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Kurs: BG 8050/ BG 1016/ BG 1115 Självständigt arbete, kandidat, jazz, 15 hp 2022

Konstnärlig kandidatexamen i musik, 180 hp Institutionen för jazz

Handledare: Håkan Goohde Examinator: Ola Bengtson

Bjarni Már Ingólfsson

Drawing From the Source

Gaining improvisational language through transcription

Skriftlig reflektion inom självständigt, konstnärligt arbete

Det självständiga, konstnärliga arbetet finns dokumenterat i KMH:s digitala arkiv.

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Abstract

In this thesis transcriptions of solos from selected musicians are explored as a way to deepen my connection with improvisation and my instrument. It is about a number of different philosophies towards transcribing and working with transcriptions, as well as my reflections on ways to utilize transcriptions in a way that I can absorb the concepts and language from solos without regurgitating it in my own playing, but rather attempting to utilize it to explore ways to expand my playing and conception of improvisational language as well as my own instrument.

Keywords:

Transcription, improvisation, analysis, guitar, jazz, musical language

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There are many ways to transcribe and utilize transcriptions for different purposes in your practice, and it is my aim in this project to shed light on some of those different aspects and processes, apply them to my practice and use them to expand my own improvisation, technical ability and conceptual knowledge.

1. Introduction

1.1 Project description

In this work I will transcribe solos, and fragments of solos from selected musicians and explore them as a tool to help widen my language as an improviser as well as my instrumental capabilities. I will use different methods of transcription and applications of the solos in order to learn from them.

Transcribing solos can help to give insight into the thought process of the soloist, how he/she approaches the music as well as the instrument. I think that transcribing can give you the chance to first learn and understand, and then expand upon a concept or language that has already been established or mastered by the person you take inspiration from.

I transcribe music to gain a better understanding of the details of the music. Transcribing helps me to understand the harmonic, melodic and technical tools being used and in taking close look at the solo it can also help me to understand other nuances of the music, such as the phrasing of the soloist, the sound, rhythmic details and more. Apart from being a helpful tool to encounter and learn improvisational language, I find that transcriptions can also be a great tool to find technical material to practice and reinforce weaknesses in my own playing.

There is a physical aspect to playing transcriptions which differs from the theoretical analysis of the solos. When trying to emulate the sound of someone’s playing, there is more at play than the note choice and harmonic content of the solo. To me the physical aspect of emulating the solos of other musicians can give great insight into someone’s playing, as it is a very intuitive part of the transcription process and can help to explore and understand sonic possibilities on the instrument, whether it is trying to get close to the sound of someone on my own instrument, or applying lines from a horn player or pianist on to the guitar, which often can be just as valuable as the theoretical aspects of solos.

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1.2 Background

Transcription is a tool used by many musicians in their development and is considered by many to be one of the key ingredients to obtaining improvisational language.

In a conversation between guitarists Mike Moreno, Gilad Hekselman, Nir Felder and Lage Lund the subject of early influences and transcription comes up, Lund and Moreno then talk about using certain guitarists as a way to extract information, to then apply in a broader musical spectrum beyond the guitar. Lund said of discovering new guitarists during his development:

“Sometimes you find something, and it’s like: oh, I was looking for that, or I needed that right now…”¹ I think that certain things can be used as a stepping stone to getting to a broader understanding of the musical language you are trying to acquire if it contains some element that you feel is relevant to the goal you want to achieve.

Later in the same conversation Moreno counts up his influences and talks about transcribing their solos: “I transcribed everybody... It’s like going into a shop and you’re trying on clothes, like let me see how this shirt fits like on me…” ²

In my opinion there is value in emulating how others play in your development in order to understand your own relationship to that kind of playing, and understanding what possibilities exist on your instrument, and whether it fits the way you want to play. Some of it might not suit your taste, but you might find elements that complement how you want to play.

There are many sides to analyzing and working with transcriptions apart from exploring the harmonic content and note choice of the soloist.

In an interview from 2020, Sullivan Fortner and Pablo Held speak on some the different aspects of ear training besides the pitch value of notes and how it relates to transcribing. Fortner says:

“Ear training is also articulation and dynamic levels. Being able to respond and hear that quickly, being able to adjust to that, and fit in to that... You’re training your ear to hear detail, as quick as you can, you know what I mean? Not just the note but the detail of the note, the skeleton of the note.” Held: “Yeah it makes sense because a lot of people are getting caught up with transcription and getting the notes right, but this is usually where the journey only starts you know.” Sullivan Fortner expands, stating that he has only really transcribed two or three solos (implying from start to finish), and states that he does not see the point in doing it. “Unless you are analyzing the solo, unless you understand what the rhythm section is doing, unless you are figuring out the hidden details and the inner workings of the types of lines, and the line structure. And unless you have gained a serious, strong opinion about the solo, you’re not really transcribing.” Sullivan Fortner then continues, addressing a conversation he had with a student on a transcription “… If you can’t tell me three things you hate about the solo, then you’re not doing your homework. (laughs) You’re not finding your voice through that person.”³

Some of the details surrounding the transcription process of Moreno, Fortner and Held don’t come up clearly in the interviews above, though it is implied in Held’s conversation with

1 Moreno, M, 2021, “HOUSE GUEST SERIES ... Felder, Hekselman, Lund”, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uRki7- CdQJU&t , 1:56:15

2 Moreno, M, 2021, “HOUSE GUEST SERIES ... Felder, Hekselman, Lund”, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uRki7- CdQJU&t, 1:58:30

3Held, P, 2020, “Sullivan Fortner interviewed by Pablo Held” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SzAN5CWlmh0&t, 1:06:08

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Fortner that they don’t transcribe much as opposed to Moreno who spent a lot of time transcribing solos. Held addressed his transcription process in an interview with Nelson Veras.

Held was asked whether he transcribed much or not. Held replied: “I had to transcribe some for school … Obviously I took a lot of stuff off records, but it was never a whole solo, more like little things … If I would hear a phrase that spoke to me by Dexter Gordon, Cannonball Adderley, Miles or Herbie -well, anyone- I would definitely take it apart. It might even be just four notes - anything that I liked I would learn it and see what it means.” Prompted by Veras, Held then started speaking about the realization that a lot of what he transcribes ends up being simpler than what he thought upon just hearing it. “I realized more and more that it’s less about what they play it’s more about how they play it.”⁴

Moreno in his conversation with Lund, Felder and Hekselman similarly addresses that the information you gather from studying certain musicians goes beyond just the notes themselves, or the music theory behind it. “It’s just sound, like I feel like with (Scofield) in particular, it’s just like the groove of what he’s playing and the sound.” Then Moreno adds “...With some guys, you get to that point where you can just play three notes and that surpasses like all the music theory that people get obsessed with, and what am I going to play on these changes? and all that stuff. It’s just tone and groove.”⁵

To me this suggests that there are a lot of similarities in the approach that all three of them take to transcription, listening to and analyzing music. The information that you can gather from a solo is about much more than just harmonic content and pitches, but just as important is the timbral, rhythmic and dynamic content of the solo as well as the less definable human elements such as their projection of energy.

It is also interesting to note that although Fortner’s and Moreno’s approaches to transcription seem to differ fundamentally, as Moreno talks about transcribing from as many sources as possible, and Fortner being less concerned with the volume of transcriptions, they come to quite similar conclusions about what are the important elements to transcribing or analyzing a piece of music in detail, as well as using the transcription to help you to figure out how you yourself want to sound.

An established American saxophonist told me during a private lesson that he had only transcribed a handful of solos throughout his life, yet he had a very deep understanding of the bebop language and could recall and even sing whole solos or fragments of solos of many the great players of that style. My understanding of this is that through deep listening and aural recognition transcription wasn’t a tool that he felt was necessary in order to study and understand the music, which coincides with parts of Sullivan Fortner’s philosophy on transcription from his interview with Held, and it also blurs the line between transcription and attentive listening, a lot of what transcription gives you can also be achieved through conscious listening and practice related to that.

To me some language is most easily captured through transcription. Instrument specific details such as those that pertain to timbre and phrasing, I find to be most efficiently learned by emulation, and detailed inspection.

4 Held, P, “PABLO HELD INVESTIGATES: NELSON VERAS, https://pabloheld.com/en/investigates/nelson-veras

5 Moreno, M, 2021, “HOUSE GUEST SERIES ... Felder, Hekselman, Lund”, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uRki7- CdQJU&t, 1:52:03

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5 1.3 Aim and research questions

My purpose with this project is to investigate what I can learn from doing transcriptions of different solos, and using some different methods of transcribing, analyzing, practicing and learning to apply concepts and language from these solos into my own improvisation. In doing so I hope to strengthen different aspects of my playing, and to gain a broader understanding of language, technique, sound and more to expand my own playing.

The questions I aim to answer with this project are:

What are the different aspects of transcription?

How do different approaches to transcribing material affect my understanding and implementation of the solos?

How do I apply language from a transcription to my own playing?

2. The transcription process and its artistic results

My work consists of transcribing improvised solos, either whole or in fragments, and analyzing and working with the material in ways that I think can contribute to my own improvising and composing.

Transcribed pieces that will be used in the work:

Mike Moreno – Anthropology live at a Paris masterclass 2009 ⁶

Sonny Rollins - I’ve got you under my skin from his album, “A night at the Village Vanguard”

(min 0:51 – 2:50)⁷

Charles Alturas’ solo on Elsewhere live at Bar Bayeux with Melissa Aldana in 2021 (min 8:51 – 10:20)⁸

Fragments of Johnny Griffins’ solo on Let’s Cool One on Thelonious Monk’s album

“Misterioso”⁹

Much of the focus of applying and understanding material from the solos I have transcribed has come in the form of learning and playing the transcriptions on the instrument. Doing this has led me to both take certain phrases or concepts from the solos and try to use them in different ways, as well broader concepts, like fingerings, hand positions, register, shapes etc. Working on these solos has also led me to tackle technical concepts in a broader way that may not entirely relate to the solo. For example, I have found that Mike Moreno and Charles Altura are effortlessly able to use triads in a way that I cannot, which has led me to spend time with playing triads linearly through scales, in different places on the instrument, different fingerings,

6, 2009 ”Mike Moreno Rhythm Changes – Anthropology” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V-Uq_qTUTOc

7 1959, Monk, Thelonious. “Let’s Cool One” Misterioso, Riverside Records, track nr. 3

8 2021, Melissa Aldana Quartet – Elsewhere – Bar Bayeux https://youtu.be/2SGSQipPAK0?t=531 8:51

9 1987, Rollins, Sonny. ”I‘ve Got You Under My Skin“ A Night at the Village Vanguard, vol. 1, Blue Note, track nr. 2

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inversions etc. as well as using the book “Hexatonics” by Jerry Bergonzi to find exercises that suit this concept.

I experimented with different ways to engage with the language from the solos, like taking eight bars of a solo to use as a foundation and try to improvise lines that resemble the structure, note choice, rhythms and such in order to try to use the language in an improvised manner, and to be able to compare my own interpretation of the language to that of the solo. The concept I find to be quite interesting and was a useful tool in some ways. I found that over a longer period it did not keep me engaged in the practice, and to some extent I think that it can have a limiting factor on my creativity in soloing, because I found myself taking those concepts with me when I was improvising over similar harmonies in different situations.

Finding ways to work with the solos in a concrete way after the transcription process could be quite complicated and yielded mixed results. Usually working on specific lines or concepts from the solos in isolation failed to keep me engaged for a longer time, and begged questions about how to use them in a creative way and get away from mimicking the feel of the solo I was transcribing in my own improvisation.

Since the solos were difficult for me technically It was often a long process to work on playing the literal lines from the solos well, and as a result I found that even just playing along to lines from the solos themselves was a good exercise, as well as taking broader concepts from the solos and working on them in isolation.

Examples of concepts that I extracted from the solos and worked on, varying in specificity:

Numerous fingerings, chromaticism, linear triads with inversions, different modes, numerous harmonic concepts from the solos, arpeggios (7^th chords minor/major/dominant and suspended), different registers on the instrument, approach notes and enclosures etc.

2.1 The transcriptions Mike Moreno – Anthropology:

Mike Moreno’s solo on anthropology was taken from a masterclass where he was playing the tune in a solo setting, playing almost exclusively single line phrases. To me the transcription of the solo was more about the technical and phrasing aspects of the solo, as well as the melodic shapes rather than the harmonic content of the lines.

What fascinated me about the solo was the technical command of the instrument that Moreno showed in the clip, as well as the phrasing and sound of the lines. Every note is very clear and the phrasing is fluid but still very clear in the time, as opposed to floating over the time.

I wanted to be able to emulate Moreno’s phrasing and use the solo to encounter difficult technical things that I could work on. Playing along to the solo and extracting concepts from it meant that I had to work on the dexterity of all of my fingers to be able to replicate the fingerings that Moreno uses in the solo. I also had to gain strength in my fingers and get used to playing technically commanding phrases in more stretched positions, and in the lower portion of the guitar neck.

The concepts I extracted from the solo include:

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• chromatic passages, four- to six note per string chromatic passages

• Playing in positions in the low register of the guitar neck (positions from open to 7^th fret)

• Playing phrases with different fingering combinations, using ring and pinky fingers more

• Approach notes and enclosures, diatonic and triads, arpeggios.

• Chromatic descending 2-5-1’s

• Using chord voicings on the instrument as a tool to construct single lines

• Mike Morenos‘ sense of flow in the lines

Figure 1: An example of Moreno’s long weaving lines through the changes taken from his solo on Anthropology, in this example he plays in the lower neck positions of the instrument, which for me is quite technically challenging. He weaves through the changes “horizontally” using many chromatic notes, and mostly not marking the chords in a very literal sense, with a more modal approach to the changes, which I tried to apply to my own improvisation exercises on rhythm changes.

Figure 1

Figure 2 (top of next page): Another example of Morenos’ long flowing lines. Using four different minor triads in the first four bars (Gm/Fm/Abmin/Gbmin) resolving it to the 5^th bar of the example, and then flowing in a long technically difficult line that lasts for 17bars (past the end of the example).

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Figure 2

Charles Altura – Elsewhere:

Apart from the complex way that Charles Altura weaves through the changes, I realize in playing his solo that he can make very fast and difficult passages sound very relaxed. As opposed to Rosenwinkel or Moreno, where the fast passages are often very fiery and expressive, and in my own playing I tend to feel very much on the edge of control when I’m playing fast, the calmness on fast phrases is an aesthetic I would like to explore also. In the solo Charles Altura switches back and forth between two modalities seamlessly in a way in which at points they seem to blend together. He utilizes difficult fingerings, stretches as well as triads and arpeggios in an interesting and complicated way.

Charles Altura’s solo has made me interested in exploring a different type of fingerings. a lot of three note per string figures, both diatonic and pentatonic.

• Investigating linear triads

• Three note per string position arpeggios and triads, in Major and Melodic Minor modes

• Three note per string pentatonic shapes

• Connecting V7- Imin or bII7- Imin (A7 – Dm or Eb7 – Dm) cadence in Minor keys using Melodic Minor scales a major third apart and alternating between them in a flowing way. F.ex (A7 or Eb7 -Dm = Bb melodic Minor – D melodic Minor)

• Suspended 4^th triads arpeggiated modally through Major and Melodic Minor modes

Figure 3: In this example Altura moves freely between the modalities of Eb7 (Mixolydian) and Dm6 (Dorian), with a few “outside notes” and notes suggesting Eb7#11 and D-maj7.

This type of line made me interested in exploring moving fluidly between modalities.

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Figure 3

Figure 4: In this example you can find how Altura weaves together arpeggio shapes, 4ths and scale lines, all while switching back and forth between the two modalities unpredictably and then landing on the D minor.

Figure 4

Figure 5 (next page): One of the simple technical exercises that I studied, was to play linear 7^th chords and triads diatonically in Melodic Minor on different starting notes and different positions, for the purpose of working around this specific solo I focused on Bbm and Dm.

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Figure 5

Figure 6: An example taken from my own improvisation on “A Night in Tunisia” inspired by lines and concepts from Charles Altura, in regards to his harmonic approach, fingerings and phrasing on the alternating Eb7 and Dm6.

Figure 6

The focus of my improvisation exercise attached to the project, on A Night in Tunisia (same concept of Eb7 to Dm6 vamp) was to play long flowing lines, many of whom have a similar shape structure to some of those found in Altura’s solo.

Sonny Rollins – I’ve Got You Under My Skin

Sonny Rollins’ solo on I’ve Got You Under My Skin is one that I have listened to for a long time but never actively transcribed. I started by singing along to the recording, slowing phrases down and figuring out how to sing them note for note, and singing along to the solo at a slow speed, and trying to sing whole phrases without reference from the recording. I transcribed a rather large portion of the solo but not the entire thing. A big part of what I got from transcribing this solo came from absorbing the language itself by listening and singing, which made it very simple to translate the solo to the instrument, and I found myself being able to play much of the solo in many different positions on the instrument without having to try so hard, as things just naturally fell to the instrument which was an interesting comparison to the solos of Mike Moreno and Charles Altura, where I had to be very meticulous about fingerings and such. I did find fingerings and string combinations on the guitar that suited how I wanted to play the lines and concepts from the solo better than others, and it was interesting to me to try to apply similar phrasing to the lines as many modern guitarists and find out how many similarities the language of some modern players share with Sonny. The tempo of the recording is very high and there

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11 is a high technical demand in playing lines from the solo at that tempo, so putting some of the lines and concepts into practice in my improvisation is an ongoing process and has taken a lot of practice.

The most valuable part of the transcription for me was the aural part of the transcription process.

In order to obtain some of the language from the solo and some of the phrasing elements I wanted to pursue I extracted small portions from the solo, and isolated some concepts like:

• Using chromaticism, enclosures and approach notes through triads and four note arpeggios within three note per string positions on the guitar

• Playing legato with attack on selected notes and trying to apply more definition to legato notes.

• Using bIIImin7 as a substitute on dominant chords, specifically resolving to IImin7 (Chromatically descending minor chords: Dbm7 to Cm7 instead of G7 to Cm7)

• Taking specific phrases from the solo to analyze, work on technically/conceptually

Figure 7: one of my favorite lines from the solo, and one that is quite difficult to play. The line has many approach notes and enclosures as well as the implied chromatic minor chords descending at the end of the phrase.

Figure 7

Figure 8: this line shows many of the ways Sonny Rollins uses approach notes and enclosures as well as well as the descending chromatic minor chords he uses a lot in this solo.

Figure 8

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Figure 9: In this example I list some approach note and enclosure exercises I did, in both directions, through the range of the position on the guitar – and through all diatonic chords.

Figure 9

In my own improvisation exercise on I’ve Got You Under My Skin, which is attached to the project. I attempted to use some of Sonny Rollins’ line shapes, approach notes, enclosures, arpeggios and Db-7 as a substitute for G7, as is seen in figure 10 below, transcribed from my own improvisation on the same harmony (line starting at 2:20 in the video.)

Figure 10

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13 Johnny Griffin – Let’s Cool One

Johnny Griffin‘s solo on Let‘s Cool One from Monk‘s In Action, is another solo where I chose to focus on the aural part of the transcription specifically. This was by far the hardest solo to transcribe, and the process of singing the lines took some work over the course of every day for around two weeks before I felt that it was time to pick up the instrument and try to play some of the lines, and at that point I still continued singing with the solo a lot, to try to get the phrases into my head and to be able to sing them without the assistance of the track.

I chose to focus on fragmented parts of the solo specifically, but did work on many more parts of the solo by ear than what I chose to focus on with the instrument, as some of the phrases are quite unclear in the time, and sometimes pitch as well, and are not so easilly playable on the guitar. It was also the most difficult solo to apply to the instrument, and the one I got the shortest way with, especially since a big portion of the solo is based on 16th note lines at a tempo that I find hard, as well as many of the phrases being difficult in tregister, shape and more.

It was very valuable to try to sing the lines from this solo, and there were some obstacles, as I noted with the lack of clarity in some lines, as well as most of the solo being very high in pitch and often much to high to really sing, but still to attempt to vocalize the high notes and sing the lines in pitch at a slow tempo was rewarding and also made the transition to the instrument easier, as it pertains to the notes of the lines themselves even though it was a big challenge technically to get them close to the recording speed. In the solo many of the line shapes are alike, and Griffin uses similar tools over the same harmonies which can be convenient for the sake of analyzing and understanding his harmonic appproach to the changes, as well a lot of lines rapidly going through different registers, often spanning two to three octaves, usually symmetrically; with arpeggios etc.

Figure 11: In this example Johnny Griffin plays through the first 7 bars of the A section, playing cleanly through arpeggio shapes, implying secondary dominants and using many approach notes and enclosures. The phrases are very much on the edge of the time and sometimes fall of the grid slightly, which is very different from the other solos I transcribed for this project, and was one of the key points to bring in to my own improvisation from studying this solo.

Figure 11

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In the solo there are many pentatonic shapes in different places, along with the arpeggios and approach notes. In figure 12, from the b section of Griffin‘s solo, he plays C minor pentatonic on F7 and a pentatonic shape outlining B minor 6 on the Bb7 chord. Hearing and singing these shapes help to create the context for myself around these more theoretic types of shapes and lines.

Figure 12

2.3 The exams concert

My exams concert was held on the 5^th of April, with a quartet consisting of Anna Gréta Sigurðardóttir, Henrik Jäderberg, Johan Tengholm and myself. We played various compositions from myself, which mostly had been written in a period of the last two years but featured one new composition as well. Playing my own compositions in trio and quartet constellations has been a big focus of mine during the last two years, and so I felt that it would be good to use that material at the concert, especially since the project is about expanding my improvisational language, and instrumental capacity as a whole, and not just under the specific circumstances that is playing the compositions I transcribed the solos from. I feel that the transcriptions have helped me to expand as an improviser and the knowledge gained from studying these solos have translated to my playing, not only at the exams concert but in other projects, gigs and jams that I encountered over the course of the year.

3. Diskussion

3.1 The application of transcriptions to my own improvisation

The practice of taking language from others and systematically applying it to improvisations over jazz standards has brought up the question of my own connection and voice in my approach to playing on standards. To me transcribing is about seeking tools that will help me to connect better to my own voice as an improviser, and to spot and work out my shortcomings on the instrument and conceptually.

I wonder if systematically taking lines and concepts from the solos of others and trying to directly apply it into my playing contributes to my own connection with improvising on tunes, or if sometimes it just is a quick way to apply language from those musicians into my own playing without any real connection to it.

I have also reflected on how to use information from a transcription to my advantage, and to

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It seems to me that it can both be of great value to understand the language of my favorite musicians, and their conception towards playing on tunes, but I also think that it might be precarious to be too literal in applying their language into my own playing, as it is not my intent to copy their approach, but rather to use it as a tool to expand my own language and approach to improvising. I think it is a more complicated step to use the language acquired from transcription in a way that deepens my own connection to improvising. But there are also plenty of examples of great improvisers being very literal in their approach to applying language from their favorite musicians into their own playing, like Joel Frahm directly lifting phrases from Johnny Griffin, Sonny Stitt from Charlie Parker etc. so of course the discussion is two-fold, and each approach has its different sides. But for me an important part of this is to be aware of how I use the transcriptions to benefit my own playing and not just as a quick way to directly lift language that I think is “hip” onto my own playing.

Over the course of this project, I have felt my playing develop significantly in many areas, and although all my different practices tie together to affect my playing, I feel that the transcription element has pushed me forward in my playing and conception of the instrument and language.

I also believe that transcription ties in directly with many other aspects of my practicing, and has an effect on why I practice certain things, noticing things that I would like to expand, or give an indication of an aesthetic picture I would like to pursue, without tying directly in to the language of the solo I transcribed. So in some ways it is hard to talk about transcription and its’

effects in a vacuum, because in my case it is often tied in to other practices, or leads me into other areas, and often the ideas that I will pursue from a solo can be quite indirect, and often tied to areas that I find as being personal weaknesses.

3.2 How process affects the result of transcribing

I experimented with a few different ways to transcribe solos during this work to see if it would affect me in different ways. Altura’s solo was one that I barely knew when I started to transcribe fragments and lines from it, and similarly I was not very familiar with Moreno’s solo when I started to translate it to my instrument, often using the instrument as a guide for the transcription process. With Griffin’s and Rollins’ solos I decided not to start transcribing and applying their contents to my instrument until I knew and could sing the phrases I was transcribing.

Singing the solos before playing them was a longer process, as I had to establish a strong aural connection to the solos before I could start working them out on the instrument, but the process was also more detailed and helped me to understand those solos more intuitively than the ones I took a more casual approach to transcribing.

One thing that stands out is my recollection of phrases in the solos, when I have already aurally internalized a whole solo deeply, it is always easy to come back to and internalize the pitches and shape of a line and recall it than if I have not established that same connection with the solo to my ears. And so, when I am away from the instrument for instance, I have a much stronger connection to the solos I have internalized through listening and singing only than the ones where the internalizing has in some ways gone straight to the instrument.

I found that applying phrases that I could sing to my instrument to be a much easier process, and often it would barely take any repetition or in some cases even a slow down to translate

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segments of the solo from my ear and to the instrument. I also found it much easier and more intuitive to use different fingerings and to play the solo on different parts of the instrument when I had internalized the solo before playing it on the instrument.

It was interesting to be able to sing phrases from the solos and not be entirely sure what it was on the instrument, so the language felt more integrated into myself rather than onto the instrument directly. I do also think that you establish a strong aural connection to the solos that you transcribe in a different way, but it is not equally as challenging on the ears as it is to sing the phrases first without help from the instrument, and singing the phrases truly by ear, as opposed to having the instrument help when things come up that I have a harder time internalizing is a really helpful tool for myself to expose and challenge what I have difficulty with.

I do think that being able to internalize a solo without the instrument is a more complete way to transcribe, as it made me much less reliant on the instrument itself to being able to translate and internalize the language of the solo. To me the process of singing the solo before playing it established how great the importance of listening to music is for my development. If you get to know a solo aurally, often you have either an intuitive or literal understanding of what is happening in the solo just from listening, and at that point it can become very simple to apply to the instrument.

Transcription is a way to get concrete evidence of what it is that you hear on a recording, being able to analyze what it is theoretically or what it means on the instrument and finding ways to utilize the concept around it. As well as being a way to hone your technique and putting things you like into practice, as well as finding ways to make it fit your way of playing or translating it onto your instrument.

4. Summary

In doing this work I realized how many sides there are to the concept of transcribing, how many different viewpoints different musicians have towards transcribing and different views on its benefits and flaws. The work also made me reflect on the perceived barriers between the act of transcribing, and the act of learning music by sheet music, deep listening and ear training, which in essence are all related to each other in different ways, as well as reflecting on the purpose of transcribing as opposed to learning by these other methods, and how these methods play into the act of transcribing.

Transcribing and learning to apply these solos to my instrument presented many challenges and exposed me to weaknesses in my playing that I tried to find ways to work on through the year.

by transcribing I gain a deeper connection with the solo than purely through listening.

By listening I can understand the overall aesthetic and vibe of a solo and pick out certain stuff but when I transcribe, I see and am able to analyze the inner workings of the material I transcribe, giving me a much more specific understanding of it.

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17 Citations

Album

1959, Monk, Thelonious. “Let’s Cool One” Misterioso, Riverside Records.

1987, Rollins, Sonny. ”I‘ve Got You Under My Skin“ A Night at the Village Vanguard, vol.

1, Blue Note.

Internet

Held, P, “PABLO HELD INVESTIGATES: NELSON VERAS”

https://pabloheld.com/en/investigates/nelson-veras

Held, P, 2020, “Sullivan Fortner interviewed by Pablo Held”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SzAN5CWlmh0&t, timestamp: 1:06:08

Moreno, M, 2021, “HOUSE GUEST SERIES ... Felder, Hekselman, Lund”, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uRki7-CdQJU&t, timestamp: 1:52:03 Moreno, M, 2021, “HOUSE GUEST SERIES ... Felder, Hekselman, Lund”, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uRki7-CdQJU&t , timestamp: 1:56:15 Moreno, M, 2021, “HOUSE GUEST SERIES ... Felder, Hekselman, Lund”, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uRki7-CdQJU&t, timestamp: 1:58:30

2021, Melissa Aldana Quartet – Elsewhere – Bar Bayeux https://youtu.be/2SGSQipPAK0?t=531 timestamp: 8:51 2009 ”Mike Moreno Rhythm Changes – Anthropology”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V-Uq_qTUTOc

PDF Drawing From the Source - DiVA portal

Bjarni Már Ingólfsson

Drawing From the Source

Abstract

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