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Unknown
Hey, guys. Welcome back to the channel. My name is Mark from Jazz Guitar Lessons, and in this video and podcast episode, I want to talk about a more elusive side to improvising and soloing. And no, this is not clickbait. This is something that absolutely
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Unknown
every single one of the decent improvisers that I know, even the, you know, the average.
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Unknown
I went to Berklee kind of guy. Your guitar teachers, myself included, all the students that were successful are doing. And this stems from a reading that I'm doing recently, and the book is arranged by David Epstein. And interestingly, here's a reveal. So I'll go for the big reveal of the video and then we can hammer it out.
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Unknown
I'll even give you three precise exercises to to be acquainted with that side of playing and how the brain functions. So the reveal is our brain can develop a capacity for self,
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Unknown
censorship or to block off that part of us that censors. That's it. Why is this relevant to improv? So here's the thing. You may be sitting here and especially coming as a rocker or classical player and go, I can learn all these skills.
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Unknown
I learned the harmonies of the tunes. I know the the scales, the chords with the nines and stuff. But there's no way I can do this in real time. So this is what we're about to address. So it's less language and vocabulary and skills and stuff and more about the how. But it's very nuanced. So bear with me.
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Unknown
You may humor me for just a second. So here's the anecdote. As a kid, I mean, I was in my early 20s. I went to that MRI machine at one of the Montreal hospitals, and they were testing the brains of subjects that were trained musicians versus not trained musicians. And, no kidding. The week before I was in the in the scanner, sting, the famous singer.
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Unknown
Sting, the police guy was in that same scanner for the, the TV show. The nature of things with David Suzuki. So I was in that machine and they scan it, and they had me hear music and sometimes perform something with my index or play a few notes, and they would look at, you know, the different areas of the brain react to that.
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Unknown
I'm not a neurosurgeon. I don't know what I'm talking about, but what I do know is that they're able to find differences in the ways that people improvising music, tackle information. What kind of brain areas are lighting up? All right. So that's the premise for this video. Now, they were able to construct a mini keyboard that has no, no metal in it.
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Unknown
So it could be in the mirror machine. And they asked improvisers to improvise in that machine. I saw that on TV a long time ago. Right. And they could find that the area of self-censorship or judgment could essentially be
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Unknown
turned off in improvising musicians or the good improvisers or the decent improvisers. I don't mean like Wes Montgomery or Pat Metheny, I mean people that could improvise well, well enough had that capacity.
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Unknown
now, bear with me in a moment. Like censorship is pretty useful. Like if I'm doing daily life things or if I meet new people, there are thoughts that I have that should definitely not be coming out all right. However, if I am improvising lyrics and I'm playing on top of standards, I'm jamming with people that self-censorship or that judgments may actually be a hindrance.
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Unknown
And so there's a way that, again, that's not the language, it's not the scales, the tunes and the chords, but there's a way that trained musician can turn that off and free flow. So I want to give you more like a few exercises in order to do that. Free flow right on the guitar today. It's going to be fascinating.
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Bear with me
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until the end of the video.
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Unknown
Now, why is improv so hard to learn?
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Unknown
So I want to bring the example of, say, chess,
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Unknown
versus soccer or football for my European friends. Right? So in a game of chess, there's a learning environment in which the outcome is binary, which means there's you win, I lose. Vice versa. And there's a certain number of pieces, there's a certain number of moves that could happen right in the book range.
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Unknown
the author talks about a kind of learning environment that's not his term, David Epstein, but it is from research, right? The kind learning environment has a definite outcome and also a feedback mechanism that's accurate and that's precise and that's instant. Right. So I lost a chess game because I was a bad move. And that's the end of that.
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Unknown
On the opposite side of the spectrum, there's a wicked learning environment where we may or may not get feedback, and that feedback may not be accurate. For instance, soccer, there's so many people that play, there's the ball and there's so many strategies. It's so hard that I'm trying to drill my way into doing that. And having success
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Unknown
There's just too many things happening. And the feedback I may get,
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Unknown
it may be a fluke, maybe, like beginner's luck type thing. Right. So this this is why improv is so hard to learn. Because the outcome is not binary. And there, just so many other variables.
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Unknown
So that's why rockers and classical players, maybe like you watching, will say, well, I have all the materials, but I can't quite improvise. So jazz to that extent
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Unknown
is a bit more like a language in that as kids, we started making sounds way before mommy picked up a grammar book and went, this is an adverb, right?
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Unknown
So in the jazz sense and wicked learning environment is just,
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Unknown
I guess better to do it by rote, by repeat. And I'll give you now three exercises that you can do either simultaneously, one after the other. They all have strengths and weaknesses, and these three exercises can simply help you get acquainted with that side of you that can play and perform things and have fun without the judgment side.
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Unknown
It's not going to be instantaneous like I have. I have the room mate. My head's like, this is not swinging enough. Why did you play this last night? But this is constantly happening. But in my experience, improvising jazz is its own form of meditation, and we can work on that focus, or we can work on that flow state on that letting go so we don't constantly judge.
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Unknown
And then actually stop playing. So this is the kind of training we're about to do. Stay tuned. I have three exercises coming up.
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Unknown
first exercise I suggest we play together is what I would call free flow. Namely, this is going to sound completely crazy, but there was a time my life where I would simply play things and just play things,
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Unknown
not try to set them for scale or arpeggio. It could be a bunch of chords, could be fingerings. But to let myself be in a way be the observer of what's happening so we can do this right now.
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Unknown
Grab your guitar if you want. This is completely off the cuff. This is not prepared.
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Unknown
You play a single note and I'll play another one and then play another one, and then stop a little bit. And then maybe the fingers want to go there. And then.
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Unknown
And that's essentially the training which is people say you play anything I do kind of and I let that little intuitive voice play whatever it feels like.
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Unknown
I'm not trying to play within a scale, an arpeggio. I'm not trying to play specific chords, although because of my training, that stuff may come out and there's just no bounds. And what I recommend is doing a, you know, a timer, do it for 30s beep stop done.
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Unknown
Do it for a minute. Do it for two minutes. So a lot of fun actually. Just make sure no one's listening except yourself.
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Unknown
What's fascinating with that kind of exercise is that my students will often say, like, oh, what tune were you doing? Like what? What's that song? But you were making changes to a progression. It's like after the facts, perhaps there is this analysis we can make like, oh, that was the third of this and it went to be an exercise, but
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Unknown
upstream, I'm simply not looking to do anything specific.
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Unknown
I'm just being in the moment and going like, okay, whatever comes out comes out. In American football, they call it the throw a Hail Mary. It's like, we don't know what's going on and it's fine. am I fine with that ambiguity, this insecurity of playing things that are ugly? Am I good with that? Am I good with, sitting on a note and just hearing how it sounds?
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Unknown
It's very Zen, actually. Right?
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Unknown
So there's two components of this exercise. The first one would be free flow like this. That's one a and then 1BI would say you could add the component of tempo and you could have a metronome like this for instance sitting up on a beat that's 116 and just play along to it right.
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Unknown
I'm swinging like that. Or you could do it very straight.
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Unknown
Notice the exercises. I relinquish control over whatever is going to come out. It's like it came out and that's it, I think I love to do. And that's like for call it jazz shredding, if you will. I would set it up and hear it as two and four for a fun tempo that I'm comfortable at and just let it rip.
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Unknown
Right. So something like this, that's 76 but that's two and four. The metronome. So a1, a2, a1 to get three.
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Unknown
This seems to be an idea I have, that's recurring, today maybe, I don't know why it's coming out. I don't even know the note, so that's doesn't really matter in that point. And I think, earlier this morning, I was playing Just friends. So I'm hearing jazz and. Right. So sometimes I hear an interval. Sometimes I'll be doing this free flow and I'll be of course, just hearing a motif and hearing more of a rhythm.
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Unknown
So I just latch on to it and I just listen where it's got no judgment. Is it good? Is it bad? Am I in the music? There is no form. There's no way. Like there's no way anything I can play is wrong. Because anything goes. yeah. So also, I recommend this book that I'll put on camera here for you guys called Free Play.
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Unknown
It is by Kenny Warner. And, can you see this? Yeah. So this is volume 104 and our musical landscapes on which you can practice playing free like that. So I love I love the way I did it. The piano player, the author. Because it's okay. We can have time and no changes. Or we can have just changes like chord changes, but no time.
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Unknown
Or we could have a very dry like staccato sounds stuck. We can have held notes or we can, you know, all these metrics that are not necessarily about the harmony or the melody or the rhythm. It's more about like the texture, how it feels, how it sounds, like fascinating. And then again, seeing what crops up in my mind while I do this free flow is sort of the treats like, oh, wow, you know, I'm thinking about lunch right now, right?
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Unknown
Or or I'm out to lunch, depending. Also, speaking of that author, there's two more authors. You may you may look to read in that vernacular. So there's Effortless Mastery by Kenny Werner, same author. And that's more of a, I would say a meditation actually. There are audio tracks with this is only the as well in which he talks about he does guided meditations with you, about the musical side.
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Unknown
So really interesting. And there's one more, violinist. I don't have the paper copy called Free Plate. There's a red cover. It's, Stephen, something namak of which? Something like that. Really interesting because it gives an in into that mental game of playing the music versus what scales or what chords are correct and what kind of practice routine and arpeggios and with string gauge and what kind of pick and what's the amp and whatever.
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Unknown
And so those that's a the first exercise for helping you, stop the censorship. As you notice, I'm like playing it and notice if the big censor, the big bad wolf comes up and then I go, okay, well, you're judging it. Fine, I notice, but then I'm going to keep playing whatever comes to mind.
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Unknown
Second exercise is not actually an exercise.
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Unknown
You could do it in combination with the two other ones would be to film yourself and watch yourself. The, the the idea here is I can practice non-judgment while I'm in free flow. I can practice just having anything come out and just rehearse that. And when I go to play, or my autumn leaves, or my summertime or my all the things you are, some of that freedom carries over with me.
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Unknown
So a bit of that free playing, that's non-judgment and, you know, the censorship is turned off. It carries with me while I play. So if I film myself and I listen to myself after I listen and watch, I practice non-judgment while I'm not playing, that's really difficult, by the way. So to hear it and just to take it for what it is and not go, I should have played.
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Unknown
I played the wrong note. I should have played the flat line instead of should you know all of that. You can practice non-judgment during playing, which is way more exciting. Or you can practice non-judgment while watching yourself play. That's the second exercise. There's another video on YouTube you can watch here. Here I'll put in the description where I described all the benefits of filming oneself.
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Unknown
We do it as far as my coaching program. If you're interested, link in description. That's mandatory that all my students go through this painstaking process of filming themselves. We get feedback over the videos and the assignments naturally, but also the process is to help the student, him or herself develop in being able to film, to watch and go.
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Unknown
This is how I'm playing. I'm removing any denial from what it is or what it should be or whatever, and I'm posting it to the group with the, the mentors, the coaches, and also with the fellow student. So it's tremendous exercise. If you haven't filmed yourself or listen to yourself play. This is life changing. And I, I'm saying this very consciously.
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Unknown
It's mind altering what you're going to pick up when you hear yourself play. It's fantastic.
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Unknown
okay recap. So first exercise free flow in time, not in time. Whatever. Use a free play book, whatever free flow Non-Judgment second exercise film and watch. Which means I practice not censoring myself while I watch myself while I'm not busy playing.
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Unknown
The third exercise is basically shut up for long enough so that the previous idea rings in my head. And I can do this in the moment, and I can implement this at any time. So I can do a standard improv or blues improv. And what I do is I call this the instant replay echo or the echo exercise.
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Unknown
When I started to do that, I remember like it was yesterday, I remember where I was. I remember the guitar, remember what room, I remember what I was wearing, and I started to improvise on a B-flat blues, and I just stopped in between my lines for long enough and pause and rest. And then the form carries over like the Blues keeps going right?
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Unknown
I only allowed myself to play the next thing once the previous thing had digested, so to speak. So the previous thing, was echoed in my mind. What's cool is when I do that, it took like four bars for me to play something else. I was playing very little, mostly rests, but after a while one beat would be enough.
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Unknown
And if we hear, like Keith Jarrett's and Bill Evans and these heavy guys, they could rest a 16th note and that's all they need for them to digest. So my my instructor back then said, that's like an emotional resolution. It's not necessarily the 5 to 1. The flat night. It's not that it's an emotional resolution of all the information that was carried in the previous bars.
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Unknown
So you can do the instant replay exercise while you do improvise over form, or if you jam with friends, or you can do it while you do your free flow, which would be free flowing and then stopping and hearing how it sounds, and then resume and stop, hear how it sounds, etc.. So you have to stop playing long enough.
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Unknown
That's the trick. That's the thing with the third exercise, play stop long enough to hear the echo of the previous thing. Once it's heard, check. Move on. You can do it at any or all time, but that's a more elusive exercise. It's really hard to demonstrate because unfortunately, even if I do, it's here. You, the listener. You don't have access to my inner world like my consciousness.
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Unknown
You don't know how long it took and you don't know how well or how soon. That previous idea I played was fully digested. But be aware, if it's your first time doing that, you're going to have really long periods of rest. And one of my instructors in Montreal, another guy, James Williams, said as an exercise, at least play that form of whatever you're doing, like out of nowhere, I don't care a bossa nova, whatever, improvise lines, but only play what you hear, quote unquote.
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Unknown
Only play what I hear. And I played, I'm like, I called him dude. I'm playing like three notes. Every chorus, it's like, yeah, that's right. You're you're on your way. It means you're really not fudging anything or letting your fingers take it away. You're not that BSing. You're developing that deliberateness of playing. So that's partially like an instant replay exercise, which is, hey, can I really cut the bass
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Unknown
and just play what I hear?
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Unknown
Naturally, this is not sustainable because if I have a gig and I have someone to ask me to take a solo on the B-flat blues or so what, I don't want to sit there and just rest and go, I don't hear anything. I'm not playing anything, I don't hear. I don't want to. There is an exercise still. I can fall back on my surge, on my bass, on my safety net, on the licks that I know.
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Unknown
Fine. But these moments of pure inspiration, what's really fascinating, and I'll leave you with that thought, is that the moments of pure inspiration can be felt and heard by the audience. People were like, oh my God, you were really in the pocket. Analyze this after the fact. Put this through your computer. Yeah, the rhythms were cool. There was eight notes and it was the scale of that scale was scale, but the level of energy carried by those choices seems to be heavier when it's backed by what I fully hear.
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Unknown
So that's pretty intense. It's pretty intense topic. I hope you enjoyed it. I hope you can take these three exercises and at least try to free flow. At least try to watch yourself and play and even do instant replays. Let yourself hear the echo because with the best of intentions and hours upon hours of scales and arpeggios and years and even all the sanders, if you don't have that more elusive part to the improv, which is actually the the turning off of the censorship, if you don't have that and you keep censoring yourself, you may wind up sounding like some of my colleagues and people I know.
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Unknown
You know, being you sound like a frustrated Jazzer. Yeah, people say like, oh, that guy sounds like he's eternally, eternally not satisfied with his playing. And I think I was there for a long time and it's, you know, it's a work in progress for me. So on that note, I'm Mark from Jazz Guitar Lessons. Please like and subscribe.
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Unknown
Let me know if you have any questions or comments below and I will see you in the next episode. Take care. Bye.
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