Product Review: Greg Fishman’s Jazz Apps for iPad

(This review was originally published in Saxophone Today, July/August 2014.)

April 1, 2020 - Important update from Greg Fishman:   "Thanks again, David, for the great review. I have exciting news about the apps. I have a new app designer and we are updating the existing apps and adding new apps. For the first time, the duet books will be available as apps. Also, the new hip licks app will feature user adjustable speed, looping of licks, practice trainers that take you from slow speed to full speed in stages, trading licks with my sax and more. Also huge—these new apps will also work on the iPhone. Still tweaking them, but they will be out in the next few months."

Product Review:  Greg Fishman’s Jazz Apps for iPad

I first became aware of Greg Fishman when his excellent jazz etudes hit the scene.  That first book was a very important addition to the library of any student or educator, as it offered a contemporary spin on a classic format by providing modern jazz vocabulary and play-along cds that accommodated e-flat and b-flat saxophones in one concise package.  Fishman followed up with numerous sequels, an awesome series of duets, phrasing books for beginners, and, most recently, the “Hip Licks” series (see David Demsey’s excellent review in the July/August issue).  With some novel apps for iPad, Greg Fishman brings us fully into the 21st century with a whole new level of flexibility and convenience, all in a very slick and easy to use interface.  At this time, the apps are only available for iPad - presumably because a smart phone or iPod screen is simply too small to work with this amount of content.

I adopted Greg’s books into my teaching a long time ago, and I even use them with my thirteen year-old son, which should indicate how much I like the materials.  When I first downloaded the Jazz Phrasing app, I left it on the iPad for my son to discover, while I spied from the next room.  He quickly figured out how to use the program, and intuitively listened to the recording once, and then played along the second time around.  It was interesting to see how quickly he adapted to the electronic format.  It actually made the practicing fun for him, which is no small accomplishment!  The play-along tracks are very high quality, well recorded, and expertly performed.  They sound fine when played through the iPad’s internal speaker, but I recommend plugging into an external stereo system, if you want to get the most fidelity out of the pre-recorded tracks, especially to hear the fullness of the bass.  (If you tend to play at a louder volume, you may find external speakers necessary.)

The Jazz Phrasing apps, for alto or tenor, were the first to be introduced.  They work very well, providing the full text of the original books, and a tappable table of contents to access each etude.  At the bottom of the screen, you have the option of playing back “rhythm & sax,” or “rhythm only.”  Since these are geared more for beginners, it makes sense to listen to the full recording, to start practicing playing along with the recorded saxophone track, and then to move up to playing along with the rhythm section alone.  Greg obviously worked with an experienced app designer; the interface requires no explanation, and it works very well.  The pages turn automatically, although you might need to adjust your iPad settings, so that the screen doesn’t go to sleep in the middle of your practice session.  The play-along tracks are all at-tempo, which requires that the student practice each piece until it is up to speed.  This is not much of a big deal for these particular etudes, since they are relatively simple, by design.

The Hip Licks apps feature an even better interface, with more flexibility on the play-alongs.  Each set of licks can be played at two tempos, slow or fast.  It is also possible to add, or to remove the sax track on the fly.  I find this feature especially useful when teaching, as I can tap the sax on or off, according to the needs of the student.  This feature is also useful if one wishes to use the rhythm only play-along tracks for improvising without the use of the provided licks.  Greg could have used a digital tempo slider to offer even more tempos, but this would have undoubtedly sacrificed the sound quality, and the high fidelity pre-recorded tracks are one of the best features of the apps, so the fast or slow option is probably the best compromise.  I also like the way the pages “turn” a little more in the Hip Licks apps, opting for a sliding scroll, instead of the diagonal flipping used in the phrasing app (my son found the latter to be visually jarring - even though it looks cool).

For those unfamiliar with the Hip Licks series, Greg has crafted a variety of interesting melodic clichés for various chord types and common progressions.  Rather than taking the “learn everything in every key” approach, he took the time to create licks that play smoothly and fit the range of each key.  This method is similar to the way that most professionals actually improvise.  We strive to play everything in every key, but this is not always practical in real world applications.  The Hip Licks series is a thoughtful way of incorporating a ton of excellent, idiomatic jazz language into your playing, with rhythmic and harmonic context, all guided by the expertise of an experienced improviser.  The author manages to provide essential elements of bop with attention to details such as variations in phrase length and contour.  He also makes sure that the licks start, and end, on different parts of the measure.

I have heard some saxophonists express doubt about using a licks-based approach to practicing, concerned that it only creates clones.  I think that the Hip Licks series actually does an incredible job of introducing concepts, and if practiced well, the student will be able to use the materials to create their own melodies.  A certain amount of jazz language needs to be learned in a direct manner before anyone can attempt to form their own voice.  This direct learning can be accomplished any number of ways, such as transcribing solos, learning passages in all keys, etc., but the Hip Licks approach really does offer a unique and interesting way of building a vocabulary for improvising.  This may be about as close to the real world way of learning that our current technology will allow, short of getting lessons from a master teacher, of course.

Greg Fishman is truly a creative entrepreneur and an innovator.  In addition to offering Skype lessons, he has started an in-person Hip Licks workshop, and he has an upcoming book of teaching analogies in the works with illustrations by New Yorker cartoonist Mick Stevens, and a foreword by Jeff Coffin.  When it comes to these iPad apps, I find them to be terrific resources, and very fairly priced [check the app store for current pricing].  You can even download a “lite” version of the styles app from the iTunes store for free.  I suspect that anyone that tries out the free version will ultimately decide to spend the money on the full version.  Greg Fishman has set the standard for contemporary play-along studies and I give his iPad apps my highest recommendation!  §