How can you practice your improvisation so that you can get real improvement quicker while having fun in the process?
That was the question that motivated my creation of the play-along platform called Groovz Playground. We all know and love the Aebersold play-alongs. Thank God for Jamey Aebersold! But playing through the entire form of tunes is not always the best way to practice your improvisation and improve your musicianship.
Playing through the entire form of a tune:
One principle of practicing that runs through the lessons or Music Savvy is the idea of stripping away complexity to focus on one or just a couple of elements of your improvisation and musicality. That allows you to concentrate on your listening without fretting about the upcoming difficult chord, key, or form.
Groovz Playground consists of 1, 2, 3, and 4-chord grooves. Playing through a two-chord loop allows you to listen to yourself so you can build a phrase, improve on it, expand on it, or reiterate differently on it.
The variety of Groovz also lets you explore musical textures you otherwise probably wound’t have access to. The Groovz variety allows you to explore more of your individual musicianship. After all, some of the Groovz are single chord slow grooves you can’t just run your licks through. You must create something new and original. Isn’t that what improvisation is all about anyway?!
I have created a new interface for Groovz Playground that allows you to now choose a play-along loop based on the emotion or mood of that groove. Simlpy choose a mood and a loop will be served that you can sample and explore.
Try this out as a way to explore something new for your practicing. If you want to explore more, go to each lesson to see the chords, scales, and notes that work across the entire loop as a way to build ideas, along with some written out example of lines that sound great over the loop. Oh yeah, there’s also a short track of my playing over the loop.
These full features require a membership to the Jazz Circle or the one-time purchase of Groovz Playground for $10. But you can play along with all these groovz just using the mood finder below. Try it out and have fun with it!!
Choose a mood and get a Groovz Playground play-along track to practice your improvisation. Click "Open this full exercise" to find the scales, chords, and other lesson components that will help you best play over this. But first, choose the mood.
Trombonist, author, marketer, & tech guy
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