Vol 2: Beginners’ Impro – Pop, Rock & Blues
The eagerly awaited sequel to Volume 3 and Volume 1 is now available. It is a theory book with simple but interesting playalong tunes.Not your typical complicated yet somehow boring jazz theory.
Starter Pack deal: Beginners’ Downloads Free!
Just buy any book and get the Beginners PDF Downloads (150 pages) automatically included FREE!
About the Beginners’ Impro & Theory Pages
In this section of the site we expand on some of the material in the book, Taming The Saxophone vol2. Some of the pages in this section of the site include the basic sheet music of the tunes, ie “leadsheets” but when you buy the book you will also receive a download with printable leadsheets, audio (mp3), performance notes and explanations plus transcriptions of the example solos as played on alto and tenor. You can either make up your own solos or play the transcriptions. Study the transcriptions to learn how to put into practice what you have leaned from the theory book.
The book itself contains easy to follow practical theory. We start at the shallow end, no complex jazz harmony just yet. What you learn in the book will of course set you up for more complex jazz theory, but it is aimed mostly towards learning simple blues, ska and pop improvising.
Some of these tunes are quite simple, others are a bit more complex than you might find in many absolute beginners studies, but don’t worry, that’s why we have the audio examples to help you learn along with the sheet music – use your ears, your eyes and your memory.
If you have any comments, questions or want to share your own recordings please register at CafeSaxophone forum (TBA) where we have a dedicated area for anyone using TTS vol 2. You will get advice and answers from myself and other players learning to improvise.
If you are scared of learning to improvise, this book is for you.
As well as the book you also get (free):
- Download:
- Backing tracks (mp3).
- Sheet music and performance notes.
As well as the backing track versions, there are also fully produced finished tracks with saxophone playing the melody and improvisation which is transcribed so you can choose to play the transcribed version or make up your own improvisation.
Each has performance notes so you can easily refer to sections of the theory book to help decide what to play, or you can just play along, use your ears instead of worrying about the theory.
What’s in the book?
- What are chords?
- How chords are formed.
- Why do saxophone players want or need chords?
- About chord sequences, how harmony helps music to “tell a story”
- How to make your solos more melodic, not just running up and down scales
- Blue notes and blues scales
Who is it for and what do you need?
- Ideally you already know some very basics of music theory, e.g. about key signatures and notes on the staff. If not we advise getting a basic music theory book such as Grade III.
- Any saxophone player, beginner to intermediate who may or may not have reasonable saxophone technique, but is not yet confident enough to improvise.
- Anyone who wants a simpler yet highly musical approach to improvising – no complex jazz theory to make your brain hurt. No mixolydian dominants or modes of the melodic minor.
- Harmony examples need to be played and although you don’t need to be a piano player, you need a keyboard (either piano, MIDI or virtual, e.g. keyboard app). It doesn’t matter how slow you are finding the notes.
Many theory books start off quite simple but then suddenly progress to the very complex jazz harmony. In this book we will try to keep it as simple as possible for as long as possible, while still giving you a thorough grounding in how to do some basic improvisation. It’s recommended that you be able to read music so you can try out the musical examples, but you don’t need to be a great sight reader. You don’t even need to read the tunes in the playalong, you can learn them by ear from the fully produced versions if you want.
Contents
- Understanding chords
- Major chords (triads)
- Minor chords (triads)
- Chord functions
- Two sets of numbers
- Major, minor and diminished
- Major chords
- Diminished chords
- Minor keys
- Beyond triads
- Major 7 chords
- Minor 7 chords
- Dominant 7 chords
- Four-note chords (summary)
- A harmonic journey
- Why is there tension in a dominant chord?
- Voice leading
- A closer look at minor harmony
- The harmonic minor and leading notes
- Using chords in improvising
- Right notes and wrong notes
- Passing notes
- Suspensions
- Avoid notes
- Honing your improvisation
- The Blues
- Blues chords
- Blue notes
- Blues scales
- Glossary
In the Beginners Impro Section:
