How to Improve your Vocabulary of Jazz Rhythms

We don't often talk about is how rhythm is actually also a melody, and how to work on your vocabulary for jazz rhythm. But, of course, a very important part of playing jazz is interesting and great rhythms.

In this video, I am going to go over some great examples of rhythms used in a jazz solo taken from Chet Baker, Kenny Burrel, and Jim Hall. I also discuss how you might want to work on improving this part of your own playing.

Content:
0:00 Intro - Adding New Rhythms To Your Solos
0:14 Getting Inspirations from Kenny Burrell Jim Hall and Chet Baker
0:32 Example #1
0:39 Kenny Burrell - Mastering Medium Swing
1:06 How To Use Simple (but great 8th Note Rhythms)
1:24 Example #1 Slow
1:34 How To Use The Material
1:57 Example Lick #1
2:14 Example Lick #2
2:22 Ideas with more of a concept
2:40 Example #2
2:46 Chet Baker - Strong Rhythm and Simple Notes
3:02 Analyzing the line
3:58 Example Lick #3
4:26 Example Lick #4
4:52 Example #3
4:59 Jim Hall - Rhythmical Diversity and Strong Melodies
5.36 Motif and a Scale Sequence
5:59 Example #3 Slow
6:07 Getting More Out of the Pattern and understanding why it is great!
6:30 Example Lick #5
6:40 Like the video? Check out my Patreon Page!

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Edited by Luciano Poli

#jazzrhythm #jazzguitar #guitarlesson

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[JensLarsen]

How do you work on rhythm in your solos?
Content:

0:00 Intro - Adding New Rhythms To Your Solos
0:14 Getting Inspirations from Kenny Burrell Jim Hall and Chet Baker
0:32 Example #1
0:39 Kenny Burrell - Mastering Medium Swing
1:06 How To Use Simple (but great 8th Note Rhythms)
1:24 Example #1 Slow
1:34 How To Use The Material
1:57 Example Lick #1
2:14 Example Lick #2
2:22 Ideas with more of a concept
2:40 Example #2
2:46 Chet Baker - Strong Rhythm and Simple Notes
3:02 Analyzing the line
3:58 Example Lick #3
4:26 Example Lick #4
4:52 Example #3
4:59 Jim Hall - Rhythmical Diversity and Strong Melodies
5.36 Motif and a Scale Sequence
5:59 Example #3 Slow
6:07 Getting More Out of the Pattern and understanding why it is great!
6:30 Example Lick #5
6:40 Like the video? Check out my Patreon Page!

[astarothgr]

Note grouping, arsis-thesis, i.e. starting a melody on the off-beat and finishing on a strong beat produces much more interesting musical results. The jim hall example at the end was a great demo of that!

For anybody else interested in this topic, i highly recommend the book Note Grouping by James Morgan Thurmond. Cheers!

[ronlevenberg]

Great lesson, Jens: brief, easy to grasp, and presents something specific to work on! Thanks!

[MorningCarnival]

Thanks Jens, I’m just back from a Jazz summer school where we were working on this idea. I’m going to be working on Chet Baker and Jim Hall rhythms for the next couple of weeks!

[RCSmiths]

Great video here as always my man! Rhythm is so vital to Jazz playing given how intense it can get!

[JohnHorneGuitar]

Thanks for another awesome video, Jens. Love that Chet Baker lick! So simple but so swinging!

[Turybegood]

Hey Jens, Thank you very much for your lessons, I have about one year following your videos, and I have really improved my playing, thanks for all the "Secrets" that very few musicians dare to post, keep up the good work, you are a great player and musician overall

[Athraminaurian]

I enjoy taking flows and phrases from great rappers and using those as a rhythmical base for melodies. tunes like groovy tony by schoolboy Q and golddust by Danny Brown has some absolute killer phrasing in them.

I also like applying drum rudiments to the guitar which is an idea I got from Miles Okazaki. It's really nice for accents and stuff.

[SilentHouseStudios]

I watched this video this morning and then I listened to the album Undercurrents. Excellent playing on it, thanks for the suggestion.

[vishyoutubevideos]

thanks for another fantastic video, Jens. I have been meaning to request a video along these lines. You beat me to it!

[marceloagustinmombelli]

This is so great, lessons on rhythm yeah! I wrote the rhythms down and put a name on each to remember them in the context on wich I learned them. So far for lead I have three sheets: substitution preferences, licks preferences and rhythm preferences, all with names useful for me. More and more cathegories to solo... Thanks!

[downhill]

Another great lesson! Could you do a short lesson on how you have your guitar and amp set-up to get that tone?

[pondreezy]

If a rhythmic line needed their lawn mowed I would give it the name of the best landscaping crew in town! 😘😘😘

[antsonc]

This is a brilliant lesson not only about rhythmic ideas but also about composing melodies on the fly. I guess the same basic concepts apply when building up inside-outside phrases, any advice on that subject? :-)

On a personal experience, my first teacher told me what I played didn't sound as melodies, until the day I started improvising with octaves and right hand thumb: that way my solos where slower and I HAD to think melodies and a lot of times I started with a fragment that I kept on reproposing, e.g. a 2-4 notes cell or a rythm pattern.

[alarichzollerjazzguitar]

Trying to improve my playing I'm learning complete solos of other musicians. The most solos I like have a lot of rhythm changes, it's a big challenge to master this changes. At last for me.

[oneeyemonster]

the trick is to see the lesson in the 2 different keys and modulate back and forth
between them....C min/E Maj
The G#/Ab augmented or C augmented...both possible Loc b4 (reference)
Leading TONE

to A melodic min or C# melodic min...


The F min..could be lydian #2 or Lydian b3...or lydian #2, b7 ( you alter this to whatever)
( A harmonic min b5 or F Hungarian Major)
They over lap in many ways....
Because I could modulate from C MAJOR to C melodic min..too
Hence the Eb Maj to C min or Bb7 to Eb MAJOR
The Bb can also be the N6 of A min...
I could easily play Bb7 C7 into F melodic min...if i wanted too.



I see the D as dorian D dorian b2. #4....as well.
which will over lap..if I modulate or simply play into the D min/F MAJOR...
not so much change keys...

I''ll also see the Eb as a possible (N6)..if I want to play from D min Tonic to C min Tonic.
But I can also play F Major into F min7..too .lol
E into F..whatever...



You 'll get used to it...it's easier than you think.

[alixchatelain]

The word is “idea” not “idear” lose the ‘r’ please...

[diminishedthicc]

i think a great way to improve rhythm, even syncopation rhythm is scatting. i am solid on this. the voice is the core of your instrument. anyway great video, and also really good licks