Introduction to Jazz improvisation for Classical musicians

Website(s) : http://www.martinspeake.com

Biography

Martin Speake studied classical saxophone at Trinity College of Music from 1977-81.
In the 1980’s he was a member of award winning saxophone quartet Itchy Fingers that performed throughout the world including tours of South America and Africa. He left in 1988 and developed his own projects, which have been many and diverse, and establish himself as a composer and improviser. He has recorded 18 cds as a leader and is equally comfortable playing ballads with guitarist Colin Oxley, original music with Jeff Williams and Mike Outram, free improvisation with drummer Mark Sanders, the music of Charlie Parker with his quartet and Indian music with Dharambir Singh and Sarvar Sabri.
He teaches at Trinity Laban Conservatoire of Music and Dance and the Royal Academy of Music.

More information

This workshop will demonstrate how to practice jazz.
How jazz musicians practice and develop a vocabulary and then improvise and manipulate it has a strong parallel with learning a spoken language. This is often a mystery to classical musicians and also young players starting out who are interested in jazz but unsure of how to go about practicing it.
Clark Terry the jazz trumpeter and educator stated that Imitation, Assimilation, Innovation are the three steps to learning improvisation.
This workshop will demonstrate this process.