Gary Willis vs Putter Smith

[frank]

My chord/scale and fingerboard knowledge is something i need to work on so im wondering about the pros and cons of these two methods , Willis - fingerboard harmony & Putter Smith - Improvising hand book

I like in the Willis book where you are confined to a certain number of frets
but the putter Smith book seems like a simpler way of getting a lot more done

am i right ?

I need to get the nuts & bolts covered as quickly and simply as possible, ive been playing for a long time but havent learned this stuff properly so theres a hole in my playing when it comes to playing through unfamiliar chords or keys
or tunes with lots of chords

I would hope that this study would lead to more melodic playing and solos

Another question is that Smith plays sharp 4ths on major and dominant chords where as Willis avoids the 4th alltogether on these chords, he also avoids the 6ths as far as i can see
is this just a question of musical taste

Willis uses strong beats, weak beats for note choices where as Smith seems to have all notes equal (except the natural 4th)
the strong beat/weak beat idea seems very strong even if a bit like a formula

Again is it just musical taste and a question of getting the stuff learned by some method or other and then adjusting to suit.

[jakenewmanbass]

For my money books rarely show anything beyond 'how to' wheras listening and copying gives you the 'why to' reasoning as you either like it enough to copy it or not.

[mcgraham]

I have to admit I was mildly confused by this post, as I/we do not have the books to compare with each other.

+1 for listening/copying. After reading an article advising this, I try to link sounds I hear in songs to the theory behind them (e.g. sound of Lydian - Flying in a Blue Dream intro), that way when playing/improvising I [i]qualitatively[/i] think 'this is the sound/feel/effect I want <insert example>' and then I [i]quantitatively[/i] know what will obtain that sound. Make sense?

Re: the #4 vs no 4th business, I think that it's partly dependent on taste, partly because if you played a chord with a 1 3 7 or 1 3 b7 (even forgetting the 5), and then tried to stick in a major 4th in either of those chords, it'd sound pretty dissonant. Using a #4 wouldn't be quite so bad (IMO) but it really does depend on context, and the instrument. Closely voiced chords on bass need very select note choice to ensure they don't sound like mud.

Mark

Edited September 30, 2008 by mcgraham

[frank]

Listening and copying is great untill i want to take the bass line further and improvise my own line as i wont know ,or will have a foggy vision of what the chords are behind the line
if you know what i mean

At work at the minute have to go

[mcgraham]

I get what you mean, I think. Are you saying that you'd like to be able to know what you can/can't play or what will/won't work over a given chord/chord progression? i.e. to feel comfortable playing over chords and changes?

I personally think that to understand chords, a more harmonic instrument is a useful thing, e.g. guitar or piano. I often visualise the shapes of chords on the fretboard, thus 'highlighting' key notes that work. To understand what works over them, a good starting point is using scales that work (e.g. major scale in a major key) and notes of a given chord, and trying to blend them together (if that makes sense). Other than that, experimentation will yield useful results. Only your ear can tell you with a reasonable level of certainty what 'works' and what doesn't 'work'.

Mark

[XB26354]

[quote name='frank' post='295039' date='Sep 30 2008, 01:25 AM']My chord/scale and fingerboard knowledge is something i need to work on so im wondering about the pros and cons of these two methods , Willis - fingerboard harmony & Putter Smith - Improvising hand book

I like in the Willis book where you are confined to a certain number of frets
but the putter Smith book seems like a simpler way of getting a lot more done

am i right ?

I need to get the nuts & bolts covered as quickly and simply as possible, ive been playing for a long time but havent learned this stuff properly so theres a hole in my playing when it comes to playing through unfamiliar chords or keys
or tunes with lots of chords

I would hope that this study would lead to more melodic playing and solos

Another question is that Smith plays sharp 4ths on major and dominant chords where as Willis avoids the 4th alltogether on these chords, he also avoids the 6ths as far as i can see
is this just a question of musical taste

Willis uses strong beats, weak beats for note choices where as Smith seems to have all notes equal (except the natural 4th)
the strong beat/weak beat idea seems very strong even if a bit like a formula

Again is it just musical taste and a question of getting the stuff learned by some method or other and then adjusting to suit.[/quote]
I don't know about the Putter Smith book but I've had a good look at Fingerboard Harmony for Bass. It is basically a graphical way of looking at shapes on the neck in a given position so you don't have to shift all over the place when the chords change. It can help to create smoother linear phrases - The Jazz Theory Book by Mark Levine has the Continuous Scale Exercise which is actually very similar. Strong beat/weak beat goes back to bebop and beyond so is hardly novel or new - but it is actually quite important to learn to create better phrasing. Again the Jazz Theory Book says that scales are just an available pool of notes so jazz musicians should be able to play any note of a relevant scale over a chord at any time. One BIG caveat about Willis' book is that for walking bass lines most of what he puts is a bit busy melodically - you'd have to be a very skilled and experienced accompanist to make some of those lines work. It is after all only one way of looking at harmony.
Just goes to prove there's nothing new under the sun

[frank]

"Are you saying that you'd like to be able to know what you can/can't play or what will/won't work over a given chord/chord progression? i.e. to feel comfortable playing over chords and changes?"


Yes this is what im after


" The Jazz Theory Book by Mark Levine has the Continuous Scale Exercise which is actually very similar. Strong beat/weak beat goes back to bebop and beyond so is hardly novel or new - but it is actually quite important to learn to create better phrasing. Again the Jazz Theory Book says that scales are just an available pool of notes so jazz musicians should be able to play any note of a relevant scale over a chord at any time. One BIG caveat about Willis' book is that for walking bass lines most of what he puts is a bit busy melodically - you'd have to be a very skilled and experienced accompanist to make some of those lines work."


I also have the jazz theory book ( i think ive got method book gas ) the ideas in all of these books are the same,just coming from different angles its all just scale exercises. Im not suggesting that Willis has invented or discovered music theory id agree that his lines in the book are "busy melodically" or as i said like a formula, but they are just examples or pools of notes

What it boils down to i suppose is that im about to spend a good deal of time learning this type of scale/chord stuff and id like to make the most of it

so has anyone used these scale exercises or found them usefull

starting with the Root i can play a lot scales/chords/arpeggios but i have only learned the shape sometimes the sound
but beyond the root name im lost as to the names of the other notes when in a playing situation

Hope this makes sense im rambling

[mcgraham]

Re: improving improv - just practice! transcribe stuff, understand what notes make what sound and why, that is ultimately only decipherable and made meaningful by you, i.e. take scales, and try to identify what makes them sound the way they do (e.g. dorian - I find it to be the major 6th with the minor 3rd that gives dorian its sound, those notes are characteristic of the scale in my mind; it's very bluesy); take chords, try to identify what makes them distinctive (e.g. maj7, the words that I use are open, unresolved, I almost think of the chord like a slight sigh at the end of a sentence). These are just ways that I came up with to describe pre-existing bits of information in ways that are meaningful and memorable to me. Make sense?

Re: notes in a chord - learning where notes are on the neck is a very useful thing to do. Try drawing out a fretboard, and writing out notes of a scale (say G major) then fill in gaps in intervals, thinking about which notes are which rather than just blindly filling them in. I've found that combining patterns with a good knowledge of note locations on the neck means that by 'overlaying' chord/scale/phrase patterns on the neck I can instantly see which notes are used in said patterns. You also don't [i]need[/i] to know every note that you're playing at every moment, I tend to lean on the ability to see notes on the neck, to see patterns, to use my ear and muscle memory, and combinations of the three. Does this also make sense?

Mark

P.S. If you find you always start on the root, then practice [i]not[/i] starting on the root; do scales in descending thirds/ascending sixths, do chord inversions, finish on the root instead etc.

[Bilbo]

As has already been implied, I think the answer is that both books are right but neither is perfect. As for which is better? I don't know either book but I suspect the answer is neither.

Your role as a student is not to passively consume what is thrown at you but to look at it, consider it, process it, try stuff out and, when it feels right, discard some of it, even if it is only temporarily. I mentioned it elsewhere but you need to develop a critical sense that allows you to establish what is useful to you in serving your musical ambitions and what is a dead end. Quick wins are few and the most useful learning is incremental. Most people I know have several books that often include similar information presented in different ways - your own learning style will determine which ones work for you but, for me, the strategy is to look at as much of this stuff as you can and absorb what you can when you can. There is no yellow brick road to musical knowledge, just a big haystack you need to sort through.

[frank]

Searching through a haystack is exactly how i feel about it at the moment

[mcgraham]

+1 to Bilbo's comments. It really does take time to absorb all this information about what works and what doesn't, and some people grasp it quicker than others. Just have fun with it, and don't be afraid to try things that don't appear to make sense. Not trying things was my biggest impediment when starting; a dude at my church had said 'don't bother with modes, they're [i]never[/i] used' and another one (whom I played with frequently) was greatly unimpressed when I did [i]anything[/i] outside of the notes of a scale in a key. As such, I spent about two years staying within a major scale. Then, in a nutshell, I broke free and did many random sounding explorations of my instrument in an endeavour (still ongoing!) to find out what my instrument could do.

Mark