Days of Wine and Roses, Melodic Analysis

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Welcome to jazz piano skills. I'm Dr. Bob Lawrence. It's time to discover, learn and play jazz piano. Well, I hope everyone enjoyed this past week exploring the harmonic structure of the great Henry man seni Johnny Mercer standard from 1962 days of Wine and Roses. We certainly tackled many essential jazz panel skills. Last week, we looked at the form of days of Wine and Roses. We looked at the standard chord changes for days of Wine and Roses, the harmonic function of these of wine roses and the common harmonic movement found within days of Wine and Roses. And of course, last, but certainly not least, my suggested voicings for days of Wine and Roses, without question, a ton of information that at times can be a little overwhelming, I get it. But and this is a very big, but this process will get easier and easier and easier as we continue to march through the year. And, of course, the years to come study in great jazz standards every single month. I mentioned last week that there is a sequential order to learning how to play jazz piano, which indeed there is and there is also a sequential order to learning how to play tunes. Step one is as we studied last week, step one is always going to be form changes function, harmonic movement, voicings, alright, all things harmony. Step two, this week, we thoroughly study melody. And next week Step Three improvisation, harmony, Melody improvisation, right, a sequential order allowing us to discover, learn and play a tune successfully. That's the whole point, right? I mentioned last week as well that if you've been a faithful jazz piano skills listener for the past four plus years, you have become intimately familiar with the jazz piano skills needed to begin successfully studying tunes. And I also mentioned that if you haven't been grinding along with us over the past four years, well, no worries, right. This is a great time to jump on board to begin developing and enhancing your jazz piano skills. In fact, the tune study we are going to be doing every single month will help you sift through and prioritize the last four years of podcast episodes so that so that you can begin maximizing your jazz piano skills, like immediately. So if you're a jazz piano skills veteran, great if you're a jazz piano skills, rookie, great, you're in the right place at the right time to begin a jazz journey, as I like to say that will have a profound impact on your understanding of music, and of course, your understanding of jazz piano playing as well. So today, you're going to discover a melodic analysis of the jazz standard days of wine roses, you're going to learn melody guide tones, fingerings phrases and target notes of days of Wine and Roses. And you're going to play three different melodic treatments of days of wine roses, or classic Ballard, Bossa, and swing grooves. So as I always like to say, regardless of where you are in your jazz journey and beginner intermediate player, and advanced player even if you are a seasoned and experienced professional, you will find this jazz panel skills podcast lesson exploring days of Wine and Roses, to be very beneficial. But before we get started, before we dig in, I want to as I always do welcome first time listeners to jazz piano skills. And if you are indeed a new listener to jazz panel skills, podcast or if you're just new to jazz piano skills, I want to personally invite you to become a jazz piano skills member. Your membership grants you access to the premium content not only for this podcast episode, but for every weekly podcast episode. And premium content will without doubt, help you thoroughly and correctly discover, learn and play the jazz standard we are currently exploring and right and so much more. For example, as a jazz panel skills man

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verb you can access the past the current, and of course the future educational weekly podcast packets. These are the illustrations, the lease sheets and the play alongs are backing tracks that I designed and developed to help you get the most out of each weekly jazz piano skills podcast episode. You also as the jazz panel skills member have access to a self paced and sequential jazz piano curriculum which is loaded with comprehensive courses, all the courses containing educational talks, interactive learning media, video demonstrations, and so much more. You also have a reserved seat in my online weekly masterclass, which is held every Thursday evening. Now if you can't attend, no problem master classes are recorded, which allows you to watch the video and rewatch the video of the class whenever and as often as you wish. You also as a jazz panel skills member have access to an online interactive Fakebook containing must know jazz standards, all of them with excellent chord changes, chord scale relationships mapped out for you harmonic function analysis, listening suggestions and historical insights. As a jazz panel skills member, you can hang out with old friends and make some new jazz friends in the online private jazz panel skills community, which hosts a variety of engaging forums. And finally, your jazz panel skills membership grants you unlimited private, personal and professional educational support whenever and as often as you need it. All of these amazing privileges are waiting to help you discover learn play jazz piano. So check it all out at jazz panel skills.com. And of course become a member to enjoy premium podcast content, and all of the other perks and privileges that I just mentioned. Of course, if you get to the site and you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact me. I'm always happy to spend some time with you answer any questions that you may have, and help you in any way that I can. Okay, on to the question of the week and this week's question comes from Mark Shekar. Mark Shekar living in Johannesburg, South South Africa. Wow. So Mark writes, I recently started studying jazz piano and I am for the most part enjoying the journey. That's fantastic mark. However, I must admit that I get confused when reading chord changes. Is it me? Or are there multiple ways to notate chords? Can you offer any insight or tips that will help me decipher and keep straight? In my mind how chord types are written? I know this is probably probably an elementary question, but I want to make sure I am reading chord symbols correctly. Mark gotta tell you man, I could not agree with you more chord notation in the jazz world. It's a mess. And your hunch is 100% Spot on. There are indeed multiple ways in which you will see chords written especially like major, minor and half diminished chords. Okay, so first things first, I want to point you to a document published by Jamie Ebersole. And Jamie has been publishing this document for years decades. And it is dedicated to this very cause helping you as you put it decipher the various ways you will encounter chord notation. So if you do a Google search for jazz nomenclature, Jamie aber saw Jamie is J M UI. A result is a E, B e r s o l d jazz nomenclature, Jamie aimersoft. You will be led to a PDF file that you can download, print and keep on your piano. In fact, I think it will probably probably pop up number one in search, if not in the top three for sure. Now Jamie does an outstanding job outlining all of the various chord symbols. So be sure to add this document to your jazz education library. I promise you, you are going to want to keep this handy mark as you're getting acclimated to all the various ways jazz musicians use to notate chords. Now, with that being said, let me explain how chord nomenclature is

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supposed to work

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every chords every chord symbol, right? Well, let me say it this way every chord notation should comprise of a letter, followed by a symbol, followed by a number. Again, a letter, followed by a symbol, followed by a number. So, for example, the C minor sound would be notated using the letter C, right, followed by a symbol, typically the minus sign, followed by a number, like seven 911, or 13. Alright, so C minor seven, C minor, nine, so forth. Now, if you encounter a letters, and a symbol, like C, minus sign C minor, with no with no number, right, with no number, it just simply telling you to play that sound as a triad as a three note chord.

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Now mark, the most common symbol, let's go through this

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by sound right, so the most common

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notation for the major sound is a triangle or delta sign. So see, triangle Delta sign, seven or nine, right? And so forth. For minor for minor chords, the minus sign, right, so c minus sign seven or nine,

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and so on, for half diminished, typically a circle with a diagonal line going through it. And for diminished, just simply a circle, no diagonal line, right. So for major triangle, Delta sign, for minor, the minus sign, half diminished circle with a diagonal line, diminished sound, just a circle, no diagonal line, right? Now, the dominant sound is always a letter followed by a number. So no symbol, which in this case, I guess, is a symbol, so no symbol is a symbol. So you'll see something like C seven, or C nine says implying the dominant sound. The only exception to this, of course, is like if you see a C six notation, right, which implies a major sound, you feel crazy, this gives.

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Mark, I feel you're vain, right. So this is why you want to get this Jamie aber saw document to kind of help you sift through all of this, right. So once you download his document, right, you'll see that he's done a pretty exhaustive job here, for instance, like major, you'll see that he has the C with the C delta sign, and then he has various ways that you may may see it like C, you might see ma J for major or M A for major right? For the minus for the minor sign, you might see see, am I or C m i n, right in you'll see on the document the various how he outlines, and he puts a square around the notation that that is the most common, the most common. Like for instance, the C half diminished, he has a square around the C with a circle and a line through it. It's kind of old school notation. That's how I grew up learning the half diminish. But, but you'll also see it and hasn't notated here is the C minor seven, flat five, which, honestly, that's even becoming more common today, then the circle with a line through it. Okay. So anyway, Mark, it's a great question. And, again, you're not alone. I think everybody wrestles with this when they first start studying jazz. Unfortunately, there's not just one standard way in which all jazz musicians across the globe uses Right. So there's not a standard way, there's various ways to notate the sounds. So that's why I point you to the Jamie aber saw document which I think is a great place to start to help you sort everything out in your mind and get familiar with this nomenclature. Okay. So get that document, download it, print it out, keep it on your piano, keep it handy. And of course, if you have any additional questions or further clarification is needed, please do not hesitate to contact me. I'm happy to help you with this with this jungle of notation, so feel free to reach out. Okay.

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All right. So let's discover learn to play jazz pan. Let's discover learn and play. Days of Wine and Roses. Part two. All right, part two a melodic analysis. Last week last week, I presented my outline, in fact to do it every week.

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That's just last week. Last week and again

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and write about my I present my study my outline for studying learning any tool and again, genre makes no difference, right? It doesn't matter whether it's jazz, rock, pop, country folk, r&b, whatever, right?

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I use the same process. Alright, number one, I listened, I listened to various artists perform the piece number two I did, I determine the form A Ba, ba, B. So on. Number three, I attack the chords, like learn the chord changes and voicings, I like to focus on common harmonic progressions within within the chords right like the 251145, and so on. Then I'll turn my attention to melody, like we're going to do today, right. And then finally, I'll explore various treatments, which we'll do today. And then finally, improvisation which we'll attack next week. So I listen I determined form. Check out the chords, the voicings I learned melody, explore various treatments with that melody, and then turn my attention to improvisation. That's it. That's my outline, I use it for every tone, nothing more, nothing less. I tried to keep it very concise, very simple, very strategic, right. Last week, we focused on gaining harmonic familiarity and command of days of Wine and Roses. So what what did we do we listen, we determined to form we explored, the chord changes the harmonic function and the voices of voice scenes for days of Wine and Roses. This week, we turn our attention to a melodic analysis, our goal, right, as always, keep things clean, keep things tidy with our approach, and it makes no difference again, whether it's a skill that we are studying, or tune, makes no difference. Our conceptual understanding of all that we do, musically, of everything that we do musically, must be structured and simple so that it can be replicated over and over again. Right. And y'all can attest to the fact that I say it many times, and I've said it many times over the past four years. If your conceptual understanding of music, or any musical skill is not structured, is not simple,

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then it's going to be unorganized and confusing. And if it's unorganized and confusing conceptually upstairs, you have no shot of executing it in your hands on the piano downstairs. That's just the brutal fact. Right? Musics got to become simple, conceptually if you hope to have success with it physically. Therefore, I try very hard to keep our tune steady, very organized, very structured, very simple, and replicatable from month to month.

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So our educational agenda for today is as follows number one, we are going to begin part two of our

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examination of days of Wine and Roses, which is a melodic analysis. Number two, we are going to listen to a definitive definitive recording of days of Wine and Roses. Number three, we will analyze the melody of days of Wine and Roses. Take a look at diatonic versus non diatonic right.

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movement within the song and which by the way, with all these standards, we find out that most of them are what diatonic number four we will discuss the melodic fingerings for days of Wine and Roses. We will discover learn and play the melodic phrases of days Wine and Roses. We will discover learn and play melodic target notes of days of wine roses, we would discover learn and play melody with voicings for days of Wine and Roses. And of course, last but not least, we will take a look at three different treatments of days of Wine and Roses. So Wow.

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Big agenda, big agenda a lot to get done. So if you are a jazz piano skills member, I want you to take just a few minutes right now hit the pause button. I want you to download and print your podcast packets, the illustrations, the lead sheets in the play alongs. And again, your membership grants you access to the premium content for every weekly podcast episode, which includes the educational podcast packets that I mentioned that every week, you should have these pockets in your hands when listening to this episode to get the very most out of it. And of course you should have this material sitting on your piano at home when practicing as well. So if you are listening to this podcast on any of the popular podcast directories such as Apple or Google, Spotify, iHeartRadio, Amazon, Pandora, the list goes on and on then go directly to jazz piano skills podcast.com

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and you will find the active download links for each podcast packets in the show notes or you can log into your jazz piano skills account. And from your Dashboard, navigate to this episode where you will find one convenient link to download all three podcast packets in one convenient bundle. Okay, so now that you have your podcast packets in your hands, I want you to grab your lead sheets and you should have six lead sheets in your packet right six lead sheets lead sheet one

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provide you a really nice template for learning the melody of days of Wine and Roses using your ears right there's some nice you'll see there we'll go through in a minute but with the guide tones but that's the lead sheet number one template for learning the melody of days of Wine and Roses using our ears and number two lead sheet to provide you with the melody of days of wine Rosa so you can kind of check your work once we sketch out the melody using our ears we can kind of look at it. See how close we are our how our melody interpretation varies from what I present in lead sheet to now lead sheet three provides you with the fingerings that I recommend for for playing the melody of days of Wine and Roses. lead sheet for highlights the phrases that unique phrases within days of Wine and Roses that you should isolate and study and practice. lead sheet five illuminates the target notes use for melodic and you'll use next week it for with improvisation development for improvisation development as well. And finally lead sheet six combines the melody, the voicings that we took a look at last week in the in your podcast packet, my suggested voicings we have the melody combined with those voicings in lead sheet six. So no question about it right some invaluable tools to discover learn and play today. Right. So like I said, we got a lot to get done. So let's get busy. Okay, so what is the very first thing we do? When studying and learning attune?

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We did it last week. We're going to do it again. Today. We were going to do it next week to in fact we should always be doing it. Always. I stress last week that listening to various renditions of a tune is not only the first but I believe the most important step. I can't even imagine it's beyond my comprehension to think about learning a tune attempting to learn a tune before spending time becoming familiar with it, absorbing it, listening the various artists performing. Now I typically listen to vocal renditions like we did last week. I typically turn to the vocalist first. Right and fall I follow that up with instrumentalist and then follow that up with pianists. Right So bottom line, I listened. And that is what we're going to do right now before going any further now last week, we checked out Sinatra, Frank Sinatra with the Nelson Riddle orchestra, a vocal rendition of days of Wine and Roses. This week, we turn our attention to an instrumental rendition and I have selected for this week ask the Oscar Peterson trio. I wanted to use Dexter Gordon, and I'd recommend you checking out that version. But quite it was just too long.

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Just too long, so I chose Oscar. I know he's a pianist. But that's alright. I kind of favorite pianists. So I chose Oscar Peterson. Playing with Ray Brown of course on bass and Ed Thigpen on drums. What in my opinion, one of the best jazz piano trios ever. So I want you to grab your favorite beverage. I want you to sit back and enjoy the best of the best. The Oscar Peterson trio playing days of Wine and Roses. 1964 Here we go. Enjoy.

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The best of the best, no doubt about it. Now with all recordings, right, I encourage you to listen to it over and over and over again. And every time you do, right, I guarantee it every time you do, you're going to hear something new. And in doing so, it will have a profound impact on the development of your treatment of the two, I promise. So now let's explore those lead sheets right grab lead sheet one, and let's discover learn how to properly begin learning the melody of days of Wine and Roses using our ears. In fact, I want you to grab lead sheets, one, two, and three. I want you to think of them as a group. I want you to think of lead sheet four and five as a group, and then lead sheet six as its own group. Okay, so lead sheets one and one, two, and three is all about melodic excavation with guides which I call Discover.

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lead sheets for foreign five phrases and targets, learn and then lead sheet six, our melody with our voicings, treatments and tempos play, right so these lead sheets, there's six of them, but you can kind of snap them apart break them apart with the discovered learn and play mentality. So lead sheets one, two, and three. So let's start there lead sheet one, you will see that I have melodic guide tones map.

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Thank you for listening to jazz piano skills. The remaining premium content of this episode is available to jazz piano skills members at jazz piano skills podcast.com Visit jazz piano skills.com To learn more about membership privileges, and become a jazz piano skills member. Thank you.