Jazz Guitar in the Style of Norman Brown

In one of my previous posts, I made an important point that jazz is in fact a language and it’s important to learn that language from master jazz musicians by listening to them regularly.  So, going forward I’m going to be focusing on some of the language of these musicians.  We’ll take some of their licks and phrases and analyze them so that you can better understand what they’re doing. We’re going to start with a lesson focusing on the style of Norman Brown. 

The Focus of this Study

Norman is one of my favorite guitarists. I’ve followed him for over 10 years, seen him live on numerous occasions and own all of his records.  He plays smooth jazz with a funky, R&B style similar to George Benson. For more information on Norman see my previous post. No, it’s not straight-ahead, traditional jazz. But you should be able to incorporate the concepts and phrases we will be learning into any style of jazz. Don’t be short-sighted and say “Well, I don’t play smooth jazz, so I’m not going to learn this”.  Why don’t you just take the phrases and fit them to a straight-ahead jazz rhythm?

Anyway, we will focusing on a song from Norman’s latest album, “Stay with me”. In particular, we will study a chord progression that I wrote out that is similar to first song on his album. I’ve entitled my chord progression, “Normanesque” (pronounced, “nor-man-esk”, it means “like Norman”). After studying the lesson, you should be able to play the chords along with the record.  Next, we will study some licks and phrases that I’ve composed that will work over the bridge section the Normanesque.

The first lesson will be posted tomorrow. I would encourage you to purchase the record entitled, “Stay with Me” so you can listen to it at your leisure. Unfortunately, the song is not on SpiralFrog.com or any other online music service that I’m aware of. So, you’ll have to buy the actual cd.  Actually, you really won’t get the full benefit of the lesson unless you have the record.  It’ll be like trying to learn how to drive by watching people drive on TV. It just doesn’t work. You need to go to the source. Order the CD in the Recommended Resources section.

You can also just buy the mp3 of the song if you don’t want the full album. Again check the Recommended Resources section.

So here’s a summary of what we are going to work on over this multi-part series:

1. A chord progression which is similar to the of the most popular song on the “Stay with Me” album (the first song).   I’ve entitled the chord progression, “Normanesque”. We’ll analyze and learn how to play the chords to this Normanesque using most of the chord forms you already learned in my 8 essential jazz chords post. After going through the chords, you’ll should be able to play along with Norman on the record.

2. How to  play 4 distinct jazz phrases that I created in Norman’s style.  These phrases can be played over the bridge section of “Normanesque”.

3. Full analysis of the notes, scales and other theory behind the chords and phrases.

4. Ideas on how to use these phrases with other songs.

You’ll also get:

5. A Jam track to practice the phrases at slow and normal tempos.

6. Downloadable PDF charts of the chords and phrases.

Sample

To whet your appetite, take a listen to the following clip that I played and recorded: These are 2 of the 4 licks that we be learning.  Keep in mind you will be learning the chords AND the phrases. We’ll be working on the chords to the song first.

[audio:http://learnjazzguitar.com/audio/normanlessonclip.mp3]

Format

I’m going to be using screencast videos for most of the lessons. I think this will be a little more flexible and It’ll be easier for me to explain the concepts.

Who this is for

I encourage any interested players to follow along with these lessons. However, given the syncopated nature of this type of playing, you’ll already have to have some sort of technical facility on the guitar to learn this quickly.  Therefore, I would say that this lesson is geared more toward intermediate players. However, even if you can’t play it now, come back to it later when you do improve enough to be able to play it. Most importantly, any player should be able to benefit from and understand the theory that I discuss.

Tomorrow, we will start the first lesson. If you don’t already have the “Stay With Me” cd, go buy it from your local record store or go to the Recommended Resources section of the site (See also the link at the top of the page).

See you tomorrow!

Leon