Building a Jazz Vocabulary: A Resource for Learning Jazz Improvisation [Englisch] [Taschenbuch]

Described in one word: useful!

If you were going to teach someone to read, would you start out by having them memorize and repeat great speeches from history, or would you teach them the alphabet and how to recognize common words and phrases?

Building a Jazz Vocabulary takes the latter approach and is a very cleanly organized book in which each section contains a brief explanation and expository exercises that illuminate a fundamental feature of the language of Jazz.

Topics covered include intervals, chords, scales, progressions, and solo building, among others. Perhap the gem of the book is the excellent coverage of cells and the development of melodic line.

One of the real advantages of Building a Jazz Vocabulary is that the exercises are not mindless transcriptions or the painfully mechanical contrivances that all too commonly fill up endless pages in many music books. Instead, each topic is covered with just enough explanation to make sure you get it intellectually and just enough examples and exercises to allow you to see how it works in practice. The topic then ends by providing enough suggestions on practice and application that you can proceed on your own for a lifetime or two.

As a result, this is the rare kind of music instruction book where you *will* want to have your instruments in hand, but *will not* just be reading exercises off of a page.

A couple of things to be aware of, this book doesn't do a lot of hand-holding; it's written in an easy to understand manner but it is definately for adults and does presume some existing knowledge of music and music theory. Additionally, it covers 'vocabulary' only in the sense of notes and phrases. Coverage of intonation or rhythm is very brief.

FWIW, I'm a somewhat experienced musician and play a number of instruments, primarily guitar and violin. My wife is a relative novice and plays tenor sax. We both love this book. I'll be getting her a copy for her birthday. Do I love my wife? Sure! But mostly, getting her a copy of her own is the only certain way to ensure she keeps her grubby fingers off of mine!

- Cayenne

I can count on one hand, the number of books on how to improvise jazz that are actually worth owning. This is clearly one of them!

One of the worst things you can see in a book on improvising is something like..."here are the scales that you can play over the various chords. Now go and randomly mix up the notes of each scale over the proper chord and you'll be on your way."

That's just not going to work, if you want to learn to play jazz.

The author of this book actually shows you how to develop a jazz sound by starting you out with some of the most basic and important melodic units, in simple 4 note cells, which you will learn to alter and string together, giving you the necessary foundation for developing meaningful, logical and authentic sounding solos.

Highly recommended!!!

I'm a fretless electric bass player, and I've played in jazz/fusion bands with competent, formally trained musicians for a few years. I can improvise walking bass lines freely over fast-moving chord changes, and can do some modal improvisation. I also studied classical piano for 8 years. So, I approached this book with the intermediate knowledge the author says you need to understand it.

I'm also a university teacher with about 12 years of experience teaching non-music courses.

With this background, I think a good text has the theory explained in simple concepts, with many very clear examples. A good book also has a significant number of practice exercises after each theory section. These exercises should allow the student to master the individual concepts, integrating them later on. The practice exercises should also provide answers, where applicable, so you can check your work.

Further, a good book presents material so the student sees an increase in their ability to improvise as quickly as possible -- this increases their motivation to persist with the remaining exercises in the book.

Against these criteria, I find Building a Jazz Vocabulary to be a fair, but not excellent book.

Its premise -- that there is a common jazz vocabulary that the students can use to "imitate, assimilate, and innovate" is interesting and sound. The author's explanations of the components of this common vocabulary are well explained, and he provides for simple and multiple examples often.

On the other hand, I found the book to be sorely lacking in carefully crafted practice exercises that help the reader practice the concepts. The author provides Etudes (studies) but they are long and sometimes complicated. Further, there are times there are no chord changes over the staff, which makes it hard to understand how the notes fit in with the overall harmony of the song. The author repeatedly puts the onus on the reader to find their own practice exercises, with exercises like "find a jazz solo and analyze it for four-note cells". Also, there is no CD with the book, so you have to use your own play-along software like Band in a Box if you want to practice at home, which will cost you an extra $50-60 or more if you don't already have it.

In terms of providing motivation, I also found the book wanting. Like many books on improvisation, the author insists that one must learn a concept in "all keys" immediately. This presents the reader with an instantly boring and daunting task, which has no immediate return on investment. I think the author would have done better to provide play-along exercises in concert keys C, Bb and Eb, throughout the entire book. This would help the reader see some results immediately, which would further his or her motivation to keep practicing with the book. At the end of the book, he could have then encouraged the student to extend the knowledge gained to all other keys.

I think there could have been some theoretical, written practice exercises too, with answers provided.

So, this is a book a good theoretical reference -- exposing the elements of basic jazz vocabulary in a fairly well-explained and simple fashion. But it doesn't put enough effort into providing you with practice exercises to help you get the concepts into your mind and hands.