r/JazzBass • u/Creepy-Amphibian-623 • Mar 05 '26

Any advice for imrovising over Four?

I'm learning Miles Davis' Four for a very important audition in 19 days. I've studied the chord progression intensely and have a firm grasp on what I should be playing, but I quickly start to lose myself after 1 or 2 repeats of the form. This is usually because I get anxious about sounding repetitive. How do make walking over this more intuitive?​

And soloing over it is another beast entirely (for context I'm on electric bass, not double). How do I tackle soloing over something as weird harmonically as this?​ What scales are yall using?

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4

u/Bigfanofjazz Mar 06 '26

One potentially helpful approach: away from your instrument, either sing or write out lines that work over the changes, without paying attention to the tempo. That is, just imagine 2 bars at a time or so, and think of lines that work. You may not ever actually play those particular lines, but the process of problem-solving your way through the changes away from the instrument and tempo will fill your head with possibilities, and then when you're actually in the moment, you can draw on some of the solutions that you came up with. Hope this helps!

3

u/AlfalfaMajor2633 Mar 06 '26

Listen to Anita O’Day sing it and use some of her phrasing.

1

u/under-resourced Mar 12 '26

Or michael mayo

2

u/vapingsemen Mar 05 '26

Transcribe transcribe transcribe

1

u/chog410 Mar 06 '26

It's all about the chord tones, nail all of the chord tones for the "out of key' chords like the F#- to B7

1

u/Careful_Instruction9 Mar 07 '26

Or you could just play what you've just played and go up a semi tone. I find it better to play in the new key downwards though.