For B Instruments
Course Guide Jay Metcalf www.bettersax.com
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Table T able of Contents Contents Introduction
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Pentatonic Scale Intro
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Pentatonic Basics
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Pentatonic Exercise 1
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Pentatonic Exercise 2
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Upside Down & Backwards
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Pentatonic Exercise 3
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Syncopated Pentatonic Exercise 1
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Minor Theory
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Syncopated Pentatonic Exercise 2
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Pentatonic Skip Exercise 1
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Melodic Ear Training 1
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Melodic Ear Training 2
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Advanced Ear Training 1-3
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Pentatonic Improvisation
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Solo Analysis
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Summary
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Introduction This Pentatonic Foundation Course has been out for over a year now and saxophone students all over the world are discovering a new way to approach getting better on the saxophone. The course focuses on saxophone playing, but most of the material can be easily applied to any instrument.
First, some background The saxophone has been a major part of my life from the age of 10. I started out in the school band. Perhaps like many of you, I played in the band and kind of enjoyed it, but the music we played was a bit boring to me, and wasn't at all the sort of music I listened to. We learned how to read the notes on the pages of sheet music, but lots of kids lost interest along the way and gave up. Because of my intense love of music I continued and took every opportunity to play any kind of music I could, but all along the way, I was always given sheets of classical music that were complex and sounded a bit weird sometimes when I practiced my part on my own. Half the time I was supposed to be counting rests! Throughout my teenage years, I was into rock and roll like many of us are, and at some point I developed a love for the Blues and Soul Music. My school had a jazz band, which was a bit more fun, but it was the same old story of reading complicated sheet music for songs I'd never heard before, and having to understand really complex chord symbols and rhythms in order to play solos. In any case, the music never sounded anything like what I listened to on my own, and what I imagined myself playing. I went to a prestigious music school after high school, but the program focused on classical music and modern jazz. I spent countless hours practicing very
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complex styles of music but still didn't know how to play the music I loved most. How could this be? I wanted to jam with my non music-major friends who played rock and popular music in the local bars, but when I got on stage with them, everything I played sounded wrong.
Solving a Common Problem BetterSax.com is all about solving this problem that many saxophone players have. Traditionally, if you want to learn the saxophone you have a choice between the Jazz method, and the Classical method. This course �lls in the gap and teaches the information that has been the most useful in my saxophone playing career and was never taught to me in music school. That's right, with all honesty I can say that 90% of what I play professionally is stuff I learned outside of classical and jazz music school and method books. Not to say that everything I learned in school is not valuable information that contributes to my overall musicianship, but it’s kind of like your high school trigonometry class. You’re not going to use it everyday. I want to show saxophone players the everyday things they need to learn in order to play popular styles of music (rock, pop, soul, blues, jazz and more). Throughout the course I try and keep the music theory part to a minimum and focus on the very practical nuts and bolts elements. The theory we do have to learn is explained in a way that everyone can understand.
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So who is this for? The main goal of this course is to help you play good melodies and improvisations on the saxophone in a wide variety of musical styles. If this interests you, then this course is de�nitely for you. If you have a basic knowledge of how to play the saxophone, you can start using this course now to get a head start on the things you should be learning from the beginning to become a better sax player. If you've been playing for a few years, or played in the past and want to pick it back up, this course is perfect for you. Intermediate players can use this course to quickly advance their saxophone playing and get to the next levels. Some of you may have put the instrument down in the past because you were bored with the materials you had available to learn from and weren't learning the music you really wanted to know how to play. This course is probably exactly what you wish you had before, and it's a great way to get back into playing your saxophone. For those of you who are more advanced players, there may be quite a lot to learn for you as well in this course. As I mentioned before, I became very good at playing classical and jazz styles, yet still had di fficulty playing some popular music styles. In my case, the vast majority of the well paid gigs and recordings I have done were not classical or jazz music, but popular styles like blues, pop, rock, and funk. I know this is a common situation for many advanced saxophone players.
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One Scale to Rule Them All Sorry about the Tolkien reference, but in this case it is appropriate. The pentatonic scale is THE scale you should know inside and out. It is the main source of melodic and improvised musical language in everything from folk music to modern jazz. One thing that really gets in our way as saxophone players is that we start o ff by learning the major scale, and then base everything else off of that. Now, there is nothing wrong with knowing the major scale. We de �nitely need to know it inside and out as well. What gets in our way, are the 2 notes of the major scale, that have a more specialized musical function. To say it very simply, there are 5 notes in the major scale that are basically all the time notes, and 2 notes that are more sometimes notes. Those 5 all the time notes make up the pentatonic scale. We are going to show you why the pentatonic scale is the preferable choice for your musical base and how to use it.
Can’t Say Enough About Simplicity Beginning saxophone improvisors suff er from technique on their instrument that is often far more advanced than their ability to improvise eff ectively. The results of this usually sound pretty bad partly because they have lots of major scale technique, when what they need is pentatonic scale technique. The pentatonic scale is the go everywhere, do everything cousin of the major scale and he is going to be our go to scale from now on. By the end of this course you will have a solid base to start playing melodies and improvisations more eff ectively. There is of course, lots more to learn once we have established this base, and we will be following this Pentatonic Foundation course up with more lessons on BetterSax.com
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Pentatonic Scale Intro Theory Review This lesson is meant to be a quick review of the basic theory we need to build our major pentatonic scales Here is our C major scale:
Each note is assigned a number. All C's are 1, all D’s will be 2 etc. If this were a G major scale, G would be 1, A would be 2 etc.
In order to construct our major Pentatonic scale, we simply remove notes 4 and 7 from our major scale. These are the sometimes notes I mentioned earlier.
This is our major pentatonic scale in the key of C. Notice that the notes F (4) and B (7) have been removed. These are our 5 all the time notes.
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Pentatonic Basics Get Your Metronome For this lesson you will need a metronome. If you have a traditional battery powered metronome that you like, you can use that. If you have a smartphone or tablet you can download an app to use as your metronome. There are many excellent apps available. Choose a sound that is pleasing to you and can easily be heard over the sound of your instrument. Everything in this lesson is played at 70 bpm (beats per minute). Feel free to play these exercises slower of faster according to your level. C major Pentatonic scale up and down in half notes.
Practice this several times on your own with the metronome set to 70. • Begin by taking a full breath. • Play with a full and steady air stream and focus on getting a good tone. • Keep your �ngers relaxed and in contact with the keys at all times. • Memorize these 5 notes. C major pentatonic scale up and down in quarter notes. Same tempo, but twice as fast.
C major pentatonic scale up and down in eighth notes played 3 times.
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Pentatonic Exercise 1 In this lesson we are going to expand on the way we practice our scales. Traditionally, scales are practices starting on the one and going up and down an octave as we played in the previous lesson. For this new exercise (PE1) we are going to start on the root an octave lower, but play up until we get to the top of our comfortable range on the saxophone. We will then change direction and play down until the bottom of our comfortable range. Pentatonic Exercise 1 (PE1) in half notes.
You may also play this exercise continuing to high E and above. Pentatonic Exercise 1 (PE1) in quarter notes.
Pentatonic Exercise 1 (PE1) in eighth notes.
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Pentatonic Exercise 1 (PE1) in sixteenth notes.
Tips • Practice playing PE1 several times from memory along with your metronome. • Speed is not important. • Accuracy of notes and rhythms matters most. • Only advance to the next level when you can play the previous example from memory, in time with the metronome and with no mistakes. • Keep your shoulders and neck relaxed. • Play with your best sound, and with a solid and steady air stream.
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Pentatonic Exercise 2 This lesson covers pentatonic exercise 2 (PE2) where we begin practicing our major pentatonic scale starting on each of the 5 notes. This gets us out of the habit of focusing too heavily on the root (1) of a scale.
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This is PE2 in eighth notes.
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And now PE2 in sixteenth notes.
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Upside Down & Backwards This technique can be applied to virtually any exercise you can play. Instead of starting on the low end of your range, start up high, and go down the scale instead of up. Practicing in this way will get us out of the habit of always starting phrased in an upward direction. It is also a great way to develop technique on our instrument. Here is the Upside Down & Backwards exercise applied to PE2 in quarter notes.
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Here is the Upside Down & Backwards exercise applied to PE2 in eighth notes.
Finally, the Upside Down & Backwards exercise applied to PE2 in sixteenth notes.
• Remember that accuracy of notes and rhythms is more important than speed. • Always stay in sync with the metronome, and focus on playing with solid timing. • Don’t forget to use your steady and constant air stream while concentrating on playing with a beautiful and strong sound.
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Pentatonic Exercise 3 In this lesson we combine PE2 and the upside down and backwards technique. In the lesson video, we play PE3 along with one of the provided backing tracks rather than a metronome. Be sure to play these exercises from memory.
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Here is the entire exercise:
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Syncopated Pentatonic Exercise 1 SPE1 is where things start to get more interesting. This exercise is built using a 3 note fragment of our major pentatonic scale. We play this fragment up and down, adding a slight rhythmic syncopation. We will start the phrase on each note of our major pentatonic scale, and again apply the Upside Down & Backwards technique to complete the exercise.
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Minor Theory So far we have been talking about the major pentatonic scale and playing exercises that begin on each of the 5 diff erent notes of the scale. Without knowing it, you were also playing a minor pentatonic scale at the same time. Have a look at the illustration below.
Notice how the notes of A minor pentatonic are the same as C major pentatonic, but starting on the note A instead. This brings us to a very important concept, that you may have never heard of or thought of before. One of the reasons this system involves practicing scales starting on each of the notes, and not just the root every time is that it gets us to think of and hear scales as a collection of notes without any hierarchy.
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In other words, no one note in a scale is more important than any other note. In music, each note has its own role and character for musical expression. Now have a look at this next example:
If we look again at our C major scale we see that A is the 6th note. If we play all the same notes of our C major scale but start and end on A, we get an A natural minor scale. If we now take away notes 2 and 6 of our natural minor scale we are left with a minor pentatonic scale which is built using notes 1, 3, 4, 5, and 7 of our natural minor scale. These are the same exact notes as our major pentatonic scale, just starting on the note A.
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Review So to review, we now know that our C major pentatonic and minor pentatonic scales share the exact same notes. We also know that our C major scale and A natural minor scale share the exact same notes. From now on, we will think of scales as a collection of notes without any hierarchy , so when we play the notes of C major pentatonic, we know we are playing A minor pentatonic as well and vice versa. We could now apply all of our exercises to the A minor pentatonic scale, but we don’t have to. By practicing the C major pentatonic on every starting note, we already have. It’s like a free bonus. From now on, when you practice your major pentatonic exercises, be aware that you are also practicing your minor pentatonic scales at the same time.
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Syncopated Pentatonic Exercise 2 Now that we've learned about minor pentatonic scales, let's put them to use. Remember, the notes of your minor pentatonic scale are identical to those of your major pentatonic scale if you start on the 6th scale degree. Since we are always going to practice exercises beginning on every note of any given scale, it doesn't really matter if we are thinking of major pentatonic or minor pentatonic. Just think of the group of 5 notes. they can start and end anywhere you please. SPE2 is a rhythmic variation of SPE1. We are playing the same melody, but changing the rhythm.Before you look at the sheet music, try playing it along with the video using your ear. Notice that we don't play anything on beat 1.
SPE2 starts on beat 2 every time. Music doesn’t always begin on beat 1, so this exercise can help us get out of the habit of always starting a phrase on the �rst beat of a measure.
On the way back down, we are going to apply the upside down & backwards technique again.
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Tips • Only look at the sheet music if you absolutely have to. • By now, if you have memorized the previous exercises, this new one should come to you without too much trouble. • Remember, the key to freeing your musical ideas lies within your ears. • We are striving to connect what we hear, directly to our �ngers, without any visual reference like sheet music. • Play SPE2 along with the backing track called Soul Miner.
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Pentatonic Skip Exercise 1 So far, all of our pentatonic scale exercises have been moving in steps, from one note to the next adjacent note up or down in the scale. 1 to 2, 2 to 3 and so on. In PSkE1 we are going to skip notes in the pentatonic scale.for example playing notes 1 to 3 (skipping note 2) or notes 2 to 5 (skipping note 3). In the melodies and improvisations we are soon going to be playing, there will be skips within the pentatonic scale, so we need to prepare our �ngers and ears ahead of time using using PSkE1.
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You‘ll notice that the �rst note in PSkE1 is played early, before the �rst beat. This is called a pick-up note. Pick-up notes happen all the time in music, So we’re going to prepare our �ngers and ears for them using PSkE1. On the way down, we will once again apply the upside down & backwards technique. This exercise and all preceding exercises can be played along with the metronome set to whatever speed you like, or along with the Easy Sunday and Soul Miner backing tracks.
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Melodic Ear Training 1 At this point in our Pentatonic Foundation course, we want to have three main goals accomplished. 1. Be able to hear the pentatonic scale in our ears and be able to sing it accurately. It is very important that we make the connection between what we hear in our head and what we play on our instrument. 2. We want to have developed some solid technique with our �ngers while playing in sync with the metronome or backing track. Rhythm is arguably our most important element in music. 3. Grasp the basic music theory about pentatonic scales. We are soon going to be moving on to playing in other keys so we need to know how to construct our major and minor pentatonic scales. Two of the things we want to develop most as a saxophone player are our ability to play melodies, and improvise eff ective solos. The pentatonic scale is our launching pad for developing these two skills. We are now going to learn play one of the world's most familiar melodies entirely by ear. I hope you are familiar with the song Amazing Grace. The melody contains only notes from the major pentatonic scale. Listen to me play Amazing Grace over the backing track we’ve recorded. Now that you’ve got the melody in your ear, try playing the melody on your own. The �rst note is 5 and all the notes in the melody come from the C major pentatonic scale. There are several skips in the melody so listen carefully for them. Once you are have learned the melody by ear and can play it without mistakes, practice playing it several times along with the Amazing Grace backing track and focus on committing this melody to memory.
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Melodic Ear Training 2 In this lesson, I’m going to give you another familiar tune to learn. The song is Don’t Worry, Be Happy by Bobby McFerrin and once again, the melody uses only notes from the pentatonic scale. There are 2 sections to this song, the verse and the chorus. The verse starts on 3 of the major pentatonic scale and the chorus starts on 1. the melody moves in steps and skips and sometimes the skips jump more than one note in the pentatonic scale, so be aware and listen for when that happens. • We are still playing in the same key, but if you listen to the original recording you will notice that it is a 1/2 step higher. Step 1 This time I want you to listen to the backing track on it’s own and sing the melody �rst. Remember, we need to connect what we hear in our head to what we play on the saxophone, and singing is the best way to make this connection. Step 2 Once you have the melody in your ear and can sing it, use the starting notes I gave you and work out the melody on your own with no accompaniment. Remember, the entire melody is made up of the 5 notes of your major pentatonic scale.
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Step 3 Make mental notes in your head about which direction the melody goes with each note change and whether it’s a skip or a step. If the melody moves in a skip make a note of how large the skip is i.e. 1 or 2 notes within the pentatonic scale. This will help you to quickly memorize the melody. Step 4 Now play the melody from melody together with the backing track. • Focus on good sound, and timing. Listen carefully to the backing track and try to line up your notes rhythmically with it. • I’ve provided a recording of myself playing the melody along with the backing track to help you if you necessary. • As a bonus exercise, once you have learned the melody by ear along with our better sax backing track, you can try to play in the original key (1/2 step up) alongside with Bobby McFerrin’s recording.
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More Songs Now that we’ve gotten you started here’s a list of some popular, well known songs whose melodies only use notes from the pentatonic scale. I’ll give you the starting note, and it’s your job to �gure out the rest of the song using your ear. • Play these melodies �rst using the C major pentatonic scale and as a bonus tr y learning them in the key of the original recordings in order to play along. Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For by U2 • the verse starts on 3 of the major pentatonic scale I Shot the Sheri ff by Bob Marley • the chorus starts on 3 of major pentatonic scale (or 5 of the relative minor pentatonic scale) Hotel California by The Eagles • the verse starts on 3 of major pentatonic scale (or 5 of the relative minor pentatonic scale) My Girl by The Temptations • starts on 3 of the major pentatonic scale A Change Is Gonna Come by Sam Cooke • starts on 5 of the major pentatonic scale That ought to be enough to keep you busy for a while and get your ears working. Just imagine the things you’ll be able to play once you develop this simple skill a bit further.
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Advanced Ear Training 1-3 In the last lessons we learned to play the melodies of familiar songs by ear using the pentatonic scale. The objective of this exercise is to improve our ability to play what we hear in our head. This is a very important skill and takes lots of practice to get good at it. Fortunately, the practice time is fun and rewarding. Now we’re ready to take our ear training study to the next level. In these advanced ear training videos you will hear me play a musical phrase using the pentatonic scale. You will then repeat what you hear on your saxophone. After each phrase I play, there is space for you to mimic what you heard. Each phrase will be played twice, before moving on to a new musical idea. Refer to the video lessons for more instructions and the accompanying audio.
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Pentatonic Improvisation I have recorded myself playing an improvised solo over the backing track for Easy Sunday . I only use notes from the C major/A minor pentatonic scale throughout. Much of what I play comes directly from the exercises we have covered in this course.
Process of an Improvisor To be an eff ective improvisor there is a tried and true method that is sure to get great results. Here is a rough and very general overview of this process: Step 1 Learn how to play your instrument with a good sound, solid timing and even technique. This includes learning the basic music theory such as scales and harmony relevant to the music you want to play. Step 2 Develop your ear using ear training exercises like the ones in previous lessons. Listen to improvisors you enjoy hearing and try to copy what they are playing using your ear. Try to match the sound and rhythmic phrasing, as well as all other aspects you can detect such as articulation dynamics, vibrato etc. This is otherwise known as transcription. Step 3 Gather a collection of musical ideas and phrases from these transcriptions and learn to play them on your instrument in various keys. Be sure to understand how these ideas relate harmonically so that you will know when and where to play them in your own improvisations.
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Step 4 Build solos using all of the tools from the previous steps plus whatever creative original material you feel �t to incorporate in your musical expression.
Summary The purpose of this Pentatonic Foundation course is not to delve deeply into the world of improvisation. That topic is vast and requires years of study. Our intention here is to provide you with a starting point with a very solid foundation. So far we have covered material mainly relative to the �rst 2 steps in the above outline. Some of the phrases you have learned so far in this course may be added to your personal collection of musical ideas from Step 3. Listen to the recording of my solo over the backing track for Easy Sunday. Hopefully, you will be able to hear the process of taking a simple musical idea and developing it into an improvised musical phrase. The following is a step by step analysis of this solo explaining the source of the diff erent ideas played and how they relate to the material presented in this course. Throughout this analysis, you may come across terminology and concepts you are not yet familiar with. These will all be covered in depth in future courses. • Feel free to learn all or part of this solo by ear as an advanced ear training exercise before reading the sheet music.
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Solo Analysis Bars 1-4 I start out simply playing SPE1 starting on the root. I’ve embellished this line by adding a 2 note pick up. I �nish the phrase by playing SPE1 with the Upside down and backwards technique in 16th notes. Bars 5-6 This phrase is an incomplete version of SPE1 with the same 2 note pick up. Bars 7-8 Simply the pentatonic scale played down, followed by an upper/lower neighbor enclosure1 of the root. Bars 9-12 UD&B version of SPE1 in 16th notes descending. Each group is preceded by a pick up note. The phrase is ended by �rst repeating part of the the last note group then �nishing with the same descending pentatonic scale as in bar 7. Bars 13-17 Here we introduce another pentatonic scale fragment. This can be de �ned as going up the scale 5 notes then down 1. The syncopated 16th note rhythm makes it more interesting. We �nish the phrase with another simple pentatonic scale line that descends 2 notes and then goes back up. Bars 18-24 This melodic idea is derived from a well know Herbie Hancock composition Chameleon. I vary the ending of each note group. 1
Embellishment created by playing the diatonic upper then lower neighboring notes before arriving at the target note.
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Bars 26-28 Here I simply play the pentatonic scale ascending from A to high E, then from G to high G, then back down to A. I slow things down by using longer notes here as well. This can be an e ff ective way to change things up in a solo. Bars 29-36 In this section I start to use more skips within the pentatonic scale. A simple 2 quarter note motif develops into something a bit more complex based around skips. I �nish with another simple "up the pentatonic scale" line. Bars 37-40 We come back to the idea from earlier here repeating a descending note group that goes down 2 notes then back up 1. This leads into a new pattern that can be described as step down skip up. Bars 41-44 A new motif is introduced here repeating note 3 of the major pentatonic scale2 twice. I vary the notes leading up to this motif each time �nishing with a phrase reminiscent of what we played in bar 36. You can see there are virtually endless possibilities for variation within the pentatonic scale. Bars 45-49 I lead into a new 3 note idea again using a simple ascending pentatonic scale. Repeating an idea and developing it is a fundamental principal of composing melodies. Building an eff ective solo is in essence composing a melody spontaneously. Therefore this technique of stating a melodic idea and then repeating it with variations is essential if you want your solos to sound coherent.
2
You should hear that very often on the 3rd degree of the major pentatonic scale, I embellish this note with a “scoop”. I encourage you to mimic this as you hear me do it and as you hear other musicians play this. The reason this note is often approached from the note a half step below comes from the Blues Scale.
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Bars 50-53 Another 16th note syncopation idea. be careful of the exact placement of these notes rhythmically. The phrase is ended with another playing of our SPE1 as in the beginning of the solo. Bars 54-60 In this part I play 2 variations on a very common pentatonic pattern. You will hear these licks played on all di ff erent instruments in all diff erent styles of improvised solos. They are part of the basic pentatonic scale language and you should add them to your repertoire of pentatonic patterns right away.3 Bars 62-end I end the solo the way it began using SPE1. Reusing material throughout a solo is another way to build continuity and make it more interesting for the listener.
3 Anytime
you recognize a pentatonic pattern that you like, turn it into a new exercise by playing it starting on each note of the scale going up and down the range of your instrument, as we have done throughout the Pentatonic Foundation course.
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Summary We have covered a lot of material in this Pentatonic Fundamentals course, but it should really have just opened up the door to endless possibilities and more musical discoveries. There’s lots of diff erent directions we could go from here and which way you go depends on your own personal goals. Check out the follow up courses on BetterSax.com for more stuff to sink your teeth into.
Moving Forward One of the �rst steps moving forward should be to start applying what we have learned here to the other 11 keys. The key of concert Bb sits very nicely on the saxophone, but you will �nd that it is not one of the most popular keys with some other musicians. The truth is that the world of popular music styles is ruled by guitarists and they have their favorite keys to play in. Unfortunately for us saxophone players, those keys are E, A, G, and D. So if you play the alto saxophone, these are C#, F#, E and B Ouch! On tenor and soprano saxophone these correspond to F#, B, A, and E. If you are going to be play popular standard repertoire songs with other musicians, you will very likely be playing in these keys a lot. Being able to play in every key is absolutely essential for improvisors. A common trap, that saxophone players fall into is they practice all their material in the more comfortable keys and avoid the nightmare keys outlined above. You may be able to sound great improvising in the key of Bb concert after completing this course, but that’s not necessarily help you when you have to play in your instrument’s key of F#.
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