{"id":22773,"date":"2014-12-10T14:48:22","date_gmt":"2014-12-10T19:48:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.neffmusic.com\/blog\/?p=22773"},"modified":"2021-11-23T14:10:17","modified_gmt":"2021-11-23T19:10:17","slug":"great-transcription-of-george-coleman-over-cherokee-changes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.neffmusic.com\/blog\/2014\/12\/great-transcription-of-george-coleman-over-cherokee-changes\/","title":{"rendered":"Great Transcription of George Coleman over Cherokee Changes"},"content":{"rendered":"

Here’s a burnin’ tenor saxophone solo from the great tenor saxophonist, George Coleman. \u00a0This is from his album “Amsterdam After Dark”. \u00a0The solo is from the tune “Apache Dance” which has a solo section over the changes of “Cherokee”.<\/p>\n

I was actually given this solo transcription by a teacher at Berklee College of Music almost 30 years ago.\u00a0 (I think it might have been Bill Pierce). \u00a0I remember practicing this solo like crazy at the time.\u00a0 I was captivated by George Coleman’s extensive use of the bebop scale in this tenor sax solo. \u00a0 I had heard of the bebop scale before, but to be honest, I never really heard much use of it in actual recordings. This was the first recording and transcription where I saw it in action.<\/p>\n

George Edward Coleman is an American hard bop saxophonist, bandleader, and composer, known chiefly for his work with Miles Davis and Herbie Hancock in the 1960s. He was named a National Endowment for the Arts Jazz Master for 2015.<\/em><\/p>\n

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George Coleman<\/strong><\/p>\n

It was my first or second semester at Berklee and I was really wanting to get Cherokee down and burnin’ fast. \u00a0I remember taking the lines and concepts and transposing them to the alto key and trying to get them mastered. \u00a0I spent thousands of hours on these lines and over the course of time, the transcription was destroyed or lost. Pages were ripped, pieces were missing, pages were lost…….<\/p>\n

Years later when I started teaching, I decided to transcribe the solo myself to use with my students who were working on the bebop scale material. \u00a0(It wasn’t very hard as I knew many of the lines already.) \u00a0 \u00a0Working on the scale and links from my “Mastering the Bebop Scale” books is one thing, but nothing replaces hearing the lines and concepts pieced together in a real recording to hear how they can be used.<\/p>\n

This solo is also a great demonstration of how to use diatonic scale patterns in a solo. \u00a0You can hear how, \u00a0at\u00a0this incredibly fast tempo, Mr. Coleman has to rely on certain\u00a0tools to build\u00a0his solo from. A good portion of these tools are bebop scales, diatonic patterns, approaches\u00a0and\u00a0bebop links (that’s my name for them from my books) \u00a0You can hear the diatonic patterns on measures 23-24, 31-32, 35, 70, 71-72, 81-82, 103, 119-120, 187-188, 212-213,242-243. \u00a0Notice how he just uses little bits from each pattern within the lines. \u00a0Any more than that becomes too much…….<\/p>\n