A LESSON WITH ROY PATTERSON
"RHYTHM IS THE ESSENCE."
One of the first statements pertaining to jazz that I can remember hearing is that "The Essence of jazz is rhythm." Often the emphasis on harmony, chord-scale relationships, etc. overshadows this aspect of the music. A friend once said that without the rhythmic treatment associated with jazz, all you have is icing on the cake. I would like to present a fundamental rhythmic exercise that helped free my lines up at a time when I felt very boxed in and restrained by chord changes.
It's what I call a "three beat rhythmic etude." The idea behind an elude is to allow work on a specific idea or problem in a musical context so that one can eventually use it naturally and with confidence in a playing situation.
Here is the procedure:
1. Give yourself a three beat figure to start with. A Charleston figure or some variation of it works well.
Ex.1
2. Assign pitches to the rhythmic figure that you have chosen and limit your soloing for the duration of the etude to this figure, or a variation of it as in example 2 and THIS IS MOST IMPORTANT. DO NOT adjust the melodic content of the figures to fit a bar line or new chord UNTIL you have finished the three beat figure that you started with. Allow the implied harmony to spill over the bar line or anticipate the next chord or key area, then begin the next 3 beat figure.
Ex.2
Notice that the 2nd and 3rd three beat figures in example 2 go over the bar line. Notice also that the melodic material in the first figure is derived from Dminor and the second figure is derived from Eminor. The G7 is not a consideration even though the notes in the second figure do not clash, and can be heard as the 3rd, root and 6th of G7. The melodic material in the 3rd figure is derived from the A7alt. and spills over into the Dminor in bar 3. The final 3 beat figure anticipates the G7alt. by a beat. The line naturally resolves on beat one after 3 bars. This sounds complicated if we look at it harmonically but if we regard the rhythm as the premise of the line it becomes quite simple.
3. Repeat the three beat figure, using different notes of course for the entire elude, while maintaining a strong sense of the underlying harmony and form of the etude. If at first you find yourself getting lost, try taping yourself playing the chords in strict time and then play along with the tape. When you have the form and harmony internalized, then play with the metronome only. You can also use a drum machine to cue you every four bars with a cymbal crash.
Ex.3
When you are comfortable with this, try starting the etude on different beats of the bar including the upbeats. Eventually you will want to combine three beat groupings with two and four beat groupings.
Ex. 4
Here is an example over a series of chromatic II V's.
Ex. 5
Keep in mind that the tempo is a determining factor in anticipating the harmony or delaying its resolution. In general, the faster the tempo, the more liberty you can take with the bar lines. If you listen to almost any of the great bop horn and piano players, you will hear this kind of rhythmic organization all over the place. I spent a whole season once practicing Sonny Rollins solo on Tune Up, which has a lot of this combination of 3, 2 and 4 beat groupings. For a more adventurous study of rhythmic grouping, check out some of the music of Lennie Tristano, Bill Evans and, of course, Herbie Hancock. Have fun and keep swingin'.