I see people posting clips of them playing jazz at the most ridiculous speed so that their fingers are almost a literal blur.
I could play for 1000 years and I could never do that. What I can do is to improvise melodically. It sounds nice to me, but when I see people doing jazz shredding, I just feel useless.
Give me consolation, please 😳🙏
Hi guys, I just wanted to post my experience of my first ever jazz jam. It’s a long post but we only ever get to do something for the first time once 😊
EDIT TLDR version
The original post is far too long. So this is a three paragraph TLDR summary (I just fed the original post into one of our electronic overlords and this is what it came up with - it's a good summary so I’ll just leave it as is 😂)
"Went to my first proper jazz jam in South East London last night and it was one of the most musically overwhelming experiences I’ve ever had. I took my acoustic guitar, sat towards the back where I could quietly hear myself, and just joined in where I could. About a third of the time I had absolutely no idea what was going on, another third I was sort of in and out, but then there were those magical moments where everybody was jamming together and suddenly I was fully inside the music. Especially during “Summertime”, which honestly was one of the most beautiful musical experiences I’ve ever had.
The overall standard of musicianship was extraordinary. These people were absolute monsters technically, but what struck me most was not the virtuosity — it was the joy and immersion. They were there purely to make music. Watching the guitarists comp, the horn players fly through lines at impossible speed, the singers improvising in real time… it was just incredible to witness up close. It also really drove home to me that improvisation is fundamentally about internalising musical language through doing it, not just through theory or exercises.
The biggest surprise was realising that I actually could participate. I’d assumed you needed to know every chord, every head, every position before even thinking about a jazz jam. But what mattered most was familiarity with the sound and feel of the music from hundreds and hundreds of hours of simply playing along at home. I’m still miles away technically from these players, but there were moments where I could genuinely hold my own and immerse myself in the music with them. And honestly… after “Summertime”, I had tears in my eyes.”
That’s the end of the summary. My original post is below if you have an hour spare 😂
ORGINAL POST:
Just to set the scene…
I live in London and I did go to a jazz jam a few months back and did take a guitar with me, but I was nowhere near ready and in the end I didn’t play a note so I was basically just an audience member. This time was different because I actually did some playing!
I live in North London and the jam was in a pub in South East London, so just getting there was quite a journey! I didn’t have time to go by train or car, as it was too far and too busy. So I went on my bicycle with my guitar on my back — about an hour and a quarter each way, to a part of London that I’ve probably never been to in my life!
I got there at eight, which was the start time.It was in the upstairs room of a nice pub — but just one of tens of thousands like it in London.
When I got there, the core house band had just arrived and were talking with each other and setting up. Obviously, I didn’t know anyone, but they all seemed to know each other.
There was a sort of calm, curious friendliness. I had a little chat with the lead guitarist, who was playing a hollow-body jazz box. He was just warming up and testing out his amp. Even just doing that, he played a series of jazz block chords. And if I hadn’t known what Joe Pass looks like, and you’d told me he was Joe Pass, I would’ve believed you.
I asked him how much he played each day. He said two to three hours. I actually wasn’t surprised, because that’s what I do. When you love something, you just want to do it a lot.
From what I could tell from our brief conversation, he’s a pro/session/gigging musician. I can’t say that surprised me in the slightest.
The initial setup was the lead guitarist and another guitarist (a lovely Italian Italian guy) who said he was playing nylon strings. At that stage, I knew nothing about what he could or couldn’t do. There was also a horn player, double bass, and jazz drums. I didn’t know at that stage, but the nylon-string guitarist also sang, and there were some really cool women who were also jazz singers. Later on, a sax player arrived as well.
I hadn’t realised that jazz drummers have a set of sticks that look just like paintbrushes! I had a brief but really interesting conversation with him about the difference between playing jazz drums with brushes and rock/blues stuff. He said they’re overlapping, but separate, skills.
I didn’t really know where to put myself or what to do, but that sort of resolved itself. Because as soon as the music began, I realised there was no way I could be at the front — it was way too loud, and I couldn’t hear myself play at all (all I had was my acoustic with no amp).
So I moved around the space until I found a place towards the back where I could hear them and myself in enough of a balance that I could actually play!
Even then, I had to put my ear pretty much next to my plucking hand in order to hear what I was playing. So when I was playing, the only person who could really hear me was me! But that was fine, because in a way it was ideal. I could have the experience of jamming without having to worry about getting in the way or making mistakes.
I’d really recommend doing that for your first jam. It allows you to feel that you’re fully participating without any of the exposure that comes from sitting at the front!
A bit later, I think it was the double bass guy who actually asked me if I wanted to call a tune. Rather sillily, I said I didn’t know any tunes. It turned out that wasn’t true at all — I’ll come to that. Really interesting.
The first thing to say is that the overall standard of musicianship was absolutely extraordinary.
These were people who were not only musical to their core, but also had the most wonderful technical grasp of their instruments. It was a real privilege to be in their presence.
It’s quite a thought, really, because here we were in some obscure pub in South East London — just a small group of people. It could have been a bunch of people there for a pub quiz, but instead here were musicians who were just… I don’t know… top 0.1%? Who knows?
I’ve been to a few jam sessions in various parts of the world and played with some really good players — not jazz jams, more spiritual stuff or more bluesy things. But these guys were just exceptional.
It’s a mixture of kinda sad but also inspiring that such gorgeous musicianship is, in a way, “relegated” to a little pub in South East London. But on the other hand, I don’t think any of them really cared about that. They were there not to talk, not to drink, not to do any of those things. They were there to make music. It was obviously their joy and passion.
(It’s not that they were unfriendly — just that the focus was very much on the jamming and the music rather than socialising.)
The people who did come up to me and talk with me were really nice. One of the jazz singer women very kindly came up to me at the end and asked me what my experience had been. I think I just gushed 😂
Anyway, back to the music and to my experience.
The session began at about 8:20 and continued right up until closing time, so I guess we were there playing pretty much continuously for the best part of two and a half hours.
The range of subgenres that were played was astounding. So not only were these guys really impressive musicians, but they could play anything from jazz blues to Brazilian stuff to quite hardcore bebop things to 1930s-style jazz, and a lot of other things that I didn’t even recognise.
As a player, I describe myself as 100% a jammer. So the moments that were really amazing for me well when everyone was playing and it moved from solos to full on jamming.
Overall, I would say that about a third of the time I had no idea what was going on or people were playing solos, so I was just watching. Another third of the time I was able to jam sort of in and out, but without necessarily being in flow.
But there was about a third of the time when the genre was something that I was familiar with (jazz blues or something close to that with a slightly slowed-down tempo)…and everyone was just jamming together and it was literally impossible not to play along. Those moments were absolutely incredible.
The absolute high point of the evening for me was when they (we? 😊) played “Summertime”. There was a woman singing — my goodness, absolutely incredible — an improvised jazz singer. And I can honestly say that jamming with that tune, with the trumpet moving in and out, the sax, and the guitarists… it was just absolutely incredible. One of the best jamming experiences I’ve ever had.
For that, and for a few other things as well, I could definitely comfortably have gone on stage and held my own! But then I would have had to leave the stage again, because there was other stuff where I didn’t have a clue! 😂
I learned quite a few things about my own playing from the experience.
The first is that I know more tunes than I think. When the bassist asked me if I wanted to call any tunes and I said I didn’t know any, but with hindsight I realise that’s just not true. If you’d asked me beforehand whether I’d be able to hold my own with “Summertime” at a jazz jam, I honestly wouldn’t have known the answer. But it was so nice to discover that the answer is yes. I had sort of assumed that you need to know all the block chords and the head and all that stuff perfectly before you could even think of playing as part of a jazz jam. But it’s just not true. What you need is to be familiar with the tune, not a listening sense but in a playing sense. I’ve never “learned” summertime. But it felt completely natural when they started playing it. And I would’ve quite happily gone to the front for that.
And I think that’s probably true for all of the tunes that I’m familiar with. So for example: “All of Me”, “Georgia on My Mind”, “Fly Me to the Moon”, “ satin doll” and a few other others plus stuff that I know from particular players like “Midnight Blue”, “When Sunny Gets Blue”, that sort of thing. I think I could have called any of those and I would’ve been fine. And the reason for that is not because I’ve heard the tunes before, but because I have played along with them countless times at home with masters Like Oscar Peterson and McCoy Tyner and so forth. I just cannot say an emphasise enough how invaluable doing all of that has been.
So it really does show that knowing the tune — in the sense of being genuinely familiar with it — makes a huge difference.
But a way even more importance, it’s just been comfortable with the genre. The moment any jazz blues was being played (whether I knew it or not) I was straight in and happy and vibing and completely comfortable. Because I have played along with jazz blues of all kinds at home for 1000 hours or more. I have basically been training for this!!
This meant of course that stuff like the Brazilian jazz completely threw me because I’ve never played along with any of that even once and I had no idea what to do the first time they played one. But the second time I began to hone in on its insistently major feel — definitely not my thing — but still, by watching the bassist I was able to get the rhythm and do a little bit 😊. But it was rudimentary and a real reminder that there are subgenres of jazz that I really just don’t know anything about.
A few more reflections.
The first thing is that there is absolutely zero chance that I could have done any of this without having spent probably well over a thousand hours playing along to jazz tunes at home. Jam tracks have also been really useful, but I think if you’re going to go to a jazz jam, you absolutely must spend time practising by putting on actual jazz tunes alone and jamming with them. That was completely invaluable. Without it, I would’ve stood no chance at all. Of course, it’s not quite the same as doing it in real life, but it’s a hell of a lot closer than people think it is.
A few more related thoughts. Some of this is probably repetition but hey stream of consciousness is what we do!
The first is that a familiarity with particular tunes is obviously incredibly useful. But more important than that, I think, is that you just learn the language of the stuff you play along with.
So as soon as there was any sort of jazz-bluesy vibe at all, it didn’t matter whether I knew the tune or not — I was just straight in. And I think that’s simply come from having done a lot of jamming to that sort of music on my own.
The second thing is that you can forget about theory. When you’re jamming — particularly with people like this, who are really fine musicians and playing at a really high tempo — it’s sheer raw instinct. You have literally not even a 10th of a second to think about nothing. You have to have internalised the musical language (hence the importance of playing along… At home…)
I also experience for the first time really the sort of jam session speed competition experience. I tested myself by trying to keep up with the horn and sax guys (props to both of you guys you were absolutely incredible - a joy to play with when I was able to keep up!)
It’s really interesting because they are playing single lines. And so I think that frees them to develop a speed and improvisational skill that’s astonishingly fast.
Guitar of course is a bit different because it is polyphonic at least in theory you’re trying to put in dyads and even chords here and there. The speed of those blowing guys is just unbelievable
So I was really pleased that there were moments — particularly with the jazz-bluesy stuff — where I was able to keep up. Really challenging, and at times it was just too fast and I couldn’t do it. But other times I was able to keep the pace, which was brilliant, and also fantastic training and practice, because when I’m jamming at home, I don’t jam with stuff that fast. So they really did challenge me my absolute limits (and sometimes beyond!!)
A few more guitar specific thoughts as well ..
The guy with the jazz box was the lead guitarist. When he was playing, I sat back, because there was obviously nothing I could do or add. One of the things I did learn from him, though, was to watch what he was doing when other people were taking solos. Really interesting to see live comping.
It is literally what they say — little chord fragments and stuff like that, but without getting in the way of whoever is doing the solo (drums or bass or whoever!)
I’ve been doing a little bit of that at home when I’m playing along, so I tried it here and there. It’s an amazing skill. I was able to do a little bit of it, but obviously nothing like him. But it was fascinating to see it being done properly in a real live setting. We think about learning the tune or soloing. But there is the third thing of comping which is its own very separate skill!
The nylon-string guitarist was another truly astonishing musician. It’s funny, because I’ve had people say that when they watch my fretting fingers, they find it almost hypnotic. And even though I was actually sitting quite a distance from him, I now completely understand what they mean, because I was hypnotised watching him play.
His fretting hand seemed like a creature with its own mind and will. In my own little way, I sometimes have the same experience, where I just find myself watching my fretting hand and wondering who’s doing the directing.
Because at times it doesn’t feel like me. I feel more like an observer. He was the same thing, but taken to a completely different level.
And incredibly, he was also a singer. And a wonderful singer. There was one point when everybody was jamming and he was singing, and I didn’t even realise who it was that was singing until I looked up and saw that it was him. Super-fast, jazzy, brilliant, and absolutely incredible fun to jam with. I was completely immersed in it — playing, absorbed, and just overjoyed by the experience.
It’s funny because if I think of myself and try to describe myself… technically, I’m just an advanced beginner as I’ve only been playing guitar for a little while. But it’s really interesting how what maybe lies at the absolute heart of all of this is musicianship. You can have all the technical skills in the world, but if you don’t have the musicianship, it’s worthless. And I’m very blessed that I do have the musicality. And that’s why I was able to jam when I was able to, even though these guys are obviously far more advanced technically. So I think if you are musical then you can do this stuff at least to the level of being able to not embarrass yourself, maybe a lot sooner than you think you might be able to!
The other guitar-specific thing was — and this applied both to the lead guitarist and the nylon-string guitarist — that it was so interesting watching people who had taken box/position playing to an absolute art form. It’s a profoundly complex thing to be able to do — navigating all those boxes and positions vertically, being able to move at incredibly high speed whilst still maintaining the musicality.
That’s not the way I play. I’m pretty much self-taught and, because I come from a piano background, I play horizontally (Mick Goodrick style). That has been an absolute godsend, because it means that I was able to keep up (because when you play horizontally, it makes the key largely irrelevant and makes musicality and melody-making incredibly easy).
If I’d tried to learn through boxes and positions alone, I would still be a rank beginner. I would have had absolutely no chance. Because playing vertically/diagonally that way is a really advanced skill. And I can see why people say it takes decades. Both the lead guitarist and the nylon guitarist were just incredible at being able to play at ridiculous speed on what seem to be almost autopilot.
(It’s a different conversation as to why on earth position playing is taught to beginners as the default way of playing. It strikes me that teaching that to beginners is completely mad. You’re basically taking novices and trying to teach them the most difficult thing there is on the guitar — vertical/diagonal navigation.)
Some smaller observations as well. Sound balance is a real issue. The trumpet and sax were amazing, and huge fun to jam with too, especially because some of their lines were quite bluesy. But they are loud!
So there was no way that I could have played “on the stage”, as it were, anyway, because I wouldn’t have been able to hear myself, and I also would have found it incredibly uncomfortable without headphones.
I actually don’t understand how people do it. The sound volume when you’re up there is really high. I guess if you’re playing a horn or sax then there’s no problem hearing yourself, but if you’re playing guitar then you really need everything to be right in terms of sound balance. I’m not sure how I would achieve that.
And it does feel very uncomfortable having such a high volume and being so much more close-up. Anyway, that stuff I need to work out for my next session! Technical issues 😊
When the evening was over, people talked a little bit. I was maybe a bit shy, so I just stayed with my guitar and did a little bit of quiet playing by myself.
And then I rode an hour and a quarter through the streets of South London, through places I’d never really seen before, but had only ever been names to me — Peckham, etc.
Overall, it was an incredible experience. Huge fun, especially during that sort of third of the time when I was just able to join in the jam and immerse myself in the way that I sometimes feel when I’m playing at home.
The one thing which I did realise — which I sort of appreciated before, but which was really brought home to me — is that I’m not sure I ever really want to play solos. In a way, they’re the antithesis of jamming because, apart from a little bit of jazz drumming and a tiny bit of comping, it’s actually truly solo. Whereas what I like is jamming.
But that’s fine, because you can always sit out.
I did also wonder whether maybe I should go to blues jams rather than jazz jams in the future, and I will try that. But I think the great thing about a jazz jam is that you still get some blues. Whereas I think if you go to a blues jam, you might not get any jazz ☹️
Anyway, I can’t recommend the experience enough. And doing it the way I did was absolutely perfect, because it allowed me to participate and join in whilst at the same time being able to experiment and try things out without any fear of screwing up the whole experience for everyone else.
The next stage, of course, is actually getting to the point where I’m comfortable going up front. I’m not quite sure how that will work though, because there was certainly some stuff there where I would not have been able to play a note. Whereas these guys seemed to be able to do everything.
But maybe there’s a way to just come up for the things that you know, or maybe things that you call, and then go back into the audience afterwards. Who knows — it all seems to be a very flexible experience.
Which brings me onto a point that’s really worth emphasising. If I had to give one sort of takeaway from the whole thing, it’s to emphasise the word “jam”.
These are 100% jam sessions. There is a performance element — especially with the solos — and of course there is the core group of people who are leading the whole thing. But these are definitely jam sessions. So There were people coming in during the course of the evening, joining in, people coming on stage and then leaving again, and generally just a lovely atmosphere of: play when you want to, don’t play when you want to, just vibe to it.
But all to an incredibly high standard, and all centred around jazz and its various subgenres.
I will go definitely go back to this one, even though it’s a ridiculously long way away, because the skill levels are insane and those moments when everybody — including me — were jamming and those moments were just sublime.
The one thing that maybe I did feel the lack of was that there were no keys. When I jam (play along) at home, almost everything I play to has piano in it, and I do think that piano is the most fantastic jamming and jazz instrument. So next time, when I’m back in the country, I’m actually going to seek out a jazz jam that has a piano as well, just to see how the experience compares.
But this was brilliant — make no mistake.
No one there knows who I am, but anonymously I just want to thank everyone for the opportunity to be there. Really, really great. Illuminating. So much to learn. So much talent in that world.
And a joy to feel that even though I’m a long way from where they are, there were still times when I could hold my own and immerse myself in that world of music — and especially jazz music.
What a privilege.
(one little post script - after summertime, I had tears in my eyes)
Does anyone here improvise with backing using a walking bass below with Melody line on top? Thinking specifically about jazz and blues. Or do most people stick to single lines?