Hey,
I play tenor sax in 2 decent local jazz orchestras, & wonder if there is something more to jazz, then just improvising? One of my friends is about 1st dip jazz sax, & keeps going on about formations, like 5,5,1 I think, & I just wondered what this is? Can anyone tell me any of these things, as I have no sax teacher.

Hope you understand

jonathan

Are you sure your friend isn't saying II V I ? This is a really common shord sequence in jazz. e.g. Dm G7 C and if you see this chord sequence you can essentially just use the major scale of the final chord to improvise over the whole sequence (in this example C major).

Yeah - thats the one. thanks - that makes sense now.

Are there any more common chord formations like that??

Yes. Lots.

But ii, V7, I is used in nearly all jazz standards.

I believe that the most common chord progression for jazz tunes is 12 bar blues and variations, followed by Rhythm Changes - i.e the chord changes for I Got Rhythm (and variations). There are quite a lot of jazz theory books that help explain common chord progressions, but the way I've found it easiest to make a start in getting to grips with some of this stuff is through workshops and group lessons.

By the way, it's Dm7...not Dm.