Fun with Scales??????

Quick, what's the best business to be in in January? My
guess would be diet books, and exercise programs. But
piano workshops are pretty popular this time of year
too.

Hopefully a piano workshop will be more FUN than a diet
or an hour a day at the gym. But piano can have its
more challenging moments. I recently got a letter from
one of our subscribers asking about scales and
exercises. He asks, "What other types of exercises can
you recommend that will help? I'm looking for exercises
that will help with harmonization."

Here was my reply to him.

Harmonization is more of a cerebral issue, while
practicing scales and exercises is more physical. What
is really challenging, helpful, and fun is to make up
exercises that address both issues. Here is what I
would recommend.

1. Keep learning the major scales with both hands.
Learn one per week. Should take you 12 weeks. Make sure
your brain is engaged with this exercise, not just your
fingers. You should know exactly what notes belong in
each major scale. Good news: no need to practice minor
scales for now.

2. Review Hanon exercises 1 - 20.

3. Now for the challenge. Learn the Hanon exercises in
all 12 keys. Start with Hanon #1 in F. Then G. Then
gradually add the more challenging keys. Do the same
for all 20 exercises. Fingering might be awkward with
some of these combinations, but this is a mental
exercise as well as a physical one. See what we're
doing here? We are combining the physically oriented
Hanon exercises with the more cerebral idea of scales
and harmony. It's a real physical/mental challenge.

So there you have 240 new exercises to master.

Sounds like a lot of work. Realistically I have haven't
yet done all 240 of the combinations myself, but I have
worked on many of them. I highly recommend this
exercise for intermediate to advanced players.
Beginners, you can relax for the time being.

For "Hanon," pick it up at a music store. It's real
name is "The Virtuoso Pianist in 60 Exercises." And the
author is C.L. Hanon. It's cheap. Get the authentic
version, not any of the dozens of reworkings.

As for piano workshops, here's where you can find a
schedule. There might be one in your neighborhood.

http://pianofun.com/seminars.html

Keep playing.

While Watching TV

Just a thought.

Perhaps you caught 60 Minutes on TV Sunday night when
they did a feature on the classical pianist Gabriela
Montero. It's always interesting to me when a part of
mainstream media does a piece on a more esoteric part
of the culture. I sit back and ask myself, "what part
of this phenomenon are they going to try to sell me?"

Didn't have to wait very long. The thing that stuck
with me with the piece was they were portraying her as
someone "controversial." Why? Because she
(occasionally) improvises on the piano. Oh, the horror.

But that reflects on the culture too, doesn't it? The
enforcers of what is proper in classical music have
established the edict demonizing improvisation. Even
though Bach, Mozart, and Beethoven improvised, modern
day pianists are prohibited from it.

So what does this mean? In order for a modern day
classical musician to be deemed worthy, they are
prohibited from being creative? Do we live in an insane
world or not?

I come face to face with this mindset all the time,
from the upper echelon music critics to the common
everyday piano teacher. But you know what's cool? It
isn't universal. In fact, I don't even think they are a
majority anymore.

So let's give praise to Gabriela Montero and to all
piano teachers who feel that success at the piano is
more than just playing with overwhelming precision what
someone else has written a few hundred years earlier.

Audio file for Silent Night substitutions

In the last entry I wrote about making chord substitutions for Silent Night.
But wouldn't it be better if you could hear it?
Click on the title above for a 10 minute mini lesson.

Chord Substitutions for Christmas

One of the things a veteran piano player does is make
chord substitutions. Chord theory can be quite complex,
and you could probably build a four year graduate
degree around it. But here are a couple of real basic
ideas that you can try on Christmas Carols, or any
other type of non-classical song.

Two great substitutions for major chords are 1) the
major sixth and 2) the major seventh. I'll spell out
the C6 and the Cmaj7 for you and leave it up to you to
extrapolate the formulas to the other major chords.

C6 = C E G A

Cmaj7 = C E G B (natural)

So time to get creative. Next time you play a song, any
song, make one of those substitutions for any plain old
major chord. If you are playing Silent Night, for
example, that song has the following chords. C, F, and
G7. Instead try C6, F6, and G7. That will modernize the
sound of the song.

Want it to sound even more modern? OK. Try Cmaj7,
Fmaj7, and G7, respectively.

Will that make the song sound better? That, my friends,
is a matter of opinion. Only you will know if that
makes it sound better to your ear. So try it. You might
like it.

Oscar Peterson in Person

Oscar Peterson. What is left to say about such an icon?

Would it be fair to give a critical review about an 81
year old man who could barely cross the stage to get to
the piano? No, he is beyond critiquing. All appearance
of frailty aside, by the time his fingers hit the keys,
you would never know he was 81.

His set was about what I would have expected--equal
parts blues, standards and ballads. Perhaps he did lean
a little heavily toward the ballads (mostly originals)
but by the time he got to Sweet Georgia Brown (about
two hours after he started) he just shredded the solos.
Truly amazing for someone at any age.

He had a very adept band rounding out the quartet,
including a guitar player who sounded eerily like the
late Joe Pass, a staple Peterson collaborator.

The familiar standards included Satin Doll (very modern
reharmonization of the chords), Neal Hefti's Cute, and
a gorgeous Here's That Rainy Day. The audience was
mesmerized of course, and almost everyone in the
audience I talked to was either a piano player, guitar
player, or drummer.

So what can we learn from attending such a performance?
I personally was able to watch his hands and for the
first time, connect what his playing sounds like to
what it looks like. Maybe, just maybe, some of that
playing will rub off on me.

I wanted to drive home right a way after the concert
and try some things out. But for me, it was a three
hour drive that got me home at 1:30 am and too tired to
do any practicing. But first thing the next morning I
was at the piano.

Of course Oscar at 81 isn't the same as hearing him
when he was 41. Certainly he has lost a few miles per
hour off his fastball. But he's made up for it by
becoming more of a finesse player. He consistently gets
his curve balls over, and has a devastating change-up.

He was everything a legend should be.

Visiting a Piano Legend

I'm so excited. Later this afternoon I get to drive 180
miles to Oakland. Then later this evening I get to
drive 180 miles back home to Chico.

In between I get to see a performance by jazz piano virtuoso
Oscar Peterson.

I guess he's about the most legendary jazz piano player
alive. If I'm wrong, tell me who it is.

It's Oscar, perhaps our last living link with the glory
years of jazz.

So I should have a lot to report on tomorrow. Stay
tuned.

Help! What's a Good Chord Instrument?

We've been talking about strengthening our piano skills by playing the right hand and left hand separately on different instruments, and then re-synthesizing the two parts on a piano later.

My example was using a melodica (a two and a half octave mini keyboard that you blow through) to work with the right hand, and then a guitar to work with the left hand. I find the guitar most helpful because it's a way of looking at chords through an entirely different medium. I get a whole new perspective on chords by playing them on a guitar.

Piano players can easily adapt to the melodica; it's just a miniaturized form of a piano. But what if you don't already play the guitar? I don't recommend starting to learn it from scratch. Unlike the piano, the guitar is a very difficult instrument. It takes a lot of dedication.

So what can you use for chords? Well you could play chords with your right hand on the melodica, I suppose. But you get no new insight from that.

There have been various chord producing instruments on the market over the years. The Omni Chord comes to mind. But these tended to be just one finger chord generators that didn't really reveal much in the way of how chords work. Plus they were limited to relatively simple chords.

Take a Cole Porter chord progression such as Gm7b5 - C7b9 - Fm6 - Dm7b5 - G(alt) - Cmaj7 and you've had it. These one finger chord gizmos can't cut it to my knowledge.

I believe one of our bloggers suggested a chord instrument by Suzuki or somesuch, but I have no clue how those work.

So I'm kind of stumped. Anyone out there who knows of a chord based instrument other than the piano that's versatile, musically correct, and easy to use, please let us know.

Blog on Vacation

No blog entries next week. How come?

Your blog host will be attending and teaching at a music camp all next week at a place where there are plenty of redwood trees but no phones, no Internet, no cell coverage. I will be totally isolated. My only contact with the outside world will be occasionally being able to catch an inning or two of an A's game on the car's AM radio.

Ironically, when I was traveling in Thailand a couple months ago, I had total communication back home via e-mail and even free phone calls through the Internet every single day. Now I'm going to be in California and totally isolated.

I'll be teaching a class every day called "How to Jam by Ear" or something like that. The good news is that when I return in a week, we'll pick up where we left off in the blog discussions, and I will no doubt have some stories from camp.

To learn more about this camp, check out the link. Lark Camp

And if you need to reach me, you'll probably have to do so by carrier pigeon.

Isolating the Chords

Last time I revealed how playing the melodica helps me learn melodies better. By the same reasoning, learning chord progressions on a guitar forces me to separate chords from melodies and isolate the chord progressions.

When I play chords apart from the melodies, I can focus on them better. I tend to recognize patterns better that way. And once I recognize a certain pattern, it forms or reinforces a neurological pathway in my brain (I think that's what's going on up there.)

When I return to the piano I now have both the left hand and right hand learned separately, which makes it easier to put them together as opposed to just starting from scratch on the piano.

Notice I'm not saying that learning in this fashion helps me coordinate the two hands together better. It just has the effect of better preparation with each of the two hands individually. And with guitar, I tend to see the logic of the chord progressions a little better. Or at least a little differently.

I notice this effect is especially true with difficult songs and/or difficult keys. For example, I've tried many times over the years to play standards like "Body and Soul" and Monk's "Round Midnight." I could never get the songs to "stick" in my head when trying to learn them at the piano. But learning them indepently on melodica and guitar? It smashed all those barriers to learning for me. Why not give it a try?

Oh. And what if you don't play the guitar? Let's talk about that next time.

One Cool Secret about Learning Piano That I Learned on My Houseboat

At this moment, the temperature in Chico, California is 107 F. It's headed for a high of 111 F today. For many of the days of summer, the daytime temperature here is in triple digits. Pam and I seek relief from this heat by heading to our houseboat on Lake Oroville.

I love being out on the lake in the summer. If I had an Internet connection out there, I doubt I'd ever come into the office until October. Actually, there is one other creature comfort, besides the Internet, that the houseboat lacks. A piano.

It's not inconceivable to have a portable keyboard out there. It's just I never got around to shopping for one. But I still play music out there (along with Pam on clarinet) thanks to two other instruments, a guitar and a melodica.

I've played the guitar since I was about 12 years old. I'm pretty good, but I'm not really good because I can't really figure the thing out. Piano makes sense to me. Guitar is a mystery. So all I really do with the guitar is play chords while Pam plays her clarinet. So together, we make a band (of sorts).

Pam bought me a melodica last November for our anniversary. For those who don't know, a melodica is a miniature keyboard that you blow into while you finger the keys. It has about two and a half octaves, and sounds like a cross between a harmonica and an accordion.

Whenever I learn a new song in the winter, I learn it all at once, on the piano. Whenever I learn a new song in the summer, on the houseboat, I learn it two ways--once on the guitar, and then again on the melodica. So why am I making a point of this?

It turns out that this method of learning songs became my secret new breakthrough. Instead of learning new songs on the piano where I'm trying to do everything at once, I'm now learning the parts separately.

Next time, I'll explain why this has really helped my playing.