Trane Transcriptions

Whole ebook of John Coltrane transcription, includes versions of Naima, Blue Train, Syeeda’s Song Flute and others taken from top recordings.

• John Coltrane Artist Transcriptions (65MB, PDF)

Oscar Peterson - It Ain’t Necessarily So

Some of OP’s solos can be insanely difficult and would require the patience of Job to learn and play. However, this version of It Ain’t Necessarily So is OP at his best - measured, swinging and incredibly cool.

I originally thought this version was from the album Porgy and Bess but I realise now that it’s not. If I find the album from whence it came, I’ll post it here. But in the meantime…

• It Aint’ Necessarily So (PDF, 400KB, 9 pages)

Kind of Blue transcriptions (ebook)

Really nice little book containing the entire performances from that 1958 date, great way of studying the different styles of four (actually, five if you count Wynton Kelly on Freddie Freeloader) great soloists.

• Kind of Blue transcriptions ebook (PDF, 6MB)

Michael Brecker - ebook

Obviously these are for tenor sax, but all instrumentalists can learn lots from his great lines…

• Michael Brecker solos (180KB, PDF)

Space VI - bumper book of solos (all instruments)

Happy New Year all!  Hope you have grown suitably rotund over the festive period.

The ‘Spaces’ series of books are  alternative Real books that combine a huge amount of charts in about 6 volumes.  But the last volume is probably the best - it contains over 400 pages of famous solo’s from tons of artists. So here it is for your downloading pleasure….

• Spaces VI - Solos (PDF, 108MB)

Jazz and funk blogs

I’ve updated (and re-dated) this post and because the list is really now quite long. It’s for your own good really - there’s just so much great stuff available. So much to listen to, so little time…. (15/12/2009)

Long time, no post… After a bit of a break (no excuse other than enjoying the summer) thought it was time to get on the wagon again - hope you are all doing fine!

OK, so it’s not a transcription, but I wanted to share with you three of my favourite music blogs that offer a treasure trove of rare and top quality jazz and jazz-funk grooves for your listening pleasure.

• The CTI never sleeps contains TONS of albums produced by Creed Taylor and his CTI-related labels.
• Jazz Disposition is fantastic.  Lovely design too…
• Into the Rhythm - masses of jazz on here.
• Never enough rhodes is a site aimed at the rhodes enthusiast (hence why I love it!) but any fan of funk-groove-soul music will love this.
• Ile Oxuare has some rare jazz cuts, god knows what the title means, but who cares - go visit!
• MyJazzWorld a great variety of stuff on here and a huge amount of content that is clearly a completely labour of love.
• Funk My Soul blog has some of the best OoP vinyl rips of funk/soul/groove
• Where did all this steam come from is another jazz related blog with a massive variety of content.
• http://jazzheads.blogspot.com/ and http://jazz-the-two-of-us.blogspot.com/
• And http://musicadesdelasantipodas.blogspot.com/
• MPS goodness here…
• Live jazz goodies here… stuff you can’t, nor will ever be able, to buy
• The incredible zona de jazz, a mammoth amount of stuff on here
• http://jazzallthat.blogspot.com
• http://musicacion.blogspot.com
• Fusion Jazz and Something Else for those that swing both ways
• And the great MyFavouriteSound
• Projeto Esporte Fino has some terrific funk/soul/fusion
• I’ve recently found Bentleyfunk, and its a corker
• So is All Soul and Funk
• etnikcafe.blogspot.com has a vast amount of all kinds of stuff, for those time when you fancy something different.
• Inconstant Sol is huge and has some great rare and live cuts available
• Anything Goes has a really eclectic selection of stuff on, but alot of jazz.
• ‘Taringa’ appears be some sort of Spanish knowledge sharing platform, but this post has incredible rapidshare links, plus links (at the bottom) to similar posts by other users.
• 7Oregons and 2Tomoatoes is another great/huge jazz blog.
• Oufar Khan’s blog has some of the grooviest cuts of funk jazz gems.
• Buns O’Plenty is top drawer too.
• Jazz Disposition is superb (nice design too)
• The Universal Mind Of contains only Bill Evan’s material
• 17 Green Buicks, another great jazz blog
• And Culture & Pleasure has perfect stuff for those quiet nights, and freealbumsgalore has some fine ambient too.
• Chezmateo specialises in stuff that completely OoP so you needn’t feel so guilty for checking out this one
• While the QueenBee blog is absurdly huge….

Enjoy - lemme know of other blogs that you might know of …. And remember to buy the albums if you download anything you love that is still in print.

Beautiful Love (Bill Evans)

A nice transcription of Bill’s performance of Beautiful Love (take 2) as it appears on the album Explorations. This is one of Bill’s early albums featuring the great bassist Scott LaFaro.

• Beautiful Love (take 2) (PDF document)

Marian McPartland - Easy Living

A nice transcription of one of the tunes Marian plays on the ‘Live at Maybeck Hall’ recital (Concord label, 1991). Easy Living is a sweet ballad - played here in G - and this is a good place to check out some lovely ‘conventional’ (no disrespect to Marian there) piano voicings and leading. There’s a PDF and a reference audio file so it’s in .zip format this one….

• Easy Living (PDF and MP3)

Keith Jarrett bumper book

I can’t remember where I found the original link to these, but they were originally two seperate PDF’s that I’ve stuck into one.  Like my last Wynton Kelly post, this ebook is from a rare Japanese publisher, certainly out-of-print in the West as far as I can tell.

Includes selections from Jarrett’s Trio albums Standards Vol 1, Vol 2 and ‘Standards Live’. Enjoy:

• Keith Jarrett e-book (PDF, 10MB, 225 pages)

Everybody digs Wynton Kelly

With his light touch, keen sense of swing and feel for for the blues Wynton Kelly is rightly revered. He didn’t record too much under his own name and not surprisingly some of his best playing was under Miles.  Here’s two goodies:

• Kelly’s introduction to that famous recording of Someday My Prince Will Come - note his nice use of the phrygian scale;
• A whole e-book of transcriptions, published in Japan but seemingly unavailable anywhere else. There’s effectively part one and part two available containing lots of transcriptions - absolutely top notch. Enjoy!