An Improvisor's Guide to "Voyage" by Kenny Barron

[dazzjazz]

Hi all,

 

Here's my first long-form educational video. I teach 2nd year Jazz Impro at Sydney Conservatorium of Music and here's some discussion, analysis and exercises to help intermediate improvisors get to grips with Kenny Barron's fabulous post-bop tune called "Voyage". I'm the first to admit it's a little 'dry' at times but feel free to use the chapter markers if you just want to jump to the exercises or my transcription of Kenny's solo for example.

 

Cheers

 

Darren

 

 

[NewImprov]

Cool, I look forward to digging into this when I have time and focus.

[andrzejmakal]

Hi all

New to this forum, just registered. Mainly intended to say thank you for sharing this. Really good lesson.

cheers

Andrzej M

[dazzjazz]

Thanks Andrzej, and welcome to the forum!

[George88]

Kenny, on my Mt. Rushmore of pianists. Thanks for posting!

 

BTW: are you hip to PeopleTime with Getz?  Master class.

[dazzjazz]

Yes, love that record. 

[Dave Ferris]

Nice job on the analysis and practice strategy Darren. You dissected it very nicely. I like the Dim. and drop 2 examples, the chromatic on ex. 12 and the Dom. on #14. All nice lines prime for transposing to all keys, in one or two bar increments. Good approach in connecting the Major scales starting on the 3rd in the bridge. Also good to repeat  the examples out of tempo, slow and at tempo. All in all, very thorough. Lucky students they are to have you.

 

 I learned that tune when it first came out and have played it many times since. It's another one of those type of tunes (like you pointed out) that you can practice in sections particularly on the bridge. A similar approach can be applied to Inner Urge, Have you met Miss Jones., The song is you, Just one of those things, Humpty Dumpty, to name a few.

 

Going back probably 10 years, here's a short uptempo Latin groove on it. I did it at the time to demo the CP5. Excuse some of the ghosting of notes in the two handed unison parts. Given the tempo, I feel I would've been cleaner on a real piano. Man I love this song, I never get tired of playing it !

 

 

 

[Outkaster]

Very cool.  Saw it over on Facebook. 

[dazzjazz]

Dave’s video or mine?

[dazzjazz]

Thanks Dave, that means a lot coming from you. 
 

I’m still trying to find ways to get more contrasting lines in the A section. I suspect I will be at it for a while!

[dazzjazz]

Hey Dave,

 

your Latin treatment of Voyage is simply fabulous! Love it. You must have done a lot of salsa gigs and study to come up with that. Keep sharing more stuff please. 

 

where did you get that beat from? I guess Drum Genius has something similar these days. 
 

cheers

 

Darren. 

[Dave Ferris]

Darren, thanks, much appreciated.

 

You know years ago I did delve into the huge legit Latin scene here but more as a jazz guy playing it. So consequently the hard core pop, strict "clave" guys cut me some slack because of my jazz chops. Because I'm certainly not a legit Latin player like say someone like Joe Rotundi, who's one of the older and most respected guys in town for that. But I certainly have an appreciation of the music and have listened to it a lot, and I guess picked up a bit  of the language. I would put myself into the same category as when say Kenny Barron did his all Latin/Salsa record years ago. Not his playing of course, just the style. And like many people from my generation, I've been highly influenced by Chick and his approach.

 

Believe it or not the groove was the internal drum track on the Yamaha CP-5 (man I miss that keyboard). I need to get with that Drum Genius thing, he has some fantastic grooves...but I'm just such a tech dolt.

 

You mentioned about finding some approaches to the A section. An option to explore is sometimes looking at the second chord - F#m7 -as more of a F# Minor Maj.7 (melodic minor) , it can connect better with the fourth bar of F7 alt. or B7b5. It was sort of a long process at first because the minor 7 was how I learned it but slowly over time, I found myself just going more often to the minor/major. Then when I went back to F#m7, having used the other avenue just seemed to open that whole section up more.

 

If I can get up the energy, I'll write some examples of letter A. I'm recovering and rehabbing from this knee replacement 20 days ago, so my energy, endurance and overall creative flow isn't quite there right now.