Not sure what to call this version of jingle bells… Is it more jazz or blues or rock? You decide!
This is for all the intermediate to advanced players who have been asking for something a little bit more challenging, otherwise I would normally break this lesson down into smaller steps. See if you can steal a few of my voicings for chords!
Outline:
The first half is a little reserved with some jazz voicings.. but not for long!
The second half has a walking bass line in the left hand with the right hand embellishing the melody quite a bit with some extra blues notes.
At the end I’ve attached a blues lick ending walking down from C, Bb, A, Ab, G back to C while the right hand trys to solo like crazy.
And then the final chord: C13#11 (C E G Bb, D F# A)
Here is a good definition of a lick:
A lick is “a stock pattern or phrase” (Middleton 1990, p. 137). In other words, Its a short melody made of a small number of notes that you have rehearsed. You want to do this so you sound better prepared for playing solos or improvising.
I am constantly adding new licks to my musical vocabulary. Here are a few short ones to get started with as well as a short explanation of fingering for the blues scale:
This lesson starts off covering two different easy blues scale licks at :04
Then we cover the two hand positions at :15
Make sure to learn the scale from both hand positions. Otherwise your limiting your creative possibilities. If you just start improvising from the C note every single time, what should be “improvising” will fall into becoming very routine.
I show you the fingering for the blues scale at :40
There are two different options for fingering the C blues scale:
You could use 1212121. (Thumb, Pointer, Thumber Pointer Etc)
Or 1234123 (Thumb = 1, Pointer = 2, Middle = 3, Ring Finger = 4).
Its good to be comfortable playing both fingerings.
Let me know if you have any questions or suggestions by posting a comment!
In this piano lesson, we cover the music that plays for 15 seconds or so in the Super Mario Brothers video game series when you get an “invincible star”. Video game music has been a great teaching tool for me. I find that nothing inspires young kids more than to learn a song they’ve heard a million times on their favorite video game.
The chords are Dmin7 and Cmaj7. The rhythms are almost a jazzy samba type pattern.
Most of the video game music from the mario series was written by koji kondo. His original venue was the video game console, but now his music is played by orchestras and bands all over the world!
In this piano lesson, we cover the Jazz standard: Summertime by George Gershwin. As usual I show you the final version first and then slowly break it down. STEP 1: DOWNLOAD the sheet music (fake book style) before watching the video. Then use it to follow along with the video lesson. Click here for the music chart: SUMMERTIME CHORD CHART
STRIDE PATTERNS:
Stride patterns are when your left hand plays just the root down and then jumps up an octave to play the missing notes from the chord. (2:19) The left hand is going to play the low single bass note on beats one and three. On beats two and four it will jump an octave up to play the chord. There are of course lots of different variations! In the video, I’ve slowed the left hand down half as fast. I’m only playing the root on beat one and the chord on beat 3.
GETTING STARTED WITH STRIDE: (Start Simple) 2:45
To get the hang of playing stride piano you want to first start out by practicing just with your left hand.
With your pinky, practice jumping from notes in different octaves. For example, play a low C (single note) then moving an octave up to play another C (single note). Keep working on this until you can do it in a steady rhythm without dropping a beat. Start off as slowly as you need to then gradually speed up!
The next step is to add the chords into the left hand on beats 2 and 4.
IMPROVISING:
To improvise on summertime, you want to use the Dmin blues scale. The notes for the D minor blues scale are [D F G G# A C D].
The Chords in Summertime:
Dmin7 can be played with the notes DFAC.
Gmin7 can be played with the notes G Bb D F. On Gmin7. In the video (:10 & :57), I’m playing an inversion of the chord (F Bb D) and leaving out the root because I played it earlier on beat 1.
Emin7(b5) can be played with the notes E G Bb D.
To add more walking bassline motion, I lead into A by playing Bb right before that. (:13)
A7 can be played with the notes A C# E G, however in the video I’m playing the root on beat one and then playing the chord without the root on beat 2
Fmaj7 can be played with the notes FACE. In the video (:24) I only play F & C to keep the chord from sounding muddy. Its a fast passage and a lot of notes are tricky!
Bb7 can be played with the notes [Bb D F Ab] but in the video (:25) I only play a shell voicing: Bb and Ab.
A7 can be played with the ntoes A C# E G and in the video I only play another shell voicing: A and G When you’re playing chords in a low range on the piano, use only the outside notes of the chords (shell voicings) to keep it from sounding muddy. It also makes it easier to play 2 notes from a chord rather than all 4.
Here is a intermediate boogie woogie piano pattern for two hands on Dominant 7 chords! (G7)
It builds off of our last post Boogie Woogie Piano 101
This version gives you a much fuller blues boogie sound. It would work great while playing behind a singer, soloist or even all by itself. Try to tranpose this into the keys of G, C and D, then you could use it on a blues in G.
First I show you the key to this pattern: Your pinky fingers stay on the same note G. (:35) Then we break it down step by step. (:52) Your left hand stays on the same note while your thumb moves up. In the right hand part, again your pinky stays the same while your right thumb moves the same direction as your left thumb. This creates a nice harmony between the two notes as they move together.
By moving your thumbs, you’re changing the notes from GDBG to CECG. This changes the chords from Gmajor to C major.
Watch out for muddiness! As you get lower on the piano with your left hand, you need to make sure to spread the notes out wider and wider. Rather than playing a G major triad in the low octaves (GBD) leave out the middle note and just play G and D.
