Fast Piano Lessons Blog

Werewolves of London has a really catchy set of chords. The basic set of chords are D, C and G, but Warren Zevon plays them with cool sounding embellishments that we can borrow! This embellishment actually gets used OVER AND OVER again in rock, blues and country piano. So make sure to learn them to some degree!

Ignore all the fancy stuff I’m adding in the beginning and just focus on the lick shown at :44 seconds into the video. There is a slow walk right afterwards as well! Then go back for the fancy piano fills.

The lick uses inversions and should be written out with slash chords like this:

CHORD #1: (Gmaj/D to Dmaj)

CHORD #2: (Fmaj/C to Cmaj)

CHORD #3: (Cmaj/G to Gmaj)

*If you’ve learned how to read slash chords, you have all the information you need! Otherwise you can watch the video to learn it. If you want to brush up on your slash chords, then go to my blog post on them here: SLASH CHORDS LESSON

In this lesson we’ll continue covering patterns for swinging rock piano! These are bass line patterns for your left hand. They really help push the song along and give it energy. These are meant to be played fairly quickly. They can also be fairly redundant because most of the attention is going to be on your right hand. Your left hand just plays a supporting role to drive the music, while your right hand gets the spotlight.

I came up with these notes because they’re notes from the chord. If the chord was C, we could play each of the notes in the C chord, one at a time: C E G. If we do all three at the same time too low on the piano it sounds muddy and has no energy.

Even though some of these are simpler, when I’m trying play and sing at the same time, I’ll use these simple patterns the most! There is just TOO MUCH to focus on in piano to do it all well!

Click on any of the examples to make them bigger!

Example 1: The first bass line you should start with. It outlines the same notes that are in a C chord: C, E, G.

Example 2: has a new note at the end: “A” (C, E, G, A). Fingering: Place your left hand pinky on the C and the thumb on the A

Example 3: is a little different than ex. 2. The notes are C, E, G and A, G. The last two are 8th notes, going twice as fast!

Here are the really flashy piano bass lines that will give the youngsters the challenge they’ve been looking for! These will work on a lot of swinging rock songs like “Great Balls of Fire” - Jerry Lee Lewis, “Jail House Rock” - Elvis, “Old time Rock & Roll” - Bob Seger and especially any swing dancing tune by bands like Brian Setzer Orchestra or the Cherry Poppin Daddies! The piano can really be a high energy exciting instrument with these patterns! Just watch any Jerry Lee Lewis video!

POST A VICTORY COMMENT IF YOU WERE ABLE TO DO PIANO EXAMPLE #5!!

Sheet Music Examples: Click on any of the examples to make them bigger!
Example 4: This example outlines a C7 chord, notice the Bb. The notes are C, E, G, A, Bb, A, G, E. Fingering: Left hand: Pinky plays C, Index plays G, Thumb plays A, Index crosses over to play Bb.

Example 5: This example sounds really fancy and is a little bit tricky to pull off. Its just like example 4 but now we’ve added a C in between each note. The notes are C, C, E, C, G, C, A, C, Bb, C, A, C, G, C, E, C.

Lorna had a very good piano question:
Which songs can we apply some of these country, bossa nova or blues patterns to?

ANY SONG is the short answer!

Think of what I’m showing you as interchangeable parts, or pieces for building your song or arrangement. Lets take the song twinkle twinkle which is part of the classical genre. You could add the blues bass lines and get a bluesy version of twinkle twinkle, or you could add a bossa nova bassline add a different flavor.

It all depends on what you want to make your arrangement sound like!

Thanks for the great piano question Lorna!

I probably use this little pattern and variations of it more than any other. Its quick, fun and sounds good on any major triad and sounds a little different on minor triads but thats also useful. Great for other styles besides country as well… Pop, Rock piano etc.