"Improvisation Using Simple Melodic Embellishment," a jazz clinic by Mike Titlebaum

"Improvisation Using Simple Melodic Embellishment," a jazz clinic given at the 2012 NYSSMA conference by Mike Titlebaum, director of jazz studies at Ithaca College. In this session, attendees practice embellishing a common melody ("When the Saints Go Marching In") using straightforward melodic techniques such as passing tones, neighbor tones, and more complex techniques such as double neighbors and chromatic embellishment.

Later in the session, the same techniques are applied to learning another jazz standard, Cole Porter's "What Is This Thing Called Love?" The session ends with some Q&A about the techniques and process.

NOTE FROM MIKE TITLEBAUM ON 11/21/2013: Lots of people have asked about getting the materials from this presentation. Thanks for all the kind words; I'm glad this had been helpful. You can download a PDF of the slides here:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/45ltfyqcgnwdaof/Improvisation%20Using%20Simple%20Melodic%20Embellishment.pdf

I'm sorry I can't give you any more materials quite yet. I can tell you that I am working on a book on jazz and pedagogy with a colleague, and we're hoping to have something published in the near future which will have much of this material in a more presentable format. -MT