Hi folks,

I've just joined this forum and I'm really pleased I've found such an apparently thriving source of help and information. I'm hoping the forum is going to be able to help me a lot over the coming months.

I learned to play when I was a child, then took lessons again in my mid-thirties. I guess I got to about grade 5 and realised I wasn't going to get any better, lost interest and quit.

Now I've got a bit more time on my hands and would really like to take some kind of lessons again. But I'm not sure where to start. My interests are mainly jazz and blues. Previously I've always played from sheet music, and have never been able to master chord progressions or do anything that would enable me to improvise.

Does anyone have any suggestions as to where I might start?

Any help would be more than welcome.

Look forward to hearing some feedback soon.

Amelia.

What I would suggest is to just start
improvising, that is, sit down at
the piano (a digital is ideal for this)
and play purely by ear, with no
consideration for any music theory,
or form or structure. This is going
to be something totally new to a
person who has a background in classical
music, where everything is played
from a written score. Here you
rely totally on your ear, and you
don't need to know any theory,
or anything else.

What comes out when you do this will
be influenced by all of your previous
musical experience, whether at the
piano, or listening to the radio or
live performances, etc. If you're
inclined towards jazz and blues,
your improvisation will likely
have a jazzy or bluesy flavor, but
not necessarily, because when you
improvise there are no rules, and
anything goes, and what
comes out might surprise you.
And in any case, you want to be
original when you improvise and
not just try to sound like someone
else.

Initially, your improvisation
might be disappointing
or even shocking to an ear used to
hearing nicely finished compositions
and slick commercial recordings. It
might sound like a child pounding
mindlessly on the keyboard, but
like anything at the piano, improvisation
takes practice, a lot of practice.
Over time you'll be able to home
in on the sounds that you want to
produce. This is how you really
learn about the instrument and
what you can do on it. This should come to
be the most enjoyable thing you do
at the piano. You'll be producing your
own, original music on the piano,
music that has never been played
by anyone before.

Although some of the things that Gyro points out are quite true, there are other methods that may help you avoid the frustration of sounding bad for a long period of time. Another thread is talking about the merits of the Sudnow method. You may want to check that thread out and see if it interests you.

And for what it's worth Gyro has some interesting ideas, but it appears that they would need much further clarification since following the advice as laid out is tantamount to saying 'sit at the piano and do anything, and hopefully soon something will come out.' For some people, yes, something will come out, but for many others the frustration of not understanding why everything sounds bad will lead to abandoning the activity.

In the distant past when I taught improvisation I might've said to my students 'just play the white notes in the right hand' or something to the effect, but I learned long ago that this type of advice is similar to a tennis coach suggesting to 'just hit the ball.' In any discipline certain rules must be followed in order to ensure a good beginning.

I hope this helps.

Amelie,

I find myself in a similar situation and have approached it by listing 5 or so things I want to learn to play very well... all with a degree of improvisation

Linus and Lucy (Vince Guaraldi)
Fake Plastic Trees (O'Riley version)
Winston
Hornsby
Folds

And I posted on Craig's List with a request for a non-traditional teacher... one who can put together what I know and take me to another level.

I'm getting some interest and that might be one approach for you.

My other recommendation is a Blues tutorial book. I finally cracked one open the other day (bought it two years ago) and am self learning the chord progression and notes that work in each chord (right hand).

The recommendations above are very good as well.

Good luck.

I don't agree that improvisation will
be frustrating. Suppose a person
sits down at a piano and just starts
to play by ear, with no knowledge of
theory. And suppose also that,
initially, it seems to sound terrible,
just mindless pounding on the instrument.
Nevertheless, this is the person's
original music, created on the spot,
and which have never been played by
anyone before. So what if it seems
to sound terrible at first. Where
else in piano can you say that you
create your own music on the spot
every day, and create more new stuff
the next day? Rather than being
frustrating, I think, on the contrary,
it will be inspiring. You're creating,
being original, for the first time
on the piano. And if it seems to
sound bad at first, you'll get
better over time with practice,
like with anything on the piano.

I was pretty much in the same situation. Played the organ as a kid and read notes. Started teaching myself piano in my early 30's by buying DVD's, books and using the internet. I wanted to learn how to play the blues as a start then expand from there. Best book I ever bought is Tim Richards "Improvising Blues Piano". Perfect start if you read notes. He also has 2 books on Jazz which is a follow up to the blues book. Since I don't have option of having a teacher, I was lucky to come across Willie Myette's site (http://www.pianowithwillie.com/) about 6 months ago. A goldmine and very good when it comes to explaining improv stuff, Jazz, Funk and Gospel. Not so much blues stuff on his site yet, but he is started to do more blues stuff now. Homespun tapes has some great DVD's with David Bennet Cohen where I learned my first real blues. I recommend DVD 1 & 2, but didn't care much for DVD's 3 & 4. The DVD's is more learning 3 or 4 specific blues songs than the overall picture, but they are not bad and a couple of those songs got me hooked. It was later on I discovered the Tim Richards book.

For me the Tim Richards book is the best way to start learning how to play the blues if you read notes. I also have tthe Jazz books which seem really good, but I only started on the first one.

Gyro, I believe all of the thoughts you expressed above need to be in the first person, then all will be true. Once you state "you will enjoy this" you've crossed the boundary from personal experience to advice based on your personal experience. The advice needs to take into consideration the possibility that others may not think like you, may not have your musical background, may not have your tolerance for exploration.

Also, you might want to consider some of the core elements of what you are saying and develop them into something that people can follow with some steps. This might slow you down a bit and take time to really consider what the impact each of the things you suggest, and then perhaps clarify what it is you really wanted to convey.

Its not wise to suggest that music is without rules, or that everyone will be satisfied with sounding bad and being original. Neither of these are true, but I can see what you are suggesting. In any case, given that beginners are asking for advice, it's probably in their best interest for any posters to offer well reasoned, fact based advice. If personal experience is offered as something other than what it is (You should do this --subtext I do this, it works for me so it should work for you), then problems may arise.

I agree 100% with the recommendation for the Tim Richards book. I have quite a few books which try to teach you how to improvise blues piano and his book is the best. He has two jazz books also and I found the first one to be every bit as good as his blues book. His second jazz book for me was less useful, it covers a variety of more specialized topics, the most important stuff is in book 1.

I see a lot of people like me:
classical background; no real knowledge
of theory--and moreover, no desire
to study it; wanting to get into
jazz/popular playing, and quickly;
no previous experience in improvising;
no previous non-classical instruction.

For these people, I'm suggesting
a way to get into jazz/popular without
knowing any theory: just start
to improvise. This is what I
started doing around Aug. of this
yr., after getting nowhere with
plowing through jazz method books,
and I've made surprising progress,
and each day I little get better at it.
It is now the most enjoyable thing
I do at the piano, so very different
from the difficult classical repertoire I
still plod through every day. It
is a chance to be creative and
innovative at the keyboard, freed
from the constraints of written
scores.

Gyro,

I see lots of people like you, too. It's surprising how many people seem to want to play the piano, but don't want to go the classical route and then become bogged down with the 'jazz' route.

Almost 100% of your last post was very informative. It told me what you have done, and what your experiences are. The only thing that is a bit dangerous is the advice: just start to improvise. Do you see what I mean? PM me. Maybe we could talk about this somewhere else?

And, congratulations for finding a method that works for you. Few people are able to achieve that kind of thing because most give up along the way.

Gyro, I've heard you say this 100 times. Again, I kindly
ask that you post some of your playing
so that we can learn from your great method
and put it into practice.

And I want to ask, how long did you stick with this method
before you were actually playing music that you enjoyed?

And how did you work through mistakes
and "wrong" notes and clashing harmony?

You must have spent alot of time experimenting
and playing some bad sounding stuff!




Amelia, what I would suggest first is to find some jazz and blues songs that you want to learn how to play.
Jazz is a structured music, with the chord progression of 2-5-1 being central to everything.

I would learn the 3 important chords of a key, the major 7th, minor 7th, and dominant 7th.

C major 7th is C E G B

D minor 7th is D F A C

G dominant 7th is G B D F


This is the cornerstone of all jazz. 80-90% of standard songs have this form of progression.


I would look up jazz pianists or teachers in your city and give them a call to take some lessons. 4-6 would be good to start a foundation.

Let's just say I did it the 'Gyro' way. (which I did long ago). I would feel after awhile that without some sort of guidance, that I would sound awful and feel quite frustrated about the lack of musicality.

Fast forward to today where I've gotten many years of guidance from an actual Jazz master and trust me when I say that there's not a single wrong note in what Chick Corea, Keith Jarrett or Bill Evans plays for example. It's all carefully thought out and practiced with discipline. Except at their level, it comes at at 200mph. They're doing Beethoven level compositions in real time.

Now that I've had the basics ingrained in me, making music seems much more effortless. There's no short cuts here. Unless you're some 9 year old Child prodigy, we've got to learn musicality the regular way.

So adding my 'personal' experience here, the Gyro way was a road to frustration for me.

Bluecondition - I understand where you are coming from, I am kind of in the same boat (although I am not sure what Grade 5 in your comment is but I assume its in the long "middle zone" of where you know the basics but dont think you are a good player yet).

The only piece of advice that I can give you is - all of the above makes sense however the best teacher is time, if you put in the time you will realize whats working whats not and only when you know that will you be able to put anything to practice.

There are some basic things that I know now that I would try before and sounded really bad and would have no idea why but over time you learn so for now just hang in there spend 10-15 mins daily and check back in 2-3 mnths and you will be amazed at how much you have learnt.

Errrr ... I'm overwhelmed. I didn't expect such an instant response from so many people. Thanks folks!

Gyro, I did observe this forum for a while before I posted my first message and I read some of your earlier postings. I tried your method of improvising before and all that happened was I just got lost in the tunelessness of it all and couldn't make any progress because of the complete lack of structure. If you already know the basics of music theory and, from your classical background, have interned all of that stuff intil it's become second nature, I can see that your method could work and be really satisfying.

But for me that's a huge mountain to climb. I need at least some structure. The problem I've found in the past, though, is that the structure you get from lessons based on music theory and practice just prevents me from even imagining alternative ways of playing.

Anyway, there are a couple of things I can take away from all the suggestions people have made. One, I'll try and look up the sources mentioned by Bullitt ... thanks for that. And, two, I might try to find a local teacher who teaches blues and book just a few lessons to get me back into the feel of playing again.

Now, I know that everything depends on what each individual wants to get out of their playing and that everyone has different levels of ability, but, when it comes to practicing, is there any rule of thumb about how much time to spend on scales and arpeggios relative to sight reading and, hopefully later, improv? I'd like to get the balance right so that I don't become too structured in my playing.

I'll let people know how I get on in my search for resources later.

And, once again, thanks for all the help offered so far.

Amelia

I did try to work through several
jazz piano method books, but I
didn't get very far, and so all
the theory is far from being "ingrained"
in my psyche.

This thing where you tried improvising by
ear and didn't like the "tunelessness"
and "lack of structure" and "lack
of progress" of it, I don't think
is a problem. "Tunelessness" and
"lack of structure" is exactly what
you want when you improvise, as I
see it. So you were actually progessing
when you were improvising, not
not progressing. But like anything
on the piano improvising takes
practice, a lot of it. You can't
just try it for a few days and expect
wonders. What you're doing when
you improvise is training your ear,
which you don't really get in any
other capacity at the piano. And
you're really learning about the
piano and what you can do on it,
and about music, in a way that you
can never get from a book or a teacher.

Over time, with a lot of practice,
you should be able to know what
to hit on the keyboard in order to
get what you want soundwise, all
by ear, without knowing any formal theory.
But it's going to take practice.

That statement does not apply to more than 90% of jazz out there. Most of the time we are improving over a tune in a jazz setting, which means that you are improvising over set of pre-defined chords and tempo.

Gyro, I think it's important for you to understand that you are speaking from your own experience, which is very, very, VERY limited. It's like someone who failed Biology 100 in college making medical advice on a forum. The consequence of doing that in music is not life-threatening, bu I hope you understand what you are doing.

That is not to say what you are doing doesn't have any value.. it has value to you, and it has value to people who has never improvised.. but beyond that, your advice/method has no practical usefulness in terms of becoming a better "JAZZ" improviser.

And please note how I stressed the word, JAZZ. Just because it's improvised it doesn't make it jazz, and vice versa. If you don't understand anything I say please understand that at least.. and that what you do will not be considered jazz but 99.9% of jazz musicians.

Again it's like you saying you speak chinese, but 99.9% of chinese speaker can't understand a word you are saying.

Amelia- Please take lessons. If you are starting over it is best to have personal instruction. That way you will have to break fewer bad habits and you will have some expert direction. Maybe look around at a community college that offers adult classes. Some even have jazz programs and you might find teachers there.,, and scales and arpeggios are wonderful to practice...but you want a teacher there to make sure you are doing them correctly - even just to avoid injury. Good luck.

There is a 'happy medium' to Gyro's approach. Introduce a little structure by playing certain chords for a few minutes. A timed improvisation if you will. Here's an example of what I mean.



The music in this video is from one of my online lessons. Here the right hand plays chords from the D dorian mode (white key improv.) This is a 'first take' here. No planning. No thought. The exercise was students were allowed to play any root position seventh chord they wanted to in the right hand as long as they remained in the dorian mode. I added in some bass notes in the end - and that's that.

I've used this approach with great success with my students.

Yes ... I really liked the example posted by 'eweiss' of a timed improvisation. It's a really simple idea, but sounds incredibly effective ... well, with the right hand at least. I'll have a try and let you know how I get on. Nice pictures too!

I have, more or less, decided to take lessons of some kind, at least for a while. I think it's the only way to ensure I can set about practicing within a reliable framework. That way, at least I'll be able to discover what aspects of my playing need to be improved upon. And, if I get the right teacher, hopefully he or she will be able to guide me towards easy ways to improvise.

Trouble is, I'm not sure what kind of lessons to sign up for. I guess eweiss you would tell me I need New Age Piano lessons, but, surely there's no substitute for the personal touch of a tutor sitting there right next to you?