PLEASE Watch Video above for detailed info:

Hi Guys,

Some of you have said “How do we make Pat Martino’s minor conversion technique actually sound jazzy?”

Okay, let’s take a closer look!

CHROMATIC JAZZ TECHNIQUES FOR MINOR CONVERSION

There are 5 essential devices to employ for this:

1] Target tones:

These are employed to target a specific note. In this case E the 5th note of Am.

The use of an anacrusis/upbeat works best with target tones as this also sets up the jazz phrasing.

2] Chromatic scale.

This is usually delivered in fragments:

3] Side stepping:

In this case we are moving the interval of a tone down a semitone:

4] “Classic” Jazz passing melody/MOTIF:

This is heard a lot in Charlie Paker’s playing as well as Pat’s improvisations.

5] Minor arpeggio/min7th:

This is really useful and simple melodic tool for improvisational manipulation:

PART 2:

Analysis/Example- Pat Martino’s ii V7 I

In this example we can clearly see Pat’s exploitation of chromatics and how fluid they are in creating a long phrase.

We can see the target tone set up with an upbeat. Next we can see the manipulation of the chromatic scale, also, with a chromatic mix of scale and target tones. The minor arpeggio descends easily whilst the classic jazz motif/melody comes into play to round the phrase off .

This creates a very convincing jazz line in the “Minor conversion” Martino jazz guitar style/approach.

To complete this ii V7 I minor conversion we will exploit the minor7 arpeggio. From this, notice, the use of simple scale movement that finishes with a variation of the “Classic” jazz melody/motif:

Minor conversion: Sequence/Juxtaposition

As an exercise to display the brilliance of Pat Martino’s minor conversion jazz technique we will take the minor 7th arpeggio from the previous bar in the previous example and sequence/juxtapose this to play through both major and minor ii V I’s

1] Example 1: “MAJOR”– the same line moves down a fourth to play a ii V7 I Vi

2] Example 1: “MINOR”– the same line moves down a fourth to play a ii V7 i Vim7b5

Shown in Full:

IN CONCLUSION:

This was a look at the essential devices any jazz guitar improviser needs to know and use for creative improvisation with the minor conversion, or minorisation technique.

As, I stated in the previous blog this simple method can save you 20 years of hard slog! Why? Because, Pat Matino’s minor conversion technique can be applied immediately!….

With these 5 musical improvisation tools anyone can create confident musical lines with strong and fluid jazz guitar phrasing.

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