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This is the free play approach that Gyro is always talking about:


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=biAy8fZAfHo

Yes, they must have had an innate sense of chords/theory, and I guess the blind greats like George Shearing, Stevie Wonder, etc could feel the keyboard's groups of black keys and internalize the note clusters/chords, handshapes, etc, that they liked to use, even if they didn't name them. They probably also did get some help from people, as you say. Of course, they're mainly just brilliant, "born with it" IMO.

http://www.hollywoodoutbreak.com/2009/09/22/on-this-day-in-show-biz-irving-berlin-dies/

"Berlin had little formal education and no instruction in music. A self-taught piano player, he played by ear. Able to play in only one key, F sharp, he had a special piano made for him that could be set to different keys using a gear shift. He never learned to read or write music and used a musical secretary to transcribe the songs he wrote".

Thanks Jazz+ ..... now I know what "just dig in" means.

Thanks Jazz, for putting that up. Where did you come across that?
I've had some really good chuckles today reading on various forums and threads. I actually listened to the whole piece.
I can relate in one sense to this fellows playing... because I've done a lot of very free style improvisation. But he doesn't seem to care at all about any of the sounds he's making, let alone his piano itself - just flopping around

I am not really sure if what Gyro meant was really free jazz...

but then again to say whether free jazz approach is better than other jazz is silly... and playing lots of free jazz probably won't help you much with finding the right chords to amazing grace... unless you want to play something atonal behind the melody.

Here's Cecil Taylor. The way I understand free jazz.. its like stream-of-consciousness writing.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cP5L8tjnB6w

Here is another free play master:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q3OOwglVldI

Jazz+, I disagree that an adult cannot learn to improvise by ear like a toddler. In fact, if you are not good at classical repertoire, not good at sight-reading, not good at anything musical, then maybe that means you're good at improvising by ear, because that's the only thing left you could possibly do at the piano. I'm not good at anything on the piano, and I find that I can do quite well, relatively speaking, improvising by ear, certainly better than anything else I can do at the keyboard.

Those free improvisors you posted. I don't sound at all like that. That's the way they play, I play my own way.

Good grief, this everyone-has-to-sound-the-same mindset has infected even the free improvisors. Both of those guys sound quite similar.

Is there a book on "free" improvisation that says you have to play in a certain way?

Gyro please provide some links to other free players, doesn't have to to be you.

Free playing jazz master:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q3OOwglVldI

Very revealing post, Gyro. You wrote "I am not good at anything on the piano, and I find that I can do quite well, relatively speaking, improvising by ear, certainly better than anything else I can do at the keyboard."

I thought you had previously described yourself as an accomplished classical pianist.

The original post was asking about playing tunes like John Lennon's "Imagine" by ear, and so forth. Based on your admission, I would conclude that perhaps you are not somebody to be giving advice to other pianists. And that you have some sort of anti-tradition agenda from a result of your admitted basic deficiencies. That you have latched onto feeling proud of taking a "thinking outside the box" approach to piano. It sounds as if everything else didn't work in your case. Such a direction is a recipe for isolation from all other musicians and from listeners too. One becomes an island unto themself.

Originally Posted by Jazz+

Very revealing post, Gyro.

Gyro - I think it is time you reveal yourself. I generally agree with much of what you post:
- I also think that in many ways digital pianos are superior to acoustic pianos, and
- in terms of expressing musical emotion I also think that playing by feel and intuition is superior to learning by rote.

In my opinion you would have more credibility if you would just post some recordings of your piano playing. A video would be even better. By the way, it certainly would not "cost me more than $1000 and hundreds of hrs. of testing to get it all in place".

That's true.. You can get a microphone stand for about $25.00 and a mini-tripod and put that together with a video-audio camera recorder (like Canon PowerShot) for around $100.00, and that would work very well.

Here's what Kenny Werner has to do say about "free music" or "free improvisation/jazz" as a state of mind.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UguxxPO-lHM

Of course Kenny Werner can play "freely" like that through years of playing and studying the music. I think every good players play something that is true to their music and cultivate that 'free' state of mind, but they've also spent the necessary time to study the music sot that their expression is much more meaningful than most of us noodling on the piano.

BTW there is nothing with what Gyro is trying to do. It's only a problem when he starts to claim that that's all you need to do, and for that it's not necessary or even bad to learn by wrote or imitate others as a form of learning. Like Jazz+ said, it seems like Gyro is promoting an anti-learning agenda based on ignorance and incompetence in learning jazz in general.

Here's a Mozart quote

"People are wrong who think my art comes easily to me. I assure you, nobody has devoted so much time and thought to composition as I. There is not a famous master whose music I have not studied over and over."

Gyro

of all the videos below, who do you think has everyone-has-to-sound-the-same mindset" and "sound like everyone else" with no individual voice? And does your music resemble any of these guys?

Fred Hersch
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tBfomCIvzz0

Toni Tixier
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x0OdpeDvs7g

Tigran Hamasyan
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LwjpCGCfRSk&feature=related

Chick COrea & Hiromi
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BRU1o-sCnqY

Kenny Kirkland
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vagTOR44viQ

Taylor Egisti & Julian Lage
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xmIEKcvsoHc

I can tell you that every single one of them went to school and grind through the theory books/classes, which you hate so much.