You'll Hear It: Full Album Deep Dives with Jazz Musicians - Simplest Way To Build A Solo

Episode Date: September 7, 2022

Adam and Peter talk about the simplest way to build your solo every time you play. Have a question for us? Leave us a SpeakPipeCheckout courses from Adam, Peter and more at Open StudioLet us know what you think by leaving a ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ review, or head over to our YouTube channel.Follow us on Twitter | Instagram

Hey, Peter. Hey. Have you ever heard of the acronym Kiss? Yes. K-I-S-S. Yeah, what does it stand for? Keep it simple solos. Kind of.

I'm Adam Manus. And I'm Peter Martin. And you're listening to the You'll Hear at Podcast. Jazz. Explain. Explained every day. Brought to you by Open Studio every day. Peter, we're here.

We're back. We're in the Open Studio. Oh, my gosh. It looks so great in here, by the way. Shout out to all of our Open Studio members who are here. Shout out to all of our You'll Hear It listeners. Shout out to Caleb for making the old, well, not old, but the podfront. Yes.

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And at the end, we always have a little stuff at the end, so stick around for that. And wait, there's one more thing. Okay. Oh, oh, wait, I thought I was getting excited. I was trying to get you excited about it. But yeah. So what are we talking about today?

We're talking about the simplest way to build a solo. Yes. I love this subject. We've covered similar subjects. I mean, let's be honest, Peter. This is a podcast like 960 something. Yeah. We've covered everything.

There's going to be some repetition, but we like to think of it as evolution as well. Yeah. Because we're still learning. ABS. Absolutely. Let's get back to hashtag ABS. Always be, no, ABL. ABL.

Always be learning. ABS, anti-break system. Always be singing. Always be soloing. Always be soloing. Always be soloing simply. Always be simply. So ABSS.

Always be simply soloing. Right. Always be simply. But yeah, and full disclosure, right before we started, we had a little bit of a tete-a-tete, as we would say, a little back and forth as to whether or not to do this episode, not only because we've covered similar things, but we had a little bit of a trouble, a little bit of trouble coming up with the simplest way to build solos. So we thought we would kind of banter on that, perhaps debate that and then perhaps come together in agreement towards the end of the episode. I don't want to script it to. I don't want to over script it. You were pushing back on my simple ways. Like I give three examples here.

Well, because we're saying the simplest way to build souls. And then you gave me a list of three. I know. And none of them are that simple. They're not that simple. And there's not one. There's not one. And none of them are that simple.

But I think there is a way that we could talk about. Yeah. You know, telling your story that I think more than like having one simple way, Peter, the way to go about this is to recognize that. that we don't have to overthink things when we solo. Well, here at the you'll hear of a podcast, often we do have to overthink things.

You don't have to all the time. Right. And so I thought we could just start. And this is also something that gets brought up a lot by some of our students and our members about, you know, I have so much to think about there's so many changes and scales and rhythms and all this stuff. How do I actually listen to?

I'm trying to give you some soothing music in the background. I'm sorry. So I think we could start with number one. And this will be, I think, on brand for our podcast, which is number one. Play. Nope. Not even close. Oh, number one.

Breathe. Nope. But that sometimes. Well, I mean, you're just like number three and number five. But what's number one? Listen. Listen. Always listen.

So when we talk about building a solo, what we're really talking about is creating some tension and some release, creating some drama. Yeah. And telling a story. And what storytelling is is setting up a scenario. setting up a situation, setting up your audience's expectations. Yes. Taking them on a bit of dissonance, like taking it somewhere where it feels a little unsettled,

a little uncomfortable, and then delivering them to a place that feels, again, back home or comfortable. This is like what music is. It's literally like, that's a story. That's a solo. Classic 151 solo. 151 is an arc of dissonance, right? Home, away.

Back home. Right? That's the simplest version. of thing. Maybe that's it. Let me just one five one. Let me just paraphrase. I'm gonna put another spin on what you just said. Okay.

I'm gonna look at it through a different prism. Put a, put a different prism. And then I'm gonna put a pin in it. Put some shades in. Put a pin in it. Put it on Pinterest. You're gonna take a friend. You're gonna slap them.

You're gonna kick them while they're down. Wait a minute. Why you're getting violent? And then you're gonna lift them up and give him a big kiss. That's exactly right. Okay. I scared you there.

A kiss. You're gonna keep it simple, stupid. That's exactly right. Exactly. See, now we're, We've told our own story with the story of this podcast. I think that that actually is the simplest way. And the listening is the key to it.

So the listening is not going to be the simple way to build the solo. But you can't do it simply and effectively without listening. You have to listen at all times. And that means listening to the music that's going on around you, listening to what your fellow musicians are playing, and listening to the voice and the music in your own head. Maybe it's a VOG too. you got to listen to the voice of God.

Well, you don't want to listen to anything that's super critical. Like, you don't want to listen to that self-critic in there. Yeah. You want to listen to the music that's trying to get out. I mean the VOD. Listen to the moment. And I think, you know, when you want to tell a story, right? When you want to build tension and release it, listening is crucial because a lot of what you're going to use to build tension.

Like, you can't tell the story of like a princess, you know, kicking a dragon's ass if you're not in like a medieval dragon princess scenario, right? So if you're not listening to the scenario that you're in, to the setting that you're in, where are you going to get the content of the dissonance, right? Where are you going to get the arc of the story so you can come out victorious in the end? Yes. So like if you're just coming in with a plan, like, okay, I'm here. We got two pianos and we're going to play softly is in a morning sunrise.

And I'm going to tell my story. One, two, one, two, three. He's coming in hot. He's coming in hot. And I don't care what Peter's playing. And you're not listening because you're talking over here. I don't care. I'm slaying my own dragon. Even though we're in New York City.

Like, you know what I mean? Like it makes no sense. So being aware of what's going on around you, listening to what's going around you, is the only way that you know where your story is taking place. Is that too many mixed metaphors? No, no, it's great. And I would say, you know, being aware and going next level is kind of hyper aware, which is very focused listening,

you know, and we're always working towards that will make it even easier for you to build that solo and we'll make it even simpler because the solo will sort of start, like what you need to play. Let it come to you.

Exactly. We'll start to unfold before you and then you can kind of ride that wave. Totally. Because I think, you know, the idea of the starting small, getting big, going small, starting, simple,

getting more complex or more confused or whatever and then like that's the simplest format really and so that's always going to be the simplest way there's a thousand there's a million ways to do it within that general framework and then you you know and that's kind of at the macro level but if you're not listening and if you're not hyper aware and hyper listening i would say it's going to be very hard for you to tell to be able to discern when you should go and make those shift those dramatic shifts in the overall like we're not talking about one quarter one note we're talking about the overall of an entire solo, which could be anywhere from, what, 20 seconds to 20 minutes?

So I wonder if you can give, if we can give an example of this, Peter, like, so if we do, if we go back to Soffley's on a morning sunrise, right? And I wonder if, like, you could try to arc a solo over the span of one chorus. Okay. Just using the only tool in your tool belt is listening. Okay. So you put a couple handcuffs on me, but I'm willing to try. No, but I mean, you can be freer than that, but really, like, you know,

trying to listen your way through it or letting it come to you. take the handcuffs and turn them into a bird that flies away let's try it one two one two three that's nice that was nice but there was some drama that happened yeah and i'm wondering now having with the listener having heard that um like what's going on there when you're obviously you're not planning anything you're not trying to plan anything you're not trying to like come up with an idea of what you might do so what's what's going on as you're building that yeah okay so i like for sure to have some initial simple idea. Oh, there's fuzz on my microphone.

Always. I'm sorry, I'm like a distracted squirrel. Yeah, yeah. You know, something that is put together with like a basic element. And we're normally not necessarily thinking about consciously, but the reality is rhythmic, melodic, harmonic. Some kind of nugget. And it's usually, for me, I'm kind of steering more towards the rhythmic and melodic, you know, and letting the harmonious. stuff come a little bit later.

But that's not the only way to do it. That's just kind of my typical thing on a tune like this. That's the best thing. And that's how you can build themes and let the solo come to you is finding a nugget. Like you started off with this. I think it was. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. This doc. I mean, whatever that is. And then built through it, ended with it, spun it around, kicked it,

knocked it down. Exploited it fully. Completely. Yeah. But you got the most out of it, right? Yeah. And so I would say some, let's talk about, instead of the successes of that chorus, let's talk a little bit about, to me, the failures of it.

No failures here, man. No, no, no, I feel like, you know, this tune is my own fault, but like the bridge is a little bit lame. Am I allowed to say that? Like, to me, the A sections are just easier, more fun to play over. Like, to me, the bridge is a little bit throwawayish. It's just like. Yeah, I mean, anything you do like that is going to be. And then that's it.

I mean, I'm exaggerating for a little bit of community effect. No, but it's just, it's difficult because. Because, you know, the way that the A sections unfold, going to the bridge, it's so, like, not only predictable, but it doesn't really go anywhere to me. Right. That's not predictable. So you just have to kind of account for that. And I find myself, you have to put a little bit more energy because that's, if you're doing one chorus, that's going to be sort of your time to sort of build up or whatever. So, yeah, so just to pause on that, on that moment.

So usually the bridge in an A, A, A, B, A, a. standard like this one, the bridge is used to build tension. Like when you're inside that bridge, because it's the only different section. And I know Monk referenced this a lot, but you can hear it and everybody's playing. You use the bridge as a place to swirl and build tension and then release it on that last A. It's sort of built it, right? Exactly.

Yeah, yeah. So when your bridge, as you kind of put, it's like, you know, not as interesting. Yeah. I will say, though, with this tune, there is a climax that happens in the melody. Yeah. And the changes themselves are, you write kind of thoroughway. It's a one-six. Yeah.

And then, but there is this, this little climax that happens on the melody that you might think of. Yeah. No, it's there. It's just so predictable that you kind of, as you're, as you're crafting. I mean, look, there's a lot of tunes like this, you know. Let me, can I try one? Yeah. You can.

This could be one course too, right? One course, I'm going to try to use the form. Okay. So this is another thing you can do. You can listen and find that nugget, which I'm definitely going to do. But I'm also going to use the form for what it gives you. Like, again, letting it come to you. So you have the repetition of A, A, B, A.

Use that repetition in the A sections. Yep. Like use it to your advantage. You can use it. Ride that way. And then on the B section, because it's the different section, use that to its advantage. Let's try it. One, two.

One, two. Right. So I'm having my nugget there. So there's something that kind of came. I actually heard you gave me a little a little G right there. So you gave me that information. And then you're listening.

And I can, I'm listening. So like right before we started that, Peter gave me a five, right? And I heard that I'm like, oh, I can take that and see what I can make of it. Trying to keep it simple. And the bridge,

I really wanted to take it out rhythmically put some more, I put some cluster thing, some chromaticism to it, tried to build it. It didn't work exactly how I wanted to. Like it never. is like, you know, this perfect thing or whatever. But it's a cool way to kind of break up the predictability of the bridge, I thought,

to mess around with the harmony like that. You don't really have to think about it. You don't have to plan it so much. It kind of happens for you if you let it come to you. Yeah, for sure, for sure. Cool, man. This is fun. Yeah, and then just one thing I added to that, as you let it come to you, it's not going to come every time.

Don't worry about that. Yeah. You know, and that's why we practice. That's why we work on this. That's why we're thinking about it away from the instrument and kind of try to hear some things. But we're just, we're looking to up our percentage of times that it comes to you. And that would be great. You know, the more you try, the more you're going to succeed, the more you're going to fail too, but you're going to, that's going to be the part of the learning

process for sure. Well, this was super fun, man. Real quick. Yes. Well, thanks everybody. Super fun. Don't forget to subscribe to our YouTube, a new YouTube channel called You'll Hear It. And leave us a rating review still on the pot. That's still the best way for it to spread. Just for our own ego. Just to give us a little bit of peace of mind. That too. Absolutely. that we're doing it right. Until next time, you'll hear it.