Category: Transcirptions

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Thomas Pridgen!

The Mars Volta’s Bedlam in Goliath has some excellent drumming.  Thomas Pridgen lays it down on this album.  Every track has some really great licks and grooves, but  I was especially blown away by the drum fills from the beginning of “Wax Simulacra.”

I searched the internet for a long time to see if anyone had transcribed the fills and I couldn’t find one.  Either there were drum covers on YouTube that were adding their own fills on top of the original or they were only close to playing the actual fills but it wasn’t entirely accurate.

So after all of my searching I decided I needed to figure it out, so I slowed it down and transcribed it!  I think I’m pretty accurate on the rhythms and the orchestration of the fills.

This transcription is definitely a good exercise for moving around the kit, playing linear patterns, playing at a fast tempo, and inverted paradiddles/alternating between inverts and singles.  Plus there is some pretty awesome stuff in here to keep in your arsenal.

(Sorry about that big gap, I couldn’t export the image without the rest of the page.)

Here is a link to the PDF

Enjoy!  Feel free to drop a line if you have any questions.

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Philly Joe Jones with Sonny Rollins

Here are some more solos by Philly Joe Jones.  I couldn’t find a recording on youtube, so if you can get you hands on the recording listen closely to Jones’ phrasing.  Jones’ phrasing in his solos make his thoughts complete and they make each phrase he plays make sense!

These solos are full of some standard Philly licks with a lot of great 16th note patterns which can be pretty tricky to play with brushes.  This solo can be a good exercise for playing some 16th note passages with brushes/ getting used to taking solos with brushes.

Pay close attention to bars 4, 11-12, and 19 for their over the bar line licks.

Keep in mind that all of the stickings are suggestions.

(Also I haven’t figured out how to make a key in Sibelius so the round note head is a sizzle cymbal and the “x” note head is a regular cymbal)

Here is the link to a PDF.

Enjoy!

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More Philly Joe Jones

Here are some Philly Joe fours from the Sonny Rollins release Tenor Madness.

These are some signature Philly licks to add to your vocabulary.

Enjoy!

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Here is a link to the PDF

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More Art Blakey!

Here is another transcription from the Horace Silver and the Jazz Messengers album.  It has some more Blakey licks that are very similar to the last one, but are still great.

Click here for a recording of the song.

Click here for a PDF of the transcription.

Feel free to leave any comments or questions you have in the comment box or send me an e-mail at apfranceschi@gmail.net.

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Ali Jackson with Wynton Marsallis

I have gotten a majority of the jazz I have from the library at school.  They have a pretty large section with tons of CDs to choose from.  I picked up a Wynton Marsalis album in a huge stack of CDs and this was another great find.

Not only is the whole album a good listen but the drummer Ali Jackson is excellent.  Here a transcription of the intro to the track “Skipping” which has some awesome syncopated licks and some cool hi-hat work. Enjoy!


Click Here for a PDF of the transcription

Feel free to leave any comments or questions you have in the comment box or send me an e-mail at apfranceschi@gmail.net.

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Art Blakey with the Jazz Messengers

Art Blakey was a hard bop drummer who was most famous for his work in the Jazz Messengers.  Blakey played with several big names in the jazz scene, most notably Horace Silver who was a co-leader in the Jazz Messengers for the first year of the group.

I was looking around the SJSU Library when I came across some Horace Silver albums in the jazz section of CD’s. I picked up Horace Silver and the Jazz Messengers because of the awesome cover and gave it a listen.

This is where I first discovered Art Blakey.  Right off the bat I enjoyed how interactive Blakey was with the rest of the band and I really liked his solos.

Here is a solo from the song Room 608.  It is a 32 bar solo which has a bunch of standard jazz drumming licks which can be a good addition to anyone’s vocabulary.  It may not be a complicated solo, but the tempo that it is played at makes it pretty challenging to sound good.  Blakey definitley takes something which is simple on paper and makes it complex with his phrasing and tempo.

Here is a link to a recording on the song

Keep in mind that the stickings are just suggestions there is no right or wrong way to play this transcription.

Click here for a PDF of the solo

Feel free to leave any comments or questions you have in the comment box or send me an e-mail at apfranceschi@gmail.net.

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Eight Bar Drum Solos by Philly Joe Jones

Philly Joe Jones is an American jazz drummer who is most known for his work with the Miles Davis Quintet.  Jones played with the who’s who of the bebop era after establishing himself in New York jazz scene as a house drummer for several clubs.  Unhappy with the music in New York he moved back to work in his hometown Philadelphia.   In 1955 he was hired by Miles Davis  touring and recording with him until 1958.  1958 onward he can he heard as a sideman and as a leader for several of the greats of jazz music like Sonny Rollins, Art Pepper, and even John Coltrane. (source: Drummerworld)

Here is a great example of Philly Joe’s playing from the Miles Davis release ‘Round About Midnight.  Through out each eight measures he plays a similar eight bar phrase but takes there is a slight variation on each solo.  If you listen closely in each eight bar phrase there is a base to the rhythmic structure.  Even though these solos can be repetitive, they are full of a bunch of signature Philly Joe Jones licks in each solo.

Click here to hear the recording this transcription is from.

Click the link below for a PDF of the solo above.

Philly Joe Jones Drum Solo From Ah-Leu-Cha.pdf

Feel free to leave any comments or questions you have in the comment box or send me an e-mail at apfranceschi@gmail.net.