Here is a great one for you guys to check out, John Scofield’s solo from the new (and very great) “Uberjam Deaux” CD just released a few months ago. I chose to transcribe this one for you because being a series of extended II-7 V7s that we all have to play all the time, it will give you a lot of great ideas and a great look into how he thinks in terms of substitutions on chord changes, etc. The C#-7b5 to C-6 that he has that replaces the A-7 to E7 periodically is a cool thing to try on the gig, but make sure your bass player either knows about it beforehand or has great ears.

I particularly like how he suggests the Ab7 flat five sub with the last two notes in bar 18, and the  E melodic minor E-maj9 arpeggio over the C#7b5 in measure 29, it really grabs your ear and shakes it for attention when he hits that. Overall this solo is a great example of “Sco’s lyricalness, taste, and always interesting rhythmic sense – check out where he puts things in the measure and how he will wait and play things a sixteenth note later than someone might expect to make it all the more hip. I didn’t differentiate between the hammer on and pull-off and bends in my slur markings, but your ears will tell you what those are. If you don’t have “Uberjam Deaux” yet and you like funky jazz with a lot of quirk to it, you need to get it. And if you STILL don’t have the original “Uberjam” yet, you are missing out on what I consider to be the modern “Kind Of Blue”, that started a new form of jazz that the public could really “get”.

And let’s not forget to mention that Avi Bortnick is the funkiest, most groovin’ rhythm guitar player that there ever was -period! Check this out and have fun!

Doug Perkins, JGS, Oct. 2, 2013