Jazz Trumpet Licks

This whole tone pattern repeats the same pattern going down in whole steps. I hear a lot of Jazz musicians use this whole tone lick in different variations, usually to start off a Jazz line and then branch off into something else.

Here is a sound sample played on trumpet:

How to memorize this whole tone pattern in 12 keys:

Since this is a whole tone pattern, you’ll only need to memorize it in 2 keys depending on which note you start on. You can see that this whole tone lick’s scale pattern is 1 2 3 1 4 1 6 and it just repeats that pattern going down in whole steps as far down as you would like to go. That is pretty much how you memorize this whole tone pattern. All the notes of this lick are not part of the whole tone scale. Just the first four notes are. Since the lick repeats itself going down in whole steps, I added it to the whole tone category.