Ellington Study Group Los Angeles

The Ellington Study Group is sponsored by the Academy of Scoring Arts, and is led by composer and pianist Scott Healy.

The group is open to all professional composers, arrangers and performers, and to anyone else who is interested in a deep dive into a hands-on and in-depth study of jazz composition, orchestration, arranging, jazz music theory and formal analysis using classic and modern scores and recordings. The music of Duke Ellington is a point of departure – the class will cover many influential jazz composers and bandleaders, from Bennie Moten, Bob Brookmeyer, Thad Jones and Gil Evans to Sun Ra, George Russell and Ornette Coleman.

In May, 2017, the ESG expanded its format to include guest speakers. Please join the e-mail list and check back for upcoming classes. Generally the ESG LA meets once every two months depending on artist scheduling.

Many thanks to the Academy of Scoring Arts for underwriting the ESG LA.

The Ellington Study Group classes are held at Vitello's E-Spot Lounge in Studio City, CA, from 10am - 12:30. Tickets are $15 - includes continental breakfast.

3/6/2022 – Polyphonic Jazz from the 1920s to the 1980s
Ellington Study Group: Polyphonic Jazz from the 20’s to the 80’s March 6 • 10am PT • Zoom • Free live attendance for all ASA members POLYPHONIC JAZZ FROM THE 20’S TO THE 80’S Grammy-nominated Scott […]
2/7/2021 – Jeremy Levy’s “The Planets” and Sammy Nestico Tribute
Scott Healy’s Ellington Group with Jeremy Levy Sunday, February 7th 10am-12pm PT Zoom Free event for ASA members! Become a member here! All members will be sent the Zoom info the day before the […]
2/6/2021 – Masterclass Signup and Pandemic Update
The Ellington Study Group LA has been on hiatus since March, 2020 – we’re having our first online meeting on Sunday Feb 7th 2021 at 10am PST. This event is available only to ASA members, […]
2/1/2020 – Quantum Harmony, Early Jazz – Special Guest Joshua Moshier
Our next class on February 1st will be jam-packed with a detailed of some of the basic harmony of jazz music. I’ll start with a deep dive into early jazz harmony, focusing on how improvising players […]
9/21/2019 More Noir, Linear Harmony and Jeff Beal
On Saturday, Sept. 21st the Academy of Scoring Arts will host the latest installment of my Ellington Study Group. I am excited to have as a guest speaker Jeff Beal (House of Cards, Monk, Blackfish, […]
3/23/2019 The Dark Side: Music of Late 1950’s Film Noir and Marcelo Zarvos from “Ray Donovan”
Saturday, March 23rd 2019 Vitello’s E-Spot Lounge – 10:00 am to 1:00 pm The Dark Side: The Music of Late 1950’s Film Noir, with Special Guest Marcelo Zarvos (HBO’s “Ray Donovan”) Scott […]
12/8/18 – Harmonic Superpowers and Guest Jeff Babko
SATURDAY, DECEMBER 8TH, 2018 – 10am – 12:30pm CLICK FOR TICKETS Hone your harmonic superpowers while hanging with your cool LA colleagues and ingesting large quantities of caffeine! On Saturday […]
10/20/18 – Voicing Boot Camp and Drummer Bernie Dresel
SATURDAY, OCTOBER 20TH 2018 – 10am – 12:30pm CLICK FOR TICKETS Saturday the 20th is going to be a jam-packed class. I want to spend an hour talking about how to voice a big band horn session in […]
6/30/18 – Birth of the Cool and Duke with Guest Paul Peress
On Saturday, June 30th at 10am we’ll start delving into Miles Davis’ revolutionary “Birth of the Cool”. This influential and enduring work has it all: inspired arranging, […]
5/5/18 – Concert Jazz and Extended Form – and Mervyn Magic
Ellington’s auspicious Carnegie Hall debut in 1943 gave us the masterpiece “Black, Brown and Beige”, arguably the first long form, extended “legit” concert jazz work. […]
3/24/18 – THREE GREAT WORKS, GRANT GEISSMAN
SATURDAY, MARCH 24TH, 2018 – 10am – 12:30pm On March 24th I want to start talking about a composer’s intent – how a writer’s vision is carried forward and realized. This will be the first in […]
8/25/17 Quantum Meter and Tim Davies
On the 25th I’ll open up the topic of meter and time in jazz composition. We’ll talk about how a composer can engage meter, ways to work within a grid of time, or to work expressively […]
5/6/17 – Harmonic Rhythm and Special Guest Brent Fischer
PLEASE NOTE NEW SATURDAY TIME and EXTENDED FORMAT HARMONIC RHYTHM AND SPECIAL GUEST SPEAKER BRENT FISCHER On Saturday May 6th at 10am we’ll continue our exploration of harmonic rhythm, focusing on […]
2/25/17 – Hello and Goodbye
Saturday Feb. 25th, 2017 at Vitello’s E-Spot Lounge, Studio City, 10am – noon On Saturday: Geek alert! I want to spend some time talking about what some call “harmonic rhythm”, a […]
11/11/16 – Thad, Duke, and some College Chords
On Friday we will dive back into large ensemble voicing, first by revisiting “Diminuendo and Crescendo in Blue” by Duke Ellington. Duke’s work in the mid 1930’s predicted and […]
9/23/2016 – More Gil, more Thad
At the September 23rd meeting we will start off by taking a quick listen to “Maids of Cadiz” by Gil Evans and Miles Davis. We’ll talk about some of the broad strokes: form, pace, and how Gil shapes […]
6/24/16 – Clear and Transparent Voicing Technique (that still grooves!)
On the 24th we’ll delve in to Ellington’s “Such Sweet Thunder”. This piece is a great example of the use of riffs, space, harmony, layering, groove, and economical jazz writing. There’s so much to […]
3/25/16: From “Ko-Ko” to KC
On March 25th we will start an in-depth analysis of the iconic “Ko-Ko” by Duke Ellington, using as a reference an excellent transcription by David Berger. This is another great Ellington […]
Agenda for 12/18/15: Cootie, Gil and Russell..
Listening to the classic “Concerto for Cootie” I’m hearing so many cool devices and trademark Duke sounds. I think we’re going to delve into that a little – maybe look at a […]
October Surprise: “St. Louis Blues” at 10/23 Class
I was looking around for scores on the interwebs and happened upon artistshare.com, which among other great artists, features the recent Gil Evans project of composer and arranger Ryan Truesdale. At […]

Trad and Polyphonic Jazz Playlist
Some examples of polyphonic jazz music from the 1920’s – 1980’s: […]
Protected: Class Materials 2/1/2010
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Class Materials 9/21/19
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Class Materials 3/23/2019
Sweet Smell of Success Analysis […]
Class Materials 12/8/2018
World is Waiting – 3 Exs Black Bottom Stomp Corrected Score Black Bottom Stomp Harmony 1 Black Bottom Stomp TRANS 1 – Part 2 Principles of Linear Harmony […]
Class Materials 10/20/18
GOT GROOVE? BBB SCORE ESG 10_2018 – Score Got Groove? Voicing Examples 1 – Ens Ex’s Got Groove? Voicing Examples 2 Got Groove? FULL REDUCTION – FULL REDUCTION GOT GROOVE? BBB FINAL – DRUMS […]
Class Materials 6/30/18
Paul Peress Charts: I Just Can’t (CD Version) Sugar_City_FINAL2 Show Me […]
Class Materials 5/5/18
Class Materials 5/5/18 “Black Brown and Beige” Orchestral Suite arranged by Maurice Peress “Spanish Key” Miles Davis – SH Transc-Arr “A LOVE SUPREME” sketch (is this authentic?): […]
Class Materials – 3/24/18
DIM and CRESC- Improv as Comp – Katherine Williams VCFA-Ellington-Lecture-Andy-Jaffe-Feb-2017-5 Hey! Great news…er…”Black Brown and Beige” full score of the full suite as performed in 1943 is now available on […]
Class Materials – 8/25/17
SCOTT HEALY MUSICAL EXAMPLES, 8/25/17 “DIm and Cresc in Blue” -full score RHYTHM EX #1 “I Ain’t Got Nothin but the Blues” Arr Healy Score “DYHANA” – m1-29 Leads_Bass_Chords “DHYANA” […]
Class Materials – 5/6/17 – Brent Fischer
SCOTT HEALY PDF SCORES AND MATERIALS: CIRCLES The Clothed Woman SH TRANSCRIPTION The Clothed Woman EXAMPLES The Clothed Woman- TRIO CHART There are at least four recordings of Ellington playing “The Clothed Woman”. Below is […]
Protected: Class Materials – 2/25/17
There is no excerpt because this is a protected post.
Protected: Class Materials – 9/23/16, 11/11/16
There is no excerpt because this is a protected post.
Ellington Live Concert – 1958
Just had to post this. What the hell was in the water in 1958–Miles, Ornette, Bill Evans, rock n roll, folk, etc…wow. […]
“Concerto for Cootie”
This iconic piece from 1940 features Cootie Williams on trumpet, and has some of the hippest stuff Ellington ever wrote. We took apart a great transcription by David Baker (can’t publish musical examples due to copyright law.) […]
Gil Evans: “St. Louis Blues”
Composer Ryan Truesdell did a fantastic transcription of this classic Gil chart, which features Cannonball Adderley on alto. This is some hip st*t–great changes, voicings, groove, just the right space for the soloist. Gil is the master of […]
Blues for Pablo
We talked about Gil Evans’ iconic “Blues for Pablo” which, among other things, has some great examples of gestural orchestration, or orchestration that is purposeful, and perhaps even melodic. I used some of the same materials that […]
Bennie Moten: “Moten Swing”
Click for PDF’s of class handouts: Moten Swing Shout Moten Swing-SH-reduction Parallel Motion Ex’s […]
Diminuendo and Crescendo in Blue
Ellington’s “Diminuendo and Crescendo in Blue” has some great riffs, innovative orchestration, and advanced harmony, especially considering he wrote it in the mid 1930’s. He didn’t know he was breaking the rules because […]