The Music of Gordon Goodwin

“Essential Jazz Instructional Materials”

I. The Music of Gordon Goodwin, Play Along Series 4 – Alfred Publishing – 2010.
II. HS – College
III. Big-Band Play-Along
IV. Recorded solo
V. Play-along recording minus particular part
VI. Individual
VII. Full recording included
VIII. http://www.alfred.com/

The Music of Gordon Goodwin, Play-Along Series 4, is a top-of-the-flight jazz play-along recording for advanced high school level students in a big-band setting. The tunes “rock” and offer stunning, professional big-bands that will challenge and motivate students. Great for college auditions. Students can demonstrate professional-level jazz chart reading with lots of soloing opportunities. Levels of difficulty range from medium to advanced with innovations like written-out sample jazz solos, listening and improvisation study. A tempo changing program lets you change tempo on the .MP3 CD in your computer. This feature is essential to boost students’ sight-reading capabilities. Adjusting the tempo to stay in control of your practice will be more effective than a metronome providing all the parts to musically coordinate with. The recording also has companion rhythm section book that has parts for piano, bass, and drums to create small group arrangements with parts for C Bb, Eb and bass clef instruments. There are helpful improvisation tips provided by Gordon Goodwin for each tune. The solo sections offer lots of soloing opportunities. The play-along .MP3 CD has both demo tracks and accompaniment tracks recorded by Gordon Goodwin and players from his Big Phat Band which is a knockout! The .MP3 file format also makes it convenient to upload to your smart phone or iPod for easy practicing anywhere with ear plugs. Alfred Publishing is a leader in jazz play-along releases motivating aspiring high school musicians who want to improve both their ensemble “chops” and improvisation skills.

Till next time,

John Kuzmich, Jr.