Solo Piano Jazz - The Self Administered Lobotomy

One thing I've observed in great Brazilian and Latin and Afro-Cuban music, is that the various rhythmic instruments each tend to play specific and independent rhythms - if any single part is pulled out from the mix, it could stand alone and be successful.  When the parts are played together, they are each doing something different and they don't, for the most part, line up with each other.  The parts fit together like a puzzle yet none is duplicating the other - each is an interesting rhythm unto itself.  When this happens, the groove is infectious and locked in like a well-oiled 12-cylinder engine.  Rhythmic counterpoint might be a good phrase to describe this.
 ( The converse is also true - when there's a lot of rhythmic redundancy by musicians, the groove is dead in the water and it's more like an un-oiled 12-cylinder engine, case in point, the typical American jazz version of the Brazilian Bossa Nova)

    This concept of "rhythmic independence"  is very effective in Solo Jazz Piano arranging.   By maintaining rhythmically independent parts, we trick the listener into hearing orchestrally.  In the example below, the parts will be heard as 3 independent rhythms and the listener might infer images of 3 different instruments if we shape the tone,  and balance the parts consistently.  Top part, melody might be heard as vibes, middle chords as brass section, bottom note as bass trombone.
  Notice that there is virtually nothing lined up except the first note of bar 3 ( green ) -  all of the other bass notes and chords ( red ) are played alone, and all of the melody notes ( orange) are played alone except one .   This mode of thinking is far-reaching and will work in any style of music - it applies equally well in my Klezmer band, my Polka band and my various Jazz bands and, of course, in Solo Piano. It also applies when designing bass, drum and percussion parts or just when improvising in any group setting.


                SOLO PIANO INTERPRETATION (sk) IN 3/4   First 4 bars of
                          "CONTEMPLATION"                                               
                                     Composition by McCoy Tyner:

McCoy Tyner

Actual Lobotomy not Recommended - Instead,  Just Practice, Practice, Practice