like to call it the jam session, so feel free to put on ideal or to use one of the jams that you have on the fellowship for free with the link below
and into jam. I have to do four things and I refer to this on YouTube as my four C Thank you Michael. One of my first guitar instructors forces stands for four Chorus Exercise, four course exercise. So there are four choruses courses in which we do four different roles. First one head in, last one head out, head and head out.
Pretty in the middle. I'm going to do head in a bit of comping, then a bit of improv and head out. That's it. Caveat You can play bits of your chord melodies for the head and or the head out or just one or the two. It's sort of a review step go. AD Can I play that song? Oh yeah, I know the song.
I'm just not going to chunk the chords that the course of that song. The song is the melody and the stuff I worked on Get Perfect. I got it, I got it in, I got it out. I'm playing in good time. Second step, comping. Well, what do you do? You ad lib comping from what you learned in the first two steps, you can use your staples if you know inversions and bass and chords and plot lines.
Be my guess. You just jam. You're doing it on the on the fly, just attempting to do a complete version. What do you do for improv, then? That's a big question. I recommend you do some of the making the changes without making it too rigid. So I would say let's step four. Inform your improv what you're going to do in step four.
In step five. If in step five, you wind up shredding on blues notes and stuff, it's beautiful. You are just jamming. So at a minimal level, to achieve the 90 day challenge, you want to have reached the synthesis step of five steps on at least three standards. Autumn Leaves, Blue Bossa Stella All the Things You Are Trying Steps 26 two Countdown Girl from Ipanema.
Whatever. You Can Even Be Bebop Tunes. Now, Caveat. When you do bebop tunes, you will likely not want to do a chord melody because it's pretty intense. All right. So what we have so far is 90 day challenge wrapped up in five steps. Isn't that beautiful? Okay, recap. I want you to think about this in Divide and conquer mentality.
You've got your three standards that you picked up front. You know, you have five steps each. It does mean three times five equals 15. You have 15 assignments that are do with yourself as your coach, or you can use your own one on one teacher. If you have a local teacher to do, Hey man, keep me accountable to these things, okay?
Sure. Right. Or you can process to the fellowship or would do both. And naturally, if you need more coaching and resources, you can see if you can get a spot on my schedule and then we can talk and explain the process. And this really does work. We can accelerate it. And most of my students will typically cover a new song every 2 to 3 weeks with these steps.
Now, again, 15 assignments within 90 days, you will be amazed. Track your time, track your progress. Things will start to change drastically. And again, before I let you go with this, there are two more advanced step in the process documents or just like that slash process. And again, I don't recommend you dig into steps six and seven until you got at least five or ten tunes together.
That's going to really achieve the first jam says jam sessions. And then, you know, post a comment, let us know how you did. Let me know if you have any questions about this. Please like and subscribe. I'll see you on jazz guitar Lessons, improve your jazz guitar playing with a real teacher and I'm really looking forward to seeing your video, post your questions and all the massive improvements you're going to do in the next 90 days.
Okay. Thank you.
