Brent Vaarstra

I don’t know about you, but the solos that I take where I leave feeling satisfied and happy with them are the ones where I start out with some ideas. I build on those ideas

” nickname for the melodic minor scale is “Dorian natural 7,” because the melodic minor scale is just like a Dorian minor scale except with a natural (or major) seventh instead of a flatted seventh (when compared with a parallel major scale starting on the same root). The melodic minor scale played from the root is simple to use, you can use it over any tonic minor-major-seventh chords, and you can also use it on II minor chords. Additionally, sensitive pianists and guitarists will quickly hear it if you play a strong melodic minor sounding idea over a II-7 chord, and they will likely change their voicing to accommodate your melodic choice (they can do so by switching to a minor-major-seventh chord voicing or by avoiding playing the seventh in their voicing altogether). We’ll use the melodic minor sound to create melodies every time we have a minor chord, and we’ll use the 7th mode of melodic minor (the altered scale) every time there is a dominant chord that is resolving V7-I. As an added layer of musical challenge, we’ll also practice spicing up our melodic improvisations by alternating between using 8th note vs. triplet rhythms as we create our melodies.

I really believe that in order to take a great solo over a jazz standard, or any song at all, that you need to understand how that song works. Yes, we need to be able to use our ears and that’s obviously the most important thing when it comes to being a jazz improviser. However, I believe that understanding how chord progressions work, how chords function and the context of the entire song – all of this is really important. And that’s why I like to spend some time analyzing jazz standards, going over how they work and try to dig deep inside of them.

One arm of my 30 Steps to Better Jazz Playing course is learning jazz solos by ear. This is a great practice for learning jazz language and internalizing musical information from great jazz improvisers. But what I love is when students tell me after 7 sessions of the course, that they can’t believe they were able to learn 32 bars of a solo by ear. So in today’s episode, I want to let you in on my process for learning jazz solos by ear.