Read, write, discuss and debate over Jazz. In simple words, love Jazz. Perhaps it is the best way to learn and play Jazz better. Never limit your experimentation during the phase of learning. The more you would experiment, the more you would be exposed to different styles and techniques of jazz. The more you’d be exposed to the styles and techniques, the brighter are the chances of attaining mastery over Jazz.
But while delving over the emotion of Jazz, keep in mind the fact that emotion is intrinsic in nature and no book can teach you to capture it. Your belongingness and affinity enables to master the emotion and help a lot to learn to play Jazz faster. This article comprises some necessary tips on mastering Jazz.
First step of Jazz learning is assessing your self potential. As a beginner you are advised to listen to as many Jazz tracks as you can. Maintain a judicious balance between the all time hits and the current trends. Try to understand the basics and implement it to lay the foundation of Jazz learning. After it learn and try to have proficiency in all 12 major scales. Your exposure and expertise in all the scales helps a lot in future.
In the next step you can buy a Jazz book published by any reputed publisher to make your learning easier. While buying a book, go for that where chord symbols or guitar tabs are written above the melody line. Then master major 7th, minor 7th, and dominant 7th, half diminished and diminished chord of every key. Once you master these, stop taking the help of the book and start playing on your own. With passage of time and experience, learn chord inversions, playing CM7, pentatonic scale, 3, 6, 2, 5, 1 progression, chromatic and diatonic harmony to add to your skill and expertise.
By: Akhila Choudhary