So how do we go from beginner jazz player
to intermediate to even advanced [Music]
well today i'm going to show you exactly how to level up your jazz playing coming right up
what's up brent here from learn jazz standards we hope musicians just like you
learn how to play jazz all while shortening the learning curve no matter what instrument you play
on this channel we do a lot of jazz theory tips jazz improv tips deep dives into jazz standards
as well as jazz practicing tutorials like in today's video so make sure you subscribe and
hit that bell notification button to never miss out on anything going on here now if you spend
any time at all playing a jazz you know that it's very easy to feel like you're stuck on a
plateau unsure of how to get to the next level and not exactly quite sure what the secret sauce is
to leveling up your playing well today i'm going to go over four different levels and how exactly
to go from beginner to advanced jazz musician but be sure to stick around to the very end of the
video we're going to share with you my number one tip for improving and getting to your goals even
faster at every single level level number one is complete jazz beginner this means that you
really don't know where to start you probably have a little bit of experience on your instrument
already but you just don't know what to do to actually get into jazz and start improving so
step one is you're going to start listening to a ton of jazz just listening listening listening
all the time and what i especially want you to do is i want you to start listening to jazz blues
because step number two is i want you to learn a 12 bar blues a 12 bar blues in my opinion for any
jazz beginner no matter what instrument you play is the first thing to do because there's only
12 bars it's the most basic kind of harmony that you're going to find in all the rest of jazz
and of course blues is kind of the root of jazz in the first place so mastering a jazz blues is
going to be really important for you and a very important first step to getting your foot in the
door now as far as what jazz blues to learn i'd like to recommend things ain't what they used to
be by duke ellington this is a great simple jazz blues head to learn and if you can take advantage
of learning simple blues heads you're gonna start also learning melodic language that you can start
using in your jazz solos as you start getting better and better now it's really important
though that right from the beginning you start learning jazz standards the right way now it's
really tempting just to pick up a piece of lead sheet music and start reading the melody and
reading the chords and then call it a day and say you've learned a tune however it's going to set
you up for a serious advantage if you start using my list process for learning jazz standards by
ear that's an acronym it stands for l listen start by listening over and over again to that tune and
then two is internalize so you want to internalize it by just really really focusing all of your time
on one recording of that jazz standard so that you really get that melody in your head and
then you have s which stands for sing meaning that you can actually sing whistle or hum the
melody of that jazz standard and then finally t which is transfer and at this point you can now
try to learn by ear that melody that you've been listening to in internalizing and singing
on your actual instrument now this obviously just goes for the melody but of course chords you can
start out just by learning them and memorizing them off of a chord chart or a piece of sheet
music and by the way if you want a really nice handy guide where i outline the list
process in the description down below or in the show notes i'm going to leave for you my learn
jazz standards the smartway guide you can also find it at learnjazzstandardsthesmartway.com
now the last thing that i want you to be able to do as a complete jazz beginner is start working on
the very basics of jazz harmony which is at least knowing what the five basic qualities of seventh
chords are which are major seven and you can play this on a guitar piano if you're a horn player
be able to play the arpeggios is dominant seven
and then minor seven and then half diminished seven or minor seven flat five
and then finally fully diminished seven [Music] and you want to be able to play these in all 12
keys any key be able to play these five qualities of seventh chords because they're going to come up
all the time and they are the basis of the chords that we use in the genre of jazz once
you put in this work as complete jazz beginner let's move on up to the next level level number
two is what i just call a jazz beginner and this means that you probably know some tunes
you have some exposure to jazz but you're not that good at improvising playing bass lines
comping and all of those things and you really need to start ramping things up and focusing on
the right stuff that will improve your playing faster so the very first thing that i want you
to do and commit to is to learn what i call the 10 master jazz standards these are jazz standards
that not only will they be called in jam sessions or gigs if you have that opportunity all the time
they're tunes that are specifically chosen because they teach a bunch of harmonic and melodic lessons
that will pay dividends in all the rest of the jazz standards that you learn as a jazz musician
now before i go over the whole list of 10 let's talk about the very first jazz standard i want
you to learn if you haven't learned it already and that is autumn leaves now taking a look at
autumn leaves you can see that it's a great study of what we call two five one chord progressions
and two five one chord progressions are the most important chord progressions in jazz this is what
we call a major two five one chord progression c minor seven f seven to b flat major seven
and you need to be able to know these chord progressions in all 12 keys but autumn leaves
is a good intro to this as well as a minor two 5 1 chord progression for example this one in g minor
and once you get familiar with those you're really going to start getting a good idea of
what kind of musical information you can start playing over top of these chord progressions this
is also a great study what we call relative keys relative major and of course relative
minor okay which is the g minor and the b flat major relationship this is a really basic jazz
tune to learn you have to learn this one and this one will really set you up for success
now let's go over the other nine jazz standards i want you to learn you're gonna learn blue bossa
this is a great intro into the bossa nova side of jazz as well as playing straight eights and
of course minor harmony you're going to learn all of me this is a very classic swing era tune with
some interesting harmonic concepts you're going to learn it could happen to you great introduction to
passing diminish and 1625 chord progressions you're going to learn sweet georgia brown
great study of cycling dominant seventh chords you're gonna learn so what by miles davis great
example of a modal tune to learn you're gonna learn on green dolphin street this is a great
example of using pedals and as far as switching key centers in the middle of the tune you're gonna
learn have you met miss jones which is kind of a more complicated tune but one that really explores
the concept of jazz tunes where they move into multiple different keys you're gonna learn all
the things you are which is to me the best study of cycling in force which is the most common
harmonic movement intervallic movement in jazz and finally you're going to learn stella by
starlight which is a particularly difficult tune but it's a must-know tune and will teach
you a ton of lessons and help you go through some serious challenges earlier on in your jazz playing
now obviously this sounds like a lot of tunes to learn but what i want you to think about is a long
term commitment so at least the course over one year you should learn all ten of these jazz
standards and preferably you won't learn too many more jazz standards than just these ten because i
find that if you spend more time like for example one month which is something that we do in our
jazz standards club in our inner circle membership this is really helpful to really dive deep into
the tune give enough time for you to learn it and not just skip over top of it so that you
eventually forget it in the end now step number two as a jazz beginner is to start knowing some
basic jazz theory and working on that a little bit further you already know your major seventh chords
and your all your qualities 7th chords and all 12 keys but now you want to make sure that you're
understanding how to build chord progressions for example when we look at the major diatonic
series of 7th chords we have to understand that the 1 chord is a major 7th chord the 2 chord is
a minor seventh chord the three chord is a minor seventh chord the four chord is a major seventh
chord a five chord is a dominant seventh chord the sixth chord is a minor seventh chord and the
seventh chord is a half diminished chord and once we start understanding that we understand what two
five ones mean one six two five ones one three six two five and if we start learning all those chord
progressions and understanding the harmonic series and all twelve keys then we start understanding
those ten jazz standards even better now yes this is also a good time to start working on some basic
chord scale theory for example if we take a look at a 2-5-1 chord progression it could be
a great idea to apply some modes over top of this so for example over the ii chord [Music]
you can play the dorian mode or on top of the v chord you can play mixolydian
and of course over the one chord
[Music] you can play the major scale now obviously these are just basic concepts and they're not
that musical but understanding a little bit of basic chord scale theory can be super helpful
for your progression now step number three as a jazz beginner is to start
learning jazz solos or jazz licks by ear now i say by ear because it really truly is important
that you start working on your ear skills because ultimately that is going to be the best asset for
you as a jazz improviser the jazz solo i always recommend to beginners is freddie freeloader miles
davis's solo over top of that blues learn that it's very easy it's very simple and easy digest
that would be my big challenge for you to learn and then as well as learning etudes like
this etude for example we learn a new etude in our inner circle membership every single month
and etudes are great to learn by reading and then memorizing or just simply learning them by ear
so that you're able to learn very specific strategies for how to improvise over different
chord progressions now last but not least of course you just need to start improvising at
this point you got to get your hands and feet dirty take some risks put on a backing track
get together with some friends it's okay to mess up that really is all what the process of jazz
improvisation is it is trial and error so you have to go forward in doing that now that we've done
the work for our jazz beginner phase let's move on to the next level level number three is jazz
intermediate now this means that you've learned a good amount of tunes yet of course 10 at least
you are able to improvise you're able to play you're able to do the basics on your instruments
like a bass player walk bass lines comp if you're a piano player but you're really not satisfied
with where you're at and there's still something missing hence jazz intermediate and we need to
break through that barrier now a big disclaimer before i move on with the different steps is that
this is the hardest one to break out of not very many people are able to get to the advanced level
and that's because they're not doing the right things to progress to the next level so it can be
difficult to get off of the plateau that is the intermediate level but if you follow these next
steps i can pretty much guarantee you that given some time effort and practice you will for sure
get to the advanced level so step number one is you're going to learn another 10
jazz standards yes yet another 10 jazz standards over the course of at least one year i want to
remind you that learning jazz standards is the single most important thing you can do to expose
yourself to different harmonic contexts in jazz learn more melodies be able to play more tunes
with other people so learning more jazz standards is always what i would consider the absolute basis
for jazz improvement now in case you don't know what jazz standards to learn next here's another
list of ten that i think really pack a big punch number one is there will never be another you
number two is someday my prints will come a good introduction to three four playing you
have tune up you have just friends take the a train the days of wine and roses alone together
solar what is this thing called love and the girl from ipanema these are 10 really powerful jazz
standards and if you know not only the first 10 we learned in the jazz beginner stage but these
10 in the intermediate stage you're really going to be set up for some real success moving forward
now step number two is to continue learning more solos and licks by ear taking them into other
keys and doing some deep work however there's a difference here in the intermediate level that
you really have to start paying attention to and that is composing your own jazz solos yes
i said it composing your own jazz solos not necessarily improvising now the reason we
want to compose them is we want to give ourselves the opportunity to slow the improvisation process
down so that we can truly imagine and think about all the things that we've learned so far
and apply them now when i say compose i don't necessarily mean writing them down like i have
on this solo of all the things you are that i've composed although it's totally fine to notate your
solos what i more so mean is little by little composing or writing your solo and memorizing
it as your go so that you're able to actually play it verbatim the way that you learned it by ear by
memory and the more you do this exercise the more you're going to improve i see this all the
time in my inner circle members and they really really improve by doing this exercise of course
continue to improvise you do have to continue this process keep messing up keep doing trial by
air and you'll improve this process as you go now step number three is to really start digging deep
into the instrument specific technique that applies to you and your instrument for example
guitar players really need to work on fretboard mastery being able to play their scales everywhere
being able to play in different positions they need to learn different chord voicings [Music]
right different ways to navigate the fretboard connect chords together and that goes for
piano players as well if you are a saxophone player you're going to want to be working on
articulation you're going to be working on airflow trumpet players long tones there's a bunch of
different challenges that different musicians have like bass players walking bass lines and you need
to learn how to navigate those challenges because you've learned a lot of great things about jazz
but we don't want our instrument holding us back so this is the time for you to really dive deep
and figure out what it is on your instrument specifically applies to jazz and how do you start
overcoming those barriers now step number four is super important for an intermediate player to
get on to the next level into advanced and that is to start playing out live at jam sessions gigs or
just with other friends now by far i have played hundreds and hundreds and hundreds and hundreds
of jazz gigs jam sessions i mean you name it i've done them and these are by far the best learning
circumstances to improve as a jazz musician you have to get out there and play in some sort of
capacity you're gonna find that that real world application is going to give you the challenges
and lessons that you need to grow you're going to find out what you're good at you're going to find
out what you're bad at and this is going to give you the opportunity to improve so you must must
must start playing out jam sessions gigs and with friends and this is really what's going to be
super important if you truly want to get outside of the intermediate level to the advanced level
now again this could take you one year to go from intermediate to advanced this could take you two
years three years maybe it could even take you four years however if you are diligently working
on all the things i told you to do i can guarantee you you will eventually get there to that advanced
level now that we've gone through the effort of going through the intermediate level jazz
stuff let's go to advanced level number four is the jazz advanced player now this means that you
do improvise well you do play walking bass lines well you can comp well you know a lot about your
instrument you really have learned some tunes what you're really looking for at this point is how do
i continue getting better and better so that you sound like the jazz heroes that you idolize and
listen to all the time well let's go over some steps step number one is you're going to continue
learning jazz standards i can't overstate this enough you must learn more jazz standards and
even pick more advanced ones like fifo fun inner urge giant steps all these jazz standards lots
of bebop heads i would certainly recommend like anthropology but continue learning jazz standards
in any capacity and it's going to continue growing you step number two is to continue improvising and
composing but especially really doubling down on the composing you want to start developing your
own original voice and by composing you are going to be developing that original voice much faster
along with your ongoing practice of improvisation the next step is you're going to continue playing
out with musicians in fact you should double down on this you should be playing with your
buddies you should be playing at jam sessions you should be trying to get gigs because this is
the only real way you're gonna get that real world experience and truly grow faster but here we go to
the last step and this is the absolute number one thing that i would suggest an advanced player do
to improve from where you're at but also it's the number one thing i'd recommend at any level if you
truly want to improve quicker and not waste your time and that would be to do rigorous
self auditing self auditing is super important and that has to do with recording yourself listening
back and asking yourself two important questions number one what is it that i really liked or did
really well this is an important question because what we want to do is capitalize
on the things that we are doing really well in our jazz playing figure out how we can do more of that
and figure out how we can just double down on that to make it our very own number two you want to ask
the question what am i not doing well where did i mess up am i dragging is my tempo off these little
details could really derail you sounding like a really mature jazz musician so you really want
to get critical of what's going wrong so you can correct those steps and then make sure you take
definitive action to correct those any pro jazz musician is constantly doing this self-auditing
process looking for what's good looking for what's bad and then taking determined actions to actually
do something about them if you don't do anything about them you're going to continue down the same
path you're at and you probably will not improve as quickly as you wanted to and in return you're
going to waste a ton of your valuable practice time so at this point i want you to leave a
comment in the show notes or the comments down below what level are you at and what do you think
you can do out of the things that i've mentioned to get to the next level would love to hear your
thoughts so by the way we actually are doing this stuff every single month inside of my inner circle
membership we're learning new jazz standards we are working on learning stuff by ear we're really
doing everything i talked about in this episode but we're also doing it with a community of a
thousand other jazz musicians playing all sorts of instruments and really we just aim to make
things easier and help you along your journey so that sounds good to you do check us out at
ljs innercircle.com check out the membership and we'd love to have you join us or you can go ahead
and click that on the screen right here and by the way if you're thinking to yourself hey this
is a lot of practicing but i don't have a lot of practice time well on the screen i have a video
that is a 30 minute jazz practice routine you can make progress and level up your jazz skills
and even just 30 minutes so check out that video as well make sure you like this video hit that
subscribe button so you never miss out on anything going on here and we'll see you in the next video