Hello there, I'm Matt Holborn.
I’m a professional jazz
violinist, teacher, and composer.
Right now, I'm wrapping up a book that's all about
helping violinists get to grips with jazz language and
come up with their own practice material.
Now, if you're a classical violinist, you've got centuries
of teaching methods, various learning styles, and
plenty of tried-and-tested scale and exercise books at
your disposal. But for us jazz players? Not so much.
That's why I want this book to provide a couple of
things. First off, I want to give violinists some solid
material to work on that'll help them understand jazz
melody and language. But it's not just about that. I
also want to give you, the student, a bit of autonomy
and make sure that you are getting a good mental and
ear workout. So, in the final book, you'll find different
ways to decorate and develop the major scale, but
you'll also be asked to apply what you've learned in
each exercise to complete other parts of the exercises.
This free excerpt from my book includes a few key “enclosures” (don't worry if you're not sure
what an enclosure is - you'll find out soon), and some interesting exercises that we can make
using these enclosures.
I hope you enjoy, stay tuned for the full book!
Enclosures
Note enclosures or approach notes, are ways in which jazz musicians ‘treat’ some notes when
they are improvising. They are the small details and account for a lot of the chromaticism that
we hear when we listen to jazz, swing and bebop lines. They often surround the “target” notes,
they are played before and after these “target notes” to decorate the melodies that the musician
is playing.
Often when listening to jazz lines, it can be tough to decipher where all of the chromaticism is
coming in a theoretical sense. Spending some time getting these into your head/ear/fingers will
make any transcription or solo learning you do make a lot more sense.
The exercises in this book are nearly all based on different enclosures. I apply each enclosure
to a major scale going up and down, I also give an example of the enclosure being used on an
arpeggiated exercise, also based on the major scale. This helps us hear the enclosures with a
little context and get used to applying it in a musical way.
4-Over by a Scale tone
This is one of the most simple ways to approach a note, we play the note that precedes the
target note by a scale tone above. This is one of the enclosures that is completely diatonic
(within the key centre)
Try the example below using the whole range of first position.
4a
You may notice this ends up just sounding like you are going up in major thirds.
Now try the sequence going down, shown below.
4b
Now try this, it's a combination of the Arpeggio and scale combo in the last chapter plus our
newly acquired enclosure.
4c
Now try it backwards. (it is a little harder on the way down due to the bigger jumps)
4d
Hopefully you are beginning to see a bit of a pattern in how I'm looking at each of the exercises
and how you might be able to use this way of practising for everything you learn going forward.
(As we progress along with more exercises, I will be leaving more up to you in terms of working
out the different variations).
5-Under by a Semitone
This is another very common and simple enclosure but if you can get used to the sound of it and
get it under your fingers when playing scales it can add a nice bit of chromatic detail to your
playing/compositions.
Try playing the written exercise below a couple of times and try to finish it off by using the same
pattern all the way to the top of first position.
5a
Finish this off yourself using the rest of 1st position
Now try the exercise below, this is how it sounds using the same concept going down the scale,
play it a couple of times and try to finish off the sequence going down to the bottom of first
position.
5b
Finish this off yourself using the rest of 1st position
Now try this exercise, using the combination of the arpeggio exercise and our newly acquired
enclosure.
5c
Finish off the exercise going up to the top of 1st position…
Lastly, have a go at trying this going backwards in the same way that we did with the previous
exercise. Starting from the very top point of first position and moving down.
Here’s a clue…
5d
6-Over-under
Here are two combinations of the last two enclosures, these are some of the most commonly
heard enclosures, you will find these in swing, bebop and beyond. They sound simple but create
a nice chromatic and melodic sound.
6a
Finish this off yourself using the rest of 1st position
Now try going down the sequence, shown below
6b
Now try this version going up with continuous quavers. You may notice that this ends up being
groups of 3 quavers over 4/4.
6c
Finish this off yourself using the rest of 1st position and try the same thing going down the
sequence
Now try this exercise, using the combination of the arpeggio exercise and our newly acquired
enclosure
6d
Thanks so much for checking this E-Book out, I really hope it has helped you and given you
some material to work on. Please let me know how you have gotten on either by email at
[email protected] or find me on social media via the links below
Instagram-mattholborn
Facebook-mattholbornmusic
Tiktok-mhjazzviolin
Stay tuned for the full book with loads more enclosures, scale and arpeggio exercises and some
interesting chromatic ideas.
Matt
