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Great Improvisers Are Great Composers

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TOPICS – Here’s How You Can Be Both
By Jon Gordon / Best Saxophone Tips and Techniques, Special Feature / Jazz Improvisation,
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Popular Music I believe that writing can be a great shaping and determining factor in
Practicing your development as an improviser. In my case, towards the end of
Recording
college, I had developed a be-bop vocabulary after being inspired by
Bird, Cannonball, Stitt, Phil Woods, Charles McPherson and others.
Reeds

Resources However, while I was able to play somewhat in that context, I was also
Saxophone Brand starting to become fascinated by late Coltrane, Miles’ groups in the mid
Overviews to late 60’s, Joe Henderson, Weather Report, Pat Metheny, Wayne
Saxophone Lessons Shorter, Michael Brecker’s incredible harmonic and technical
contributions, Scofield, Lovano, Jaco, Wynton Marsalis’ small group
Saxophone Parts
recordings and writing, and the line playing and harmonic concept of

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Saxophone Technique Alan Holdsworth, among other influences. In short, what I knew how
to play was no longer what I was hearing. It’s pretty common and
Tone Production
probably happens many times to improvisers over the course of their
Transcriptions
development. T.S. Eliot once wrote, “…one has only learnt to get the
Video better of words for the thing one no longer has to say, or the way in
which one is no longer disposed to say it.”

A Chance to Reshape and Chip Away at Your

Established Patterns
So the question then becomes, “What am I hearing and feeling now
and how do I get at it?” Obviously you work on the things mentioned
in this book; the scales and their application over harmony, tunes, etc.
But sitting at the piano with pen and paper and recording yourself is
perhaps the best way I know of to slow down, develop and crystallize
your musical thinking. If you’re playing a gig, or even a session, you
want to make the changes, and you want to use your strengths. But
unless you’re a pianist, you don’t have licks to play at the piano, and if
you’re alone you don’t have anybody to try and impress. (Of course,
you don’t really want your playing to be about trying to “impress”
anyone when you play, so much as expressing what it is that you have
to say.) And writing gives you the chance to experiment, reshape and
chip away at your musical thoughts and vocabulary in the way a
sculptor or painter would before showing their work. Creating in the
moment is one of the most exciting and compelling things I can think
of, and to me, there’s nothing more inspiring than hearing great jazz
musicians do just that. But it’s an odd paradox that jazz musicians don’t
get to experience the kind of long term creative process and
development over a more extended period of time that many other
artists do without composing and arranging.

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And just as importantly, as you start to write you also start challenging
and teaching yourself how to play on some sounds that speak to you
and are perhaps beyond your current language at your instrument,
whether it’s pitch cells, polychords, chromatic playing or anything else.

Getting Started
Arrange a standard – reharmonize it 2-3 ways, change the key or time
signature, add an intro, interlude and coda, write a counter line, a 2nd
solo section, try to make every “A” section different on an A-A-B-A
tune, etc. These same techniques will then inform your writing on your
original compositions. Write a new melody on a set of changes you like
to play on (also known as a contrafact), or write an original. It can be at
or away from a keyboard- it’s a good idea to try some of both. You may
be surprised at how challenging it can sometimes be to play on your
own music! But that’s when you know that you’re really growing and

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stretching your vocabulary. In the poem I quoted earlier, Eliot’s “East

Coker” (part four of his “Four Quartets”), he goes on to say in the next
line, “And so each venture is a new beginning, a raid on the
inarticulate…” You’re always going to be balancing between what you
can say and what you’re reaching for. Regardless of your style and
aesthetic, your willingness to take risks will only inform and strengthen
your ultimate decisions.

Taking it Further
For this lesson, write three contrasting pieces. Arrange a standard or
jazz composition with the above suggested techniques- intro, coda,
etc. For the 2nd piece write an original. Try to use some of the same
techniques you used for the arrangement to develop and stretch the
form and content of the piece. And also remember to write on at least
2 staves.

That way you can experiment with the instrumentation by having the
piano player double a bass line, or a horn player double a counter line,
etc. And the 3rd piece can be anything you like and go any direction- a
through composed saxophone or string quartet, another original or
arrangement, something for a different instrumentation from what
you’re used to, a chorus of a big band chart – (Though you might want
to first try reading “Inside the Score” or “Jazz Arranging Techniques” by
Gary Lindsay). But my suggestion is that you try to stretch yourself out
of your comfort zone. If you’re a be-bopper, leave those sounds and
shapes behind and think modal or free. If you come from a more free,
out or modal approach, think about Ben Webster playing over a
Strayhorn ballad. But for the long term, the main thing that I want you
to do is to get into the habit of setting aside time every day to write.

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This assignment could take a few days or several weeks, but as every Unsung Tenor Heros
composer and arranger knows, a deadline can help you to finish things.
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So write out these three contrasting pieces in no more than three Unsung Tenor Heros
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To learn more about Jon check out his website at

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https://jongordonmusic.com/

Dive Deeper with Jon

Students get a free 30 min. Skype lesson with the purchase of
the Artistshare Improviser Lesson Participant Offer. It has two
books for all improv students, a short lesson on saxophone
sound, Audio and video lessons, a CD, and lots of other content
including interviews with Maria Schneider, Mark Turner, Phil
Woods, Jim McNeely, Steve Wilson, et al.
Full Details

Students get a free 60 min. Skype lesson with the purchase of

my Complete Artistshare Participant Offer, which includes all
the above, plus a book of compositions, some composition
lessons, as well as 3 CDs and 2 Live Concert Downloads,
including, Aaron Goldberg, Mike Moreno, Bill Stewart, Joe
Martin, Johnathan Blake, Mark Turner, Joe Bagg, Mark Ferber, Bill
Campbell and Bob Hart
Full Details

Other great stuff to check out:

https://www.artistshare.com/v4/Projects/Experience/64/100
https://www.artistshare.com/v4/Projects/Experience/64/195
https://www.facebook.com/Jon-Gordon-51758165696/
https://www.facebook.com/desautelsjazzstudies/

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Jon Gordon
Jon Gordon is a world-renowned artist and one of the most
successful, accomplished and in-demand alto and soprano
saxophonists of his generation. Jazz Improv magazine journalist
Brandon Bernstein said, “Jon Gordon is a master. His
compositions, improvisation, tone, and technical virtuosity set him
apart as an elite musician of our time.” He is a winner of the Thelonious Monk award.
His 2008 C.D., "Within Worlds", received 4+1/2 stars from Down Beat and was
selected as one of the top Jazz C.D.'s released in that decade. His next C.D., "Evolution",
was selected by The Jazz Journal and the Penguin Guide to Jazz, as well as journalists
Neil Tesser and Gene Seymour, as one of the Best Jazz C.D.'s of 2009. He has been
voted numerous times as a "Rising Star", or "Talent Deserving Wider Recognition" on
multiple saxophones, as well as in the composition category, in the annual Down Beat
Critic's Polls. He is currently assistant Professor of Jazz Saxophone at the University of
Manitoba.
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2 Comments

REPLY
Tony Lopez
JANUARY 23, 2018 @ 10:00 AM

Thanks so much for the insight. I hear melodies in my head but just
cannot seem to transfer that to my axe.As an exercise I sing a short
two measure riff and try to play it back using my axe.Seems to be
working. I also try that same riff in different keys.

REPLY
Jon Gordon
JANUARY 24, 2018 @ 5:49 PM

Hey Tony, that sounds like a good way to do it. Get small pieces of
things you’re hearing on the horn. Take them through the keys. See

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how and where you can apply them in the context of basic harmony, ii,
v, I’s and tunes. But also try to get them at the piano and see if they
can be the start of a composition. Sometimes for me it will just be an
interval, like a 2nd, that will inspire a piece or an idea to develop when
improvising. A lot of great pieces and improvisations start with a small
idea, and the artistry in it isn’t the idea itself so much as what you do
with it…

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