mike's master classes

Randy Johnston is a great musician with extremely musical, beautiful and virtuosic ideas. The best thing about his approach to teaching jazz guitar is that he has summarised his years of experience into elegant concepts into this Triste Masterclass. I worked on this Triste Masterclass video after recently studying (and reviewing) his earlier video called Simplifying Jazz Guitar video.

In Triste Masterclass by Randy Johnston, you basically get a 1-hour private lesson with Randy breaking down his approach to Triste. It’s great because unlike a one-off private lesson, you’ll be able to revisit the video as many times as you want to really master the material. It’s difficult to pick favorite parts of the video as Randy shares really musical examples that are practically all worth transcribing.

In addition to multiple performances of the song, you get to learn a solo chord melody version of Triste, motivic soloing over the changes of the tune and also how to use tetrachords to improvise on the song. This is a great extension of his previous Simplifying Jazz Guitar video that I recently reviewed.

For the solo guitar version, Randy highlights the importance of creating a coherent arrangement that flows. It’s not just about the pretty voicings (although there are plenty of those in the video!)

In short, if you like the song or Randy’s playing – this is a great video to invest in. Lots of stuff to learn and Randy’s easygoing vibe helps make it fun to go through the video.

Pros: Includes a beautiful chord melody version of Triste and a great motivic soloing lesson over the changes of the tune.
Cons: No notated transcription of the arrangement. However, a PDF with the lead sheet & chord diagrams + step by step breakdown of the arrangement are amazing. So, you should be able to learn the arrangement even better by copying all the nuances of Randy’s tasteful playing guided by the PDF.
TLDR: If you like the song Triste, this is a great video to help you play even better on this beautiful composition. If you’ve never learned this tune before, this is a great way to learn it.

Get your copy here:
https://mikesmasterclasses.com/course/triste/

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[Submissions for Review Consideration]

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