In the Mood

[Jazz Cat]

super job on your ‘In the Mood’ track+solo+video, I’m working on it.

having difficulty in 2 areas, on tenor – any tips?

a) playing the main melody 8va is very hard for me, for some reason, playing middle D F Bb D, going from Bb to D squawks;
though I’m fine playing as shown off low D is relatively easy…using side Bb maybe I should try bisc instead?

b) solo ending part D F Bb D# area also really hard, moving all those keys in upper register

I’ve played alto 30+ yrs, probably would be be easier on it, but I’m trying to play it on tenor (have only been on tenor a few years, it takes more air, a bit more awkward than alto). thx, if any ideas? happy new year

[john]

Bis key most definately!
it’s a matter of practicing major arpeggios, that’s what in the mood melody is.
make yourself up a little chordal arpeggio exerciseL
C E G C, E G C E, G C EG etc
in as many keys as you can.
when you start getting this smooth the In the Mood melody will become easy.

[Jazz Cat]

hey thanks Johnny, that worked great; just got done practicing, the Bb bis fingering made a big difference….i never liked that fingering since I often like trilling off the side key, but this song made me appreciate it..super song for the new year, I’m making a video asap of it

other lessons learned:

a) your alternate C#/C/Bb down-progression on the 3rd melody note group sounds terrific (minute 1:55 in your video), a nice cool blues touch; thanks
b) thx for the rim shots on the ending quiet-3 area, perfect lead-in, early warning to play
c) it’s an easy song to memorize the intro + melody, I can finally play it by heart now, that part

great song for the new year, on youtube my top 3 vids i like:

audio only, super mix

[john]

Oh ya, I use the bis for Bb more than any other fingering position…it works for almost everything I do.
In The Mood is one of those era favorites, much like Johnny B Goode from the 50’s
I do notice when my swing band plays live it always is a crowd favorite so very worth learning.

[Michael]

Hey Johnny,
I was going to start working on this song soon…what are your thoughts about playing it as an Alto/Tenor duet, the cpu screen split in 2 with Tenor on one side and Alto on the other? I started working on Urgent yesterday, I’m doing the same thing with that song, main melody on Alto and those famous Sax lines/solo with the Tenor. I’m learning the whole song on Tenor when I play it in front of someone, but for the sake of uploading the song as a cool video project I thought a duet would be cool to see, both for Urgent and In the Mood 🙂

[john]

ya as you know I did that kinda thing with Baker Street and Careless Whisper because they both had the famous sax lines on alto.
it’s a lot of work and you’ll be editing for a while!

[Jazz Cat]

great idea, eventually I’d like to do greenscreen w/both, so both onscreen same time. In the Mood’s perfect for that since it’s an ensemble sax part…though right re a ton of editing work…

[Michael]

Hey Jazz Cat, more editing means more fun 🙂 They’re very entertaining to see, great encouragement for Members here on Johnny’s site to say the least. I think that’s so cool how you use the Green Screen..I learned how to do it and have created some background slide shows for some upcoming edits..each of those slide shows took like 3 hours or so to put together LOL But I think it adds so much. I don’t plan on going crazy and using the Green Screen all the time, but do plan on making good use of it for sure. It would be cool if you could put some kind of a “how to” tutorial to post on the forum under “home recording” to teach members how to use the Green Screen for video edit..everyone loves seeing your video editing; fantastic to say the least 🙂 Yes, In the Mood is absolutely perfect for an Alto/Tenor duet. I plan on doing it after I’m done making “Urgent” into a Duet 🙂

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