As I write this, the Dauphin is away on a school trip, Ms. Fretboard is at a friend's where hot tubbing may or may not be involved, and our daughter headed out moments ago on a fro-yo quest. Left to my own devices, I am schizophrenically alternating between Teddy Wilson's 1956 trio LP I Got Rhythm and John Scofield's 1990 album Time On My Hands while fitfully maneuvering words into place for this week's newsletter.

I'm checking out the Scofield record on the recommendation of my pal Bret, with whom I actually found a couple of hours to hang out last night. Per usual, we consumed a profoundly conservative quantity of local beer and talked mostly about music – practicing it, listening to it, thinking about it – while addressing assorted undercurrents about parenthood and dog stewardship.

The Teddy Wilson is a bit more my usual thing – not that I've consciously checked out much Teddy Wilson; tonight's listening has been spurred by yet another dip into Gary Giddins' 1985 book Rhythm-a-ning. Useful things, books; when an artist you're interested in has left a huge catalogue of work in their wake, it's helpful to have someone smart suggest where to start.

And it's always good to go to the source. I recently decided it was time to re-learn the second and third parts of Stefan Grossman and John Renbourn's "Snap A Little Owl," and when I slowed it down to 50%, I found out I'd just been guessing on some of the bass notes – and guessing wrong.

Likewise, after rediscovering some particularly hot Grant Green while revisiting Hank Mobley's classic Workout, I learned a whole lot I hadn't known about Green's playing just in the half hour or so it took me to work out his first chorus on the B-flat blues "Smokin'." Yes, I had to slow that sucker down too, but it was worth it.

I had been trying to figure out how best to include some Grant Green in an upcoming Reliable Source workshop, and with this morning's discoveries, I think I've solved how to do it. More news about that soon, but the workshop will most likely take place in early November.

To more immediate things: today's Youtube lesson takes another look at adding bass lines to a steady bass blues in E. I spent a little time on this a couple of weeks ago but it's such a cool idea I wanted to go into it in a little more detail; you can find the lesson here:

E Blues Bass Runs

Finally – and I suppose I've really buried the lead here – if you're anywhere near Austin on October 23rd, I'll be playing a show with one of my all-time favorite musicians, the great Roy Book Binder. More information on that next week, and if we succeed in arranging a streaming option, I'll let you know about that as well.

More soon,

David