Piano day (1h 40m)

Jazz voicings + left hand

  • Dominant +13 to Major +9 w/ harmonic 6ths and 9ths in LH
  • Fourthy modal structures over blanket scale — “Jazz Improvisation for Keyboard Players”, Dan Haerle (Book 2, Lesson 7) ⭐️
    • Blocks
    • Arpeggiated
      • C Dorian
      • C Lydian
  • 7-3-5 modal structures over G Mixo blanket scale
  • Alternating modal voicings over constant phrase

Scale studies

  • Whole-tone — getting to know the scale / improv over augmented chords in C through Bb

Comping

  • Crazy (Gnarls Barkley) — C, Bb
    • RH — inversions: R, 1, 2
    • LH — broken 10ths, 1-5 shells

Bass day (1h 20m)

  • Inversions
    • Major, minor & dominant 7th chords chromatically up the neck in all inversions
    • Same, starting every subsequent inversion on a new string to force “intervalic thinking” over “patternistic thinking”
    • Applying inversion against jazz standard (1st, 2nd, 3rd, and 1st descending)

Observations

Although it is always a hassle, it’s actually super helpful to spell out loud the notes you play (especially not looking at the fretboard). It might slow you down, but in fact, it really helps to break out of patternistic approach where you think shape first. Also, starting each inversion on a new string helps to focus more on intervals that make up the chord (instead of notes), so you could see many ways of playing it on the fretboard. E. g. Gmaj7: G — B — D — F#, then starting on A string: B — D — F# — G, then on D string (starting on open): D — F# — G — B, and on G string: F# — G — B — D. It feels a little uncommon, but you really start thinking about 3rds and seconds that make up the chord instead of trying to get the spelling right and not mess it up (which happens very often especially in the keys with a lot of accidentals).

Bass day (1h 30m)

  • Walking bass practice with Nashville number notation (keys of C, F, Bb, Eb, Ab)
  • Tons of Runs (Andy Laverne book) — recap 1st dominant figure + new one, apply to several chords
  • Practice 7th chord inversions over blues progression in Nashville notation in several keys (root, 1st, 1st reversed)
  • Run all 1st inversions of all 7th chords in 2 fingerings around the cycle of 4ths (to a click)