"Buster explains jazz theory really well and his enthusiasm is infectious. I always come away feeling I've learned a great deal and had a lot of fun in the process."
Matt Male - tenor saxophone and flute
Jazz Workshop 84
Sat 12 Apr 10:30am (UK)
How To Improvise with Voice Leadings
Learning how to create voice leadings is an essential skill for jazz improvisors. They can be really helpful when soloing, but they have multiple uses and are one of the things I get asked about the most.
Voice leadings can be used to simplify complex chord sequences, providing you with a clear “horizontal” pathway through dense harmony and helping you to avoid the paralysis of information overload.
Voice leadings can be used as a very simple method for targeting strong chord tones, helping you to “really make the changes” during your solos.
Voice leadings can provide a great back bone for compositions or harmony lines and counter melodies which you need to come up with on the spot when accompanying singers or other instruments.
Voice leadings are also a great way to create instant backing figures behind soloists and vamps for drum solos.
All in all, they are an extremely useful device not only for your improvised solos, but also to unlock a lot of musical opportunities when working in an ensemble.
In this workshop we will look a bit of theory, but also play through some examples covering a few common turnarounds and chord sequences. We’ll explore how to use voice leadings for your improvising and how to embellish them with one or two notes to easily create a convincing solo. Then we’ll look at some transcriptions from the jazz masters and see how they use voice leadings to great effect, and then explore how to use their ideas for your own solos.
We’ll be using my custom iReal Pro tracks to put the exercises into a musical scenario and help you to process everything in “real time”. You can download them now for free, just follow the links on the webiste.
Everyone is muted in the class, so you are welcome to play along as much as you like, or just tune in and observe. Either is fine. There is also a Q&A session at the end of the class.
The workshop lasts approx 1hr and starts at 10:30am
If you can’t make the live session a video recording of the class will be available in my lesson vault.
Sample clips from past Zoom classes...
