Saturday Transcription

A transcription of Miles' solo on Victor Feldman's Joshua from the record Seven Steps to Heaven with George Coleman, Herbie Hancock, Ron Carter and Tony Williams.

Saturday Transcription(s)

One tune, three trumpet solos 

(only 2 today, the 3rd one is on its way).  

Here are two trumpet greats: Chet Baker and Donald Byrd (Kenny Dorham's solo to follow) playing over one of my favorite ballads, "My Ideal".  Chet's is from 1954's Chet Baker Sings featuring Russ Freeman, James Bond and Larence Marable.  The second version is from Donald Byrd's 1967 album Slow Drag, featuring Sonny Red, Cedar Walton, Walter Booker and Billy Higgins (highly recommended).  As an aside, anything with Cedar Walton and Billy Higgins together is worth buying.  If Sam Jones is also on it, triply so.

Saturday Transcription

Wayne Shorter's solo on "Witch Hunt" from one of my all time favorite albums, Speak No Evil released in 1964.  This music is 50 years old and still defines what is modern.  Stellar group featuring Freddie Hubbard, Herbie Hancock, Ron Carter and Elvin Jones.  Do I have to ask if you own it?

Saturday Transcription

Miles Davis' solo from the 1954 recording of "Solar", from the album Walkin'.  You have the recording, right?   Go get it.  I'll wait. 

Interesting fact:  Miles Davis is probably not the composer.  There is a recording of guitarist Chuck Wayne performing the melody from 1946.  Get the details here.  I'm not accusing anyone of anything.  Jazz journalist Marc Myers writes this on his site:

...who knows how Davis came to the melody line in the first place. For all we know, Wayne was whistling it in the men's room at  Birdland while Davis was in there washing up.

However, if you asked Bill Evans about "Blue in Green", you might get a different angle...

Saturday Transcription

As promised, a transcription from Kenny Dorham's Quiet Kenny album.  This is Kenny's solo on I Had the Craziest Dream by Harry Warren.   Here is the music:

Saturday Transcription

A classic from Prez:  his Lady Be Good solo from the Count Basie small group recordings.  No further discussion necessary.

Saturday Transcription

OK, busy week, so just one chorus of a really good solo, Charlie Rouse on Green Chimneys.  Tons of motivic development and improv based around the melody.  I guess after playing with Monk for like a million years you'd have to develop some of that.  I'll get back to ya with the other choruses.

Saturday Transcription

I am going to try to stick to this schedule and make this a weekly thing.  Just so you don't think I only work on tenor solos (although I do seem to a lot), here is a solo from the great trumpet player Blue Mitchell.  It's the tune Strollin' from the Horace Silver record Horace-Scope.  If you don't have this record, go buy it now, then come back and finish reading this.

Saturday Transcription

Mingus Ah Um is one of those records to recommend to people that want to get into jazz and don't know what to listen to.  I remember when I first discovered this record when I was in High School.  It blew me away.  Everything about it is off the hook.

Anyway, one of the things on this record that knocked me out was the tenor break which starts the song Open Letter to Duke.  Once I found out who this sax player was (Booker Ervin) I went out and bought everything I could find from him.  To me, his best albums as a leader feature the rhythm section of Jaki Byard, Richard Davis and Alan Dawson (The Freedom Book and The Space Book, but The Song Book, which replaced Byard with Tommy Flanagan is pretty killing as well.)  Also check out Tex Book Tenor, which features Kenny Barron, Woody Shaw, Billy Higgins and a bass player I never heard of named Jan Arnet.

Coltrane Transcription

A great solo from one of Coltrane's earlier records, Lush Life, from 1958.  Like all of my transcriptions,

• It's in bass clef (if you want a copy in treble or transposed, drop me a line)
• If you find a mistake, let me know