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I'm just curious if anyone has any insight to this question: To what extent do you guys think are ideas communicated when someone like Vinnie or Dennis Chambers, for example, is asked to give input for a tune? What about when they write for their own solo stuff? Do they sing ideas? Write a sketchy chart with a few chords? Or if like Dennis, who doesn't read, relay their ideas in the form of, "this tune should sound like Return To Forever meets James Brown with a taste of Zeppelin" for example, and work loosely from such a framework? I'm also curious about how you guys who write, communicate ideas to your band. Thoughts?
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I think that the sequencer/drum machine thing is big these days. You can program a simple melody or chords and let your bandmates here it and then they can go from there...
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Jazz drummers like Jeff Watts, DeJonette, Bill Stewart etc. usualy write charts with the melody and the chord changes, (like the Real Book), all of them can play a little bit of piano.
Drummers lke Virgil, Mineman and even Vinnie work with secuencers, they usually program very specific parts. I have some tapes with old Vinnie clinics and he palyed with some of his secuences, great ideas, kind of similar to the Zildjian Day tracks.
I'm a big fan of the secuencers, I don't play to much piano, but I studied harmony and learned to program my ideas in the computer and it's really fun to hear, experiment and play along to any idea that come to your mind, I really recomend this to any serious drummer, it helped me a lot to grow as a musician.
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[Pedro (the Bad-A$$ [img]wink.gif[/img] ) back in da house!!...]
Exactly, Pedro. Good one.
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Great topic. I would have to second everything Pedro said about Tain, Jack, etc. using lead sheets. I think it was in Down Beat that I read that Vinnie has some composition skills that he used in conjunction with the sequencer work. He said that alot of the parts were done in pieces.
Regarding my own writing, I use the ol' pencil/ink and paper. As far as communicating what is on the paper to the other musicians I would have to say that it depends on the situation. These would be:
A. Lead sheet/Real Book type tunes-These, as Pedro pointed out are just simple tunes with melody and chord structure over typical "song" forms(AABA, ABAB etc). I write these on either piano or guitar. When playing/rehearsing with the band, I treat these tunes like we are running down a Real Book tune for the first time. Typical questions would be: tempo? style? dynamics? solo order?
B. Larger ensembles-When I first started writing music for anything larger than 5-pieces, I would pretty much shut up and listen to whatever opinions good/bad from everyone. I learned alot doing this. No matter how much study you put into the rules of chord voicings, voice leading, instrument ranges, etc. you still have to hear WHY these rules exist so that you can rule out/in these "possibilities" in your future writing. Now when getting my music played, I'm still open to criticism but this time I make "mistakes" on purpose!
