Brush Comping and Sweep Direction Part 2

Kenny Washington

Picking right up where we left off with last weeks brush comping exercise:

3.  Practice comping using dotted quarter notes with music
By playing a simple dotted quarter note comping rhythm with your left hand, you will have a three bar phrase that uses every possible eighth note.  In other words if you start on beat 1, then the next note will be on the "+" of beat 2, the following note will be on beat 4, and so on.  I like this approach because it covers all the rhythmic possibilities without being too cluttered.  Make sure that you are not changing the direction of your comping to accommodate your comping rhythm.  Also, to make this phrase line up more clearly with the music, just add a fourth bar in which you comp freely.  So basically three bars of dotted quarter note, and one bar of whatever.  Focus on trying to keep your sweep sound as intact as possible and locking up with the bass player.  Here is my version:

4.  Comp freely with music keeping your sweeping direction steady

By the time you get to this step, you should be reasonably comfortable with the feeling of comping without changing the direction of your sweeping.  The idea in this step is to practice the way you want to sound when you are actually playing with other people.  In other words, try to sound good!  Don't overplay or rely too much on your new technique, just use it when its appropriate.  If you feel like you have to do extra thinking every time you want to comp in your awkward direction, then you probably aren't ready to use this technique in a real musical situation.  It has to be easy.  Also, this is a good time to try to pick up some ideas from Kenny Washington's beautiful and spare playing on this song if you haven't already.  Here is my version:

Overview

• Start by practicing comping in your awkward direction with just your left hand
• Practice only comping in your awkward direction with music
• Practice playing dotted quarter notes with music
• Comp freely with music

I like to go through "Lorelei" five times in a session, focusing on whatever of these steps is giving me trouble.  Just from the last several weeks of practicing like this almost every day I have noticed a significant improvement in the depth of my left hand comping.  It's not quite where I would like it to be, but this exercise has really been helping.  

I hope you enjoy the exercise, let me know if you have any questions. 

Brush Comping and Sweep Direction Part 1

A simple experiment
Recently I noticed something peculiar about my comping with brushes.  Depending on what rhythm I was comping, I would change my left hand sweeping pattern.  As with any discussion about brushes, this sounds more complicated than it actually is.  I suggest that you grab a pair of brushes and try the following experiment:

1.  Play your regular brush pattern and comp on the "+" of 1 with your left hand- does that feel comfortable?

2.  Try the same thing but comp on the "+" of 2- does that feel comfortable?

I have found that depending on how you hold the brush and what direction you sweep in, one of the two comping rhythms above will be significantly easier to execute than the other.  For me, comping on the "+" of 1 feels totally natural while the "+" of 2 does not.  

People tend to address this challenge in one of two ways, either they change their left hand sweeping pattern so that they comp the uncomfortable rhythm in a direction that is comfortable, or they just play the comping rhythm in their right hand.  Often times people (myself included) just cobble together some combination of these two approaches to find something that works.  

Integrating comping into your sweeping pattern
Of course, there is absolutely nothing wrong with finding something that works and sticking with it!   Recently however, I found myself feeling constrained by my brush comping.  I wanted to find a way to expand my rhythmic palette to make it feel more like comping with sticks.   I quickly realized that the most direct way to make my brush comping feel more like stick comping was to tackle the issue of integrating my comping into my sweeping pattern.  That is to say, learning to comp in whatever direction my left hand was naturally moving in.  

Those of you who are familiar with this blog know that I am a huge advocate of making every exercise as close to musical as possible.  With that in mind I came up with the following system:

1.  Practice only comping in your awkward direction with just your left hand
Before you do anything else with this, you have to work out the physical motion of your left hand that will achieve the comping sound you want without breaking up your sweeping.  This is more challenging than it sounds.  For example, I noticed that I put a little extra pressure on beats 2 and 4 in my left hand sweeping pattern.  So being able to release this pressure and get my fingers to snap the brush without breaking up the sweep entirely was hard.  What ended up working was thinking of the motion as the reverse of what I normally do on the "+" of 1.  So if I normally snapped my fingers out on that beat, I had to try to get a similar sound by snapping my fingers in on the "+" of beat 2.  Although this step can be really boring, don't skip it.  Everything after this will depend on your ability to get a good comping sound in your left hand.

2.  Practice only comping in your awkward direction with music
Now that your left hand is feeling at least reasonably good, it is time to get to the music.  For this exercise I highly recommend the song "Lorelei" from the Bill Charlap album "Written In the Stars".  Kenny Washington is playing drums on this album, and his brush sound, combined with the tempo and feel of this song, make it a perfect one to practice along with.  
For this step, simply practice playing time and comping consistently in your awkward direction.  For me this meant comping on the "+" of beats 2 and 4.  Don't worry about referencing the song too much in your playing at this point, just focus on getting a good sound and locking up with the bass player (the fantastic Peter Washington)  Here is what that will sound like with the melody:

Stay tuned for the second half of this exercise coming soon!

The Fundamentals of Jazz Drumming Part Two

Here is the second installment of my series on the fundamentals of jazz drumming.  This time the topic is comping, and I will take you through my approach to learning how to comp.  Here is the recording used in the exercise:

For more on my approach to comping in the cracks, check out this earlier post.

Uptempo Jazz 5: Anthropology part 2

Continuing where I left off in the last post, here is some more advice about developing uptempo comping vocabulary based on the melody of "Anthropology".  To start off, the recording at the top from "Art Pepper +11" is a great way to familiarize yourself with this melody (the great Mel Lewis is on drums).

Max Roach: Comping as soloing

Comping as soloing

In an earlier post I discussed Max's approach to soloing in a general sense.  In today's post I am going to zero in on a particular solo technique that Max used very frequently, and to great effect.  The technique I am referring to is using comping as a vehicle for soloing.  Essentially for Max this meant soloing using his left hand and right foot while keeping the time going in his right hand and left foot. 

Uptempo Jazz part 2: Karriem Riggins

I know that there are lots of people out there who struggle with playing uptempo jazz like I am.  So I am going to make these uptempo jazz posts a series to help everyone by showing my approach to learning this extremely challenging musical style. 

Uptempo Jazz: Playing fast, slow

I recently stumbled across a lovely video of Steve Smith talking about his practice habits.  Check it out:

Practicing slowly
Although this is all stuff that I have thought about and pursued in my own practicing, something that Steve said about practicing slowly and quietly stuck in my mind.  The one thing that I can never seem to practice slowly is playing fast. 

Philly Joe: Conversation with the melody

For todays post I want to talk about another one of my favorite drummers and a way that he found to interact with the melody in a tasteful way.  Philly Joe is most famous for his playing with Miles Davis's first great group.  One of the things that made this group so influential was Philly Joe's ability to create a rhythmic dialogue with the melody instruments.  The following exercise from my forthcoming book "Melodic Syncopation" is designed to help you develop the ability to comp in the spaces of the melody or "in the cracks".

  
Suggested Recording
Sonny Rollins, “Tenor Madness”

Exercise #8:  Playing Time with Comping “In the Cracks”


    Step 1:  In this exercise we are going to explore a concept called playing “in the cracks” that is another central element of Philly Joe’s highly influential comping style.  Playing in the cracks means to play comping patterns only when a soloist leaves space in their solo.  This technique allows the soloist to play uncluttered lines, and lends itself to conversational back and forth between the soloist and the drummer.  This conversation often takes on the form and characteristics of call and response .  To develop this technique, you will practice singing the melody (the call), and only playing comping patterns (the response) during rests or notes held longer than a quarter note.