SEPTEMBER VOCAL COHORT INFO

  • Picking a tune: Performance in this class is totally optional! You’re more than welcome to observe, or use your time for us to do group improvisation games, active listening, etc. But assuming you’d like to perform in class, you’ll first need to pick a tune. If you’re just starting out, my very favorite to start with are Fly Me to the Moon and Autumn Leaves. These two tunes are very common vocal standards that contain chord progressions that show up all over the place in jazz! They’re a great study in the basics of jazz melodies and chord progressions. But you’re welcome to select any song you feel comfortable working on!

  • Practicing at home: The best tool I know of for at-home practice (if you’re not proficient on an instrument like piano or guitar) is the app iReal Pro. Once you download it, you can click the globe icon to visit the forums and download the “Jazz 1460 Standards” playlist (and/or any others that look appealing to you!). This will give you the chords to 1,460 songs!! Once you select a song, you can change the tempo, the feel (medium swing vs ballad vs bossa nova, for example), and the key. If you’re not able to download iReal for any reason, let me know and I can send you iReal audio to practice to!

  • Finding your key: The next challenge is finding your key. Don’t overthink this! We can change the key anytime! We just want to find a comfortable starting place. One of the best ways to do this is to just sing the song a cappella—you probably already have an intuitive sense of where is a comfortable range to sing the song. Record yourself singing it so you don’t lose the key, and then you can either use an online keyboard (or real keyboard if you have one!) or iReal Pro to test different keys until you find one that fits. When in doubt, you can send me the voice memo of you singing and I’ll tell you what key you’re in!

  • iReal Pro charts are totally acceptable for class. While the best option is a lead sheet, iReal is second best and a great starting place!

IDeAL OPTION: Vocal Real Book Lead Sheet for Fly Me to the Moon in A flat

PERFECTLY ACCEPTABLE OPTION: iReal Pro chart for Fly Me to the Moon in C

For funsies: My own lead sheet I created in MuseScore (free notation software) that includes my preferred ending


This is a super informal brain dump of some of the valuable things we’ve talked about in Vocal Cohort over the last several months! I will update as I go!

IN CLASS

For performances in class, I’d like for you to know/be able to do the following:

  • Know the title of your song (and if there’s a common alternate title, like how Fly Me to the Moon was originally titled In Other Words).

  • Know the composer and/or lyricist of your song, and when the song was published or first recorded. Bonus: who made the first recording? Who is best known for recording the song?

  • Know the key in which you’d like to play the song

  • Know your intro and outro. Usually something like ‘last 4 measures as intro’ works great, or a simple tag for the ending (I’d like to repeat the last 4 bars as a tag). Go as simple as possible until you know the song really well!

  • Know your tempo—not by number; you don’t have to say “142 BPM, please!” But know by feel, internally what tempo you’d like, and then…

  • Be able to count off your tune! For swing, this usually means two measures—the first measure is half time, then quarter notes. “A one - two - a one, two, three, four.” There are absolutely exceptions to this!


Jazz Tradition



SONGS TO KNOW

Here is the START of a list of great songs to know! This is so incomplete, and I’ll add as I go!

List 1: These are some of the most popular vocal standards for a good reason! I think anyone who wants to sing jazz should know their way around these. This list does, however, contain songs that can easily be overdone. For that reason, I try to use them sparingly on a gig. Many of them are exceptional practice for the most common jazz chord progressions, though, so they’re incredible etudes for getting into jazz!

  • Summertime

  • Fly Me to the Moon

  • Autumn Leaves

  • All of Me

  • Girl from Ipanema

  • My Funny Valentine

  • Moon River

  • Blue Skies

  • L-O-V-E

This list contains songs that are still quite common, but not necessarily overdone. Several of them are also great studies of common jazz chord progressions. If you want to play jazz gigs, it’s good to know these tunes and have them available if someone were to request them!

  • On the Sunny Side of the Street

  • Route 66

  • Don’t Get Around Much Anymore

  • There Will Never Be Another You

  • The Nearness of You

  • They Can’t Take That Away from Me

  • Misty

These songs are slightly more off the beaten path but well loved and worth knowing! (this list is extremely incomplete!!)

  • What A Difference A Day Made

  • How High the Moon

  • But Not for Me

  • Stardust

  • Cheek to Cheek

  • Body and Soul

  • Like Someone in Love


Practice

Practice is most effective when it is consistent and purposeful.

Practice is most effective when it is consistent and purposeful.

Practice is most effective when it is consistent and purposeful.

Can you tell that I think that’s really important?

Okay, consistent means you should do it every day, or close to it. That means you have to start small. You cannot realistically expect to add an hour of practice to your daily routine. You might go strong for a few days and then burn out and never want to practice again. Instead, start with 5 minutes. You could realistically practice for 5 minutes a day for the rest of your life without burning out. Once you’ve hit 3 days in a row of practicing for 5 minutes, why not add another 5 minutes per day? Focus on building the habit first, then try expanding your time. Give yourself rewards for completing your practice. Have an accountability buddy you can check in with. Build the habit first. I think a realistic, meaningful goal would be to work up to 30 minutes of practice (could be two 15-minute practice sessions!), 5 times a week. That would be a recipe for incredible growth for most people.

Purposeful means you have a goal in mind. Write that goal down. For the next 15 minutes, I am going to work on learning the melody of this song. For the next 15 minutes, I am going to work on my swing feel. For the next 15 minutes, I am going to actively listen to the bass line of this recording. For the next 15 minutes, I am going to study the lyrics of this song. You can accomplish more in 15 minutes with a goal written down than you can in 30 minutes with no goal in mind.

Buy yourself a practice journal. It could be a notebook, it could be a binder, but I think it should be something you can physically write in and carry around. Even better if you buy stickers to put in it. Give yourself gold stars. Make a brief note on your practice each day. It might look something like this.

Monday - I am going to spend 15 minutes studying Sarah Vaughan’s vocal style. I noticed that she uses dramatic shifts in tone/timbre, and she uses her entire range.

Tuesday - 15 minutes to memorize lyrics of All of Me. It really helps me to write the lyrics down and draw pictures beside them.

Wednesday - Today I will practice All of Me with iReal Pro at 120BPM. I will focus on swing feel/locking in with the bass and drums. I will attempt a little bit of improv and record my practice.

A tip I learned from guitarist Jocelyn Gould is to make a master list of concepts/songs/whatever you want to practice. She has a list of like 75 things. Each month or so, she’ll pick a few elements to focus on so that each time she sits down to practice, she can easily select a purpose, or a few purposes for a few blocks of practice. For example, 15 minutes of practicing a particular rhythm; 15 minutes of practicing a particular song; 15 minutes of practicing triplets in improvisation over a blues; 15 minutes of practicing comping at a very fast tempo.




Performance

  • For every song you perform, I would ideally recommend knowing the song’s title, the song’s composer, the key you’re singing it in, and how to give a strong count-off at your desired tempo.

  • A great way to start getting your bearings in terms of jazz history is to start a page in your practice journal (or this part can be online) for every song in your book. Write down the song’s title (and any alternate titles), the song’s composer, the year it was published, notable recordings of the song, etc. Look up a little bit about the composer. Make notes about famous recordings. Listen to several vocal and instrumental versions of the song and make notes—is it usually done fast? Slow? A mix? Was the song written for a stage musical, a movie, or neither?


SWING FEEL

Formal Training

Do I need formal training? Yes and no! Some of the greatest musicians of all time did it with no ‘formal training’. Don’t ever let someone tell you that you can’t make music without formal training. That said, I think training is a privilege and a gift to take advantage of if you’re able. How you define ‘formal training’ may vary, but I think a lifelong study of music theory and aural skills/ear training is valuable for anyone who desires to engage seriously with music in general and with jazz in particular. 

A child who loves mechanical things may learn a great deal about how cars and radios and machines work without ‘formal training’. They probably learn by observing, taking things apart and putting them back together, asking questions, and using trial and error. The same is true for music–it’s completely possible to learn a great deal without enrolling in a master’s program (or any degree program at all). For the vast majority of people, though, it will require curiosity, dedication, and some sort of systematic study.

As a side note, the Internet has most of the information. Like… in the world. Anything in the world that you want to learn, you can probably learn a great deal of it for free or close to it. Please don’t let anyone convince you that you must pay them in order to learn. “If you are not willing to learn, no one can help you. If you are determined to learn, no one can stop you.” That said, great teachers and human connection can speed the learning process drastically. Great teachers are worth paying for, so just try to balance your budget with your determination. 

I hear many people talk about ‘doing it by ear’ as being the opposite of learning to read music or engaging with traditional western music theory. I think all great musicians should be using their ears full time, but reading music or learning theory does not have to be the enemy of creativity. Music is a language, a means of connection and communication, and learning a language (especially as an adult) usually works best when some study of grammar is included. 

Just think about the English language. Hardly anyone is expected to know everything about proper grammar, yet a basic knowledge of the ‘rules’ helps us communicate effectively. Artistic breaking of rules helps us connect on an even deeper level. The more you study and understand concepts like internal rhyme, alliteration, word play, rhetorical appeals, and story arc, the more you can effectively and creatively connect through words (even if you’re breaking a rule!). 

The same is true in jazz. There is no finish line for understanding music theory–you could study it for life and never come to the end, and therefore no one expects you to know everything. But a basic knowledge of the ‘grammar’ of jazz makes you a more effective communicator. The more you study concepts like phrasing, swing feel, melodic quotes, and dynamic contrast, the more you can effectively and creatively connect through music. 




Music Theory

Ear Training

Ear training (or aural skills) is about putting what you hear into practice. For me, ear training means I can hear a melody and write it down without knowing the exact pitches being played. It means I can identify intervals (major third, minor third, perfect fourth, etc) and chord qualities (major triad, minor triad, dominant seven, etc). It means I can recognize patterns more quickly, and I think that’s why it’s useful for everyone. 

Ear training is one of the easiest things to practice for free at home because there are so many websites with resources. The hardest part is starting, because the possibilities are endless. So here’s where I’d start: 

https://tonedear.com/ear-training/intervals - Go here and select “simple (M3, P5, octave)”. Start with these intervals–the major third, the perfect fifth, and the octave, and go through until you can identify the interval. It can be helpful to sing the first pitch you hear and then sing up the scale–do you go up 3 steps, 5 steps, or 8 steps? 

Over time, add in new intervals. Selecting “fixed root” on the right hand menu can make things easier as you start out!




Improvisation

Failure



Songwriting



Active Listening

  • Most underrated skill of all time

  • The best way to learn a language is through immersion. The same is true for music. But immersion doesn’t just mean surrounding yourself with noise–it means actively listening. 

  • Passive listening is having a playlist on while you cook dinner. You leave the room to get a sweatshirt and you miss the end of a song but don’t necessarily notice. Active listening means you are focused on the recording. It means you are engaging with the material, anticipating what might come next, internalizing patterns. 

  • Try ‘listening through the layers’. Listen to the song once through without thinking too much about it. What is your ear naturally drawn to–lyrics? Melody? Instrumentation? Listen to the song again. Try to take note of which instruments are present. Can you hear rhythm guitar in the background? Is the drummer using sticks or brushes? Is the bassist playing quarter notes (every beat) or half notes (every 2 beats)? Spend a whole listen focused on one instrument. Spend another listen on the next instrument. I personally am the least familiar with drums–they feel like a foreign language to me. So instead of trying to listen to everything they’re doing, I might focus only on the snare or hi-hat until I can easily repeat the pattern being played on it. 

INSTRUMENTAL LISTENING RECOMMENDATIONS