There’s a part of jazz practice almost nobody talks about—and it’s the reason most beginner solos don’t sound like jazz at all. Once I figured out what was missing in my practice, my solos finally started getting a real jazz flow, and I’ve used the same method to help 1000s of students do the same.
So in this video, I’ll show you exactly what is missing in —and the simple way to fix it—so your solos finally flow like real jazz.
Where Online Lessons Fail
Did you ever notice that online jazz lessons always show you what to play—scales, licks, arpeggios—but almost never how to actually make music with them?
You end up memorizing a lot of notes, but your solos still don’t sound like jazz. In fact, they often sound robotic…like a bunch of ideas that don’t quite connect.
It’s a bit like learning to cook: Imagine if every lesson just taught you how to shop for the best ingredients, but never how to turn them into a meal.
You’d have a fridge full of great stuff, but no idea how to make dinner.
This is exactly what happens to most beginner jazz players.
They collect musical “ingredients,” but their solos don’t have any jazz flow. Joe Pass nailed what you need to get right:
“The secret to to filling something up is not playing arpeggios or playing runs it’s actually playing runs but it’s actually like making sure that you make the connection to the next phrase”
So, how do you actually connect your ideas and get that real jazz flow? Before we dive into Joe Pass style lines, let me show you the single most important exercise that almost every jazz beginner skips—and it fixes 90% of soloing problems.
How To ACTUALLY Practice Soloing Slowly
Do you practice soloing like this? You pick a new scale or lick, hit play on a backing track, and try to squeeze it in—hoping it magically fits and makes you sound better. But let’s be honest: most of the time, it sounds bad and feels forced.
Working like that is just setting you up to fail.
Here’s the problem: Trying to improvise with brand-new material, while also keeping track of the chord changes, the groove, and the song’s form, is like trying to learn how to juggle while riding a bike. It’s just too much at once, and almost guaranteed to go wrong.
Instead, you need to break things down. Think of it like learning to juggle while standing still first—mastering the moves one at a time before you add more challenges.
That’s why this next exercise is so powerful: composing lines. But probably not the way you think. Instead of just collecting more licks, you’ll actually create your own variations and, in the process, develop your sense of rhythm and your ear.
This way of working is also how Peter Bernstein talks about learning phrases:
“I would say wow look what they do over C7 and say okay when they do that what does that mean you know what what are how are they bringing out the set the notes of that chord what what notes are they leaning on so it would tell me okay well if I play the same that that phrase slightly different but I can keep the idea of the phrase then I’m I’m I’m learning how to make variations on something”
Let me show you how that might work, plus one thing that a lot of students get wrong about the exercise. Let’s say that you want to incorporate this simple phrase, which is a great way to make a Cmaj7 arpeggio sound good:
In this case, the main character is the arpeggio with the two leading notes,
and, to me, how the high leading note sits on the beat and then resolves is what makes it sound great.
The first step here is to stick to the same chord and find different ways of continuing. Something short:
Or maybe a longer, more elaborate line:
You can also move the arpeggio phrase into the bar and find some ways to lead into it:
But here’s a huge misunderstanding I see all the time: Some students think, CUT And Zoom in “Great, now I have even more licks to memorize!” CUT But that’s not the point.
The exercise is making the licks, not creating a collection of phrases to force into your solos. The more licks you make, the easier it becomes to use the new material in your own solos. You are practicing to connect it to your vocabulary and making sure that you create lines that sound good. If you start by playing over a song in time it is going to end up in stress, panic, and what is worse: practicing a lot of lines that don’t work. You are, in fact, practicing to ruin your playing.
Let me show you how composing lines helps you with both rhythm and the flow that Joe Pass talked about.
Lock In With The Groove Out Of Time
Have you ever played a solo where, as soon as you finish a phrase, you have to stop and listen—just to figure out where you are in the song? It’s a common problem, and it usually means you’re not fully connected to the groove and the form.
Here’s how you fix it: Practice composing or improvising your lines out of time, but with a focus on the main jazz groove—8th notes. In jazz, everything flows from heavy beat to heavy beat (think beats 1 and 3). So, even when you’re composing and not playing in time, you want to hear those heavy beats as anchor points and build your phrases around them.
It’s like having invisible stepping stones through the song. When you practice this way, you train your ear and your fingers to always land melodies on those strong beats.
That way, your phrases naturally “lock in” to the form of the tune, and you never lose your place—even when you’re making things up on the spot.
But there’s a catch: this only works if you also make sure put the right notes on the heavy beats. Let me show you!
Hearing The Harmony
If you’re new to jazz, it can seem like magic when pros play those dense 8th-note lines and somehow still sound musical and interesting. But for beginners, those lines often sound awkward and unclear. Compare these two phrases:
Which is not as clear and doesn’t have as nice a flow as this:
A lot of this is about which notes are used to make the sound of the chord change clear.
The 1st example has the root of the chord on beat one, which is a bit heavy and less clear than the 3rd, which is used in the 2nd example.
There are two notes you want to be able to put on those downbeats where the chord changes, and many Jazz beginners get this wrong.
You want to play the 3rd or the 5th on the downbeat. Those are the strongest notes when it comes to hearing the chord change in a melody like a solo line. You’ll see examples from Joe Pass in a bit where he does exactly that.
Here’s the big beginner mistake: When you’re told to outline chords, you’re often taught to focus on the 3rd and 7th. That’s great for comping, because those notes define the chord when played together.
But in a melody, the 7th by itself doesn’t always make the chord change clear. In fact, sometimes it barely moves from one chord to the next, so your ear doesn’t hear the change.
So, what should you do? When you’re soloing, aim to land the 3rd or 5th of the chord on the downbeat when the chord changes.
These notes give your lines clarity and make the harmony easy to hear—just like the pros do. (I’ll get to the Joe Pass examples in a second!)
But, a quick warning: Just hitting the right notes on the right beats isn’t enough. If your lines don’t have direction or connection, they’ll still sound mechanical—like this:
And THAT is where Joe Pass’ advice makes all the difference. Let’s explore how to add jazz flow to your lines!
Joe Pass’ Recipe For Flow
If you want your solos to sound like jazz, your lines need to go somewhere—they need energy and forward motion. Remember what Joe Pass said at the start of this video:
“The secret to filling something up is not playing arpeggios or playing runs it’s actually playing runs, but it’s actually like making sure that you make the connection to the next phrase”
That’s the real secret. Notice what he doesn’t say: He doesn’t tell you to learn more scales, or practice faster arpeggios. He’s not talking about cramming in more notes. Instead, he’s laser-focused on connection—making each phrase lead naturally to the next.
You can hear this in his own playing. Check out this example from “The Joe Pass Guitar Style”:
What you want to notice is that the lines are flowing to a note at the beginning of the bar:
First, the A on F7, then using the F# to hit the G, going back to C7
The good news? You can practice building lines with this kind of forward motion. But here’s the twist: to do it well, you might need to start thinking about your solo lines backward. Let me show you how.
Make Your Solos Flow
Do you ever catch yourself overthinking every chord change in your solo?
If you’re spending all your mental energy on picking the right scale or arpeggio for every chord, it’s almost impossible to focus on adding forward motion to your lines.
Here’s the fix: Stop worrying about every single chord and start thinking about where you want your line to go. It’s a game-changer. Instead of building your solo from the beginning, start with your destination—the note you want to land on.
For the C7, let’s decide on a target note on F7 that you want to hit. Having target notes for chords makes everything easier.
Let’s start with this 3rd: A. Just one note in a single place on the neck to keep it really simple.
Now, practice building lines that lead into that A. For example, you could use a C7 arpeggio and an enclosure to approach the target note:
Or maybe use the C7 arpeggio as the way to get to the A on F7:
And, of course, you can also use other common arpeggios on C7, like the Eø:
When you practice this way—always aiming your phrases so they arrive at a strong target note—you’ll notice your solos start to flow naturally, just like the lines you hear from Joe Pass or Charlie Parker.
It’s not about cramming in more theory; it’s about giving your music direction.
Build Your Vocabulary!
Of course, you still need to build up your jazz vocabulary—so you’ve always got great ideas for every chord. If you want a solid start, check out the exercises I cover in this next video. They’ll give you a rock-solid foundation in both harmony and phrasing, so your solos sound authentic—not just like a string of “correct” notes.
Check it out!
Learn Jazz – Make Music
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