Jazz Improvisation Exercises, Eb Sounds

Dr. Bob Lawrence  0:32  
Welcome to jazz piano skills. I'm Dr. Bob Lawrence. It's time to discover, learn and play jazz piano. Well, the last two weeks have been a blast. What a thrill to have Dr. JB dice from the Herbie Hancock Institute. Join us. For a couple of incredibly insightful interviews, I cannot encourage you enough to take the time to visit his site. He has some invaluable educational resources that you should have in your personal library. But now, it's time to get back to work. April is underway. And it's time to begin exploring our improvisation patterns and fingerings. For a new set of major dominant minor, half diminished and diminished sounds. Last month we tackled the B flat sounds. So this month, we are on to the E flat sounds. And that's right. Regardless of where you are in the process of mastering B flat. We are going to intentionally create forward motion by moving on to E flat so that we can rush our jazz piano playing development. Did you catch that? We want to rush our jazz piano playing development. Nothing causes development, stagnation, more than staying put in one location until we think we have it down. Which by the way, never truly happens. I mentioned this last month and I want to say it again today. professional jazz pianists always think they need to improve their playing in every conceivable way possible and are constantly thinking about the various skills they are focusing on and how to use them in such a way that creates forward motion so that they continue to improve. Professional pianists do not stay put in any one key. So today we are going to discover essential jazz improvisation exercises. We are going to learn developmental arpeggio and scale patterns of E flat sounds. And we're going to play five arpeggio and scale patterns focusing on fingerings and articulation for the primary E flat sounds of music major, dominant minor, half diminished, and diminished. So as I always like to say regardless of where you are in your jazz journey, a beginner and intermediate player, an advanced player or even if you consider yourself a seasoned and experienced professional, you will find this jazz panel skills podcast lesson exploring jazz improvisation exercises for E flat sounds to be very beneficial. If you are a new listener to the jazz piano skills podcast if you are new to jazz piano skills, I want to invite you to become a jazz piano skills member. And now there are several membership plans to choose from so check out jazz piano skills to learn more about all of the perks for each membership plan. Educational weekly podcast packets sequential jazz piano curriculum loaded with comprehensive courses online weekly master classes online interactive Fakebook private jazz piano skills community hosting a variety of engaging forums, and of course, unlimited, private, personal and professional educational support. All of these benefits all of these perks are waiting to help you discover, learn and play jazz piano. So check it all out at jazz panel skills.com and become a member. If you have any questions about any of the educational perks or the various membership plans, please let me know. I'm always happy to spend some time with you answer any questions that you may have, and of course help you in any way that I can. Okay, on to the question of the week. This week's question actually kind of a statement comes From Richard Kelman residing in the Caribbean, I'm so jealous. Richard emailed me a few weeks ago. And he made this wonderful observation. Here's what Richard said. In your interview with Brent Valastro. From learn jazz standards, I had hoped you would have explored the difference between your concepts of the role of jazz standards in jazz education. I understand him deeply, believing that digging into jazz standards is the way to learn. On the other hand, I have heard you opine that no jazz standard was ever written to teach jazz. It would have been interesting to listen to you two, together explore these different concepts. Wow, fantastic insight, Richard. And I wish I would have have dressed this with Brent, believe me the next time Brent is a guest. On jazz panel skills, I will ensure we unpack this apparent contradiction. And I'm sure you are not the only one thinking. These two guys are teaching approaches to learn jazz that oppose each other. No doubt about it. It certainly appears to be the case. But we are actually believe it or not saying the same thing but coming at it from different perspectives. Let me take a few minutes right now to expound. I often tell students tunes are hidden in the skills and the skills are unveiled in the tones. In other words, you should be able to see tunes in the skills you are practicing. And likewise, you should be able to determine the skills needed to play any tune. The bottom line skills and tunes go hand in hand. It's really not an either or proposition. You need an exploration plan that you consistently execute for both for both towns and for skills. Now, with that being said, if you are under the impression or have been given the impression, all you have to do to learn how to play jazz is play tunes, play standards. Then, if this is your impression, then you've been misled. In fact, here are some things you will not learn by just playing tunes. Using lead sheets, especially lead sheets, with the melodies included. You will not learn voicings you will not learn scales, you will not learn arpeggios, you will not learn harmonic function, you will not develop essential ear training. Both harmonically and melodically you will not learn chord scale relationships you will not learn how to improvise. You will not learn chord substitutions you will not learn regions of sounds and you will not learn treatments of altered sounds. That's just a quick list of the things that you will not learn by just playing tunes. This is why I have often stated that a tune has never been composed with the student in mind. In other words, tunes are not composed to teach you the skills needed to become an accomplished musician. In fact of tunes teach you anything. They teach you where you are mentally and technically musically deficient. And in doing so point you to the skills you need to practice to become more accomplished as a jazz musician.

Dr. Bob Lawrence  9:23  
I know this from personal experience, I spent years playing tunes using lead sheets and never developed the essential skills that I just rattled off. As a result, I never got better. And I had difficulty retaining tunes. Because everything I was attempting to do was dependent upon rote memory without any understanding of the essential information lying beneath the surface of the chord changes and melody that Essential Information can only be assimilated, developed and utilized through skill practice. So, yes, tunes are hidden in the skills and the skills are unveiled in the tunes. But never make the mistake of thinking that playing tunes without intentional skill practice will help you achieve your goal of becoming an accomplished jazz musician. The brutal fact is tune playing without skill practice will never get the job done. All right. I hope that clears up any confusion over the tunes skill dilemma. And as always, if further clarification is needed, let me know please feel free to reach out to me. Again, I'm always happy to help. Spend some time with you answer any of your questions and provide you greater detail if needed. Okay, I want to talk briefly about today's lesson rationale. Poor fingering

Dr. Bob Lawrence  11:10  
poor fingering without question based on decades of teaching experience. Poor fingering is the number one reason people have difficulty playing the piano. Quite simply, it is a lack of hand finger mobility, a type of hand paralysis that makes it difficult for students to generate melodic lines. Now scale and arpeggio practice is, of course a great way to begin developing hand mobility however, melodies do not just simply ascend and descend in straight lines. Therefore, it is important to begin practicing melodic patterns like the ones we have been exploring since the start of the year, that challenge us to begin shifting our hands across the keys. To practicing intentional shifting, begins to simulate a musical reality. That pianist must address this musical reality, the need to always have fingers available, allowing us to move in either direction, up or down. This musical reality must be practiced in such a way that it develops proper musical instincts and muscle memory, musical instincts and muscle memory that allows us to properly articulate melodies so that they sound idiomatic to jazz. This is precisely why the melodic patterns that we are exploring today, focus on intentionally creating hand shifts within a melodic line, even if it is possible to play the melodic line with no hand shift at all. The objective is to begin establishing and developing hand finger mobility. And in fact, some of the fingerings I have notated in the lead sheets include multiple hand shifts, within a one measure melodic idea. So throughout this year, we are devoting our effort to exploring all five primary sounds of music for all 12 notes using arpeggio and scale improvisational exercises that will force us to deal with fingerings to develop hand mobility. We are also utilizing the same approach to explore the altered sounds of music, flat nine sharp nine sharp 11, flat five sharp five flat 13. Each month, we focus on one of the 12 notes. January it was see February F March B flat and now the month of April, we're going to tackle E flat one week of the month will be devoted to the primary sounds and one week of the month will be devoted to the altered sounds. We then of course followed up with a bebop tune to help us apply our new fingerings and articulation to a musical setting. So the educational agenda for today is as follows. Number one, we begin our jazz improvisation exercises for E flat sounds. Number two, we play essential arpeggio patterns that you need to discover learn and play from the root to the 13th of the sound and using various entry points. Number three, we will play essential scale patterns that you need to discover, learn and play again from the root to the 13th of the sound, and again, using various entry points. Number four, I will be playing all jazz improvisation exercises today using the dominant sound. Of course, you're going to play these exercises not only for dominant, but for major, minor half diminished and diminished as well. And number five, I will be playing all jazz improvisation exercises today using our traditional swing groove at a nice comfortable tempo of 110. Now, if you are a jazz piano skills member, I want you to take a few minutes right now hit the pause button. And I want you to access download and print your podcast packets, the illustrations, the lead sheets, the play logs, and again your membership grants you access to all the educational podcast packets for every weekly podcast episode. As I mentioned every week, you should have these packets in front of you when listening to the episode. And of course, you should have these packets sitting on your piano when practicing as well. Now if you are listening to this podcast on any of the popular podcast directories such as Apple or Google, Amazon, Spotify, iHeartRadio, Pandora, the list goes on and on. Then be sure to go directly to jazz piano skills. podcast.com That's jazz piano skills podcast.com. Once you're there, you'll be able to access download your podcast packets, you'll find the download links in the show notes. One final, but very important message before we dig in. If you are listening, and you are thinking that the jazz improvisation exercises for E flat sounds, that that we are about to discover, learn and play. If you are thinking that these various skills are over your head, then I would say to you please No worries. Continue to listen, continue to grow your jazz piano skills intellectually by listening, right? That's all you have to do. Listen, every new skill. Keep this in mind every new skill is technically over our heads when first introduced, but this is how we get better. Right? We place ourselves smack dab in the middle of conversations where we have absolutely no idea what people are talking about. We're hearing things that we've never heard before. We're hearing words that we've never heard before. But this is how we grow intellectually. I say it all the time all musical growth begins upstairs mentally or conceptually before it can come out downstairs physically in your hands. So sit back, relax, listen to this podcast. Listen now to discover and learn. The play, as it always does, will come in time, I guarantee it. Okay, now that you have your lead sheets packet downloaded and printed in your hands, I want to point out a few things, you will see that lead sheets one through five deal with arpeggio motion Wow Lee sheets six through 10. Deal with scale motion. Now you'll also notice that the jazz improvisation exercises are the same for all five primary sounds major dominant minor, half diminished and diminished. The exercises are of course, modified to reflect the proper sound and therefore the fingerings change as well. You will also notice that the fingerings are included for every single note of every single exercise for every single sound. Now of course you can there is, as always there some modification to the fingerings that you can feel free to to do right but, but be careful. Remember, fingerings are what allow us to play with proper jazz articulation and we want intentional hand shifts built into our fingers. So if you change the fingerings to remove the hand shifts, you're actually working against the very objective that we have set in place. So again, you may be inclined to change fingering because it feels more comfortable or is easier. However, as I said Before you're easier actually may end up making it harder for you in the long run, and make it harder for you to play with a proper jazz articulation. So when you go to make a modification, just be very careful. Okay? All right. So let's dig in, I want you to grab lead sheet two. And I want you to grab the lead sheet seven, pull them out of your packet lead sheet today, the dominant sound arpeggio motion, lead sheet, seven dominant sound, scale motion or scale patterns, right. And, of course, again, your you are going to play these patterns for all five sounds major dominant minor, half diminished, diminished.

Dr. Bob Lawrence  20:49  
But for the sake of time, in this podcast, I'm isolating one sound and modeling everything using the dominant sound today, you will use these same patterns to play for all five of the primary sounds. So we'll start with lead sheet two, skill two. And look at pattern A, this is just straight arpeggio motion for entry points, the entry point of the root of the E flat dominant sound entry point of the third of the E flat dominant sound entry point of the fifth of the E flat dominant sound. And then of course, entry point of the seventh E flat dominant sound. Okay. And you will also notice looking at the fingerings there, you will see that each one of these four note arpeggios has a hand shift intentionally built into the arpeggio. So don't change the fingerings to remove the hand shift, right, this is the whole point, right? So if you see like pattern one there, off the root entry, you have a 2124 fingering. Off the third entry, we have a 1313 fingering, and so on. So let's bring the ensemble in. And let's just listen to straight arpeggio motion from the root to the seventh, from the third to the ninth, from the fifth to the 11th and from the seventh to the 13th covering the entire sound using an intentional hand shift on each arpeggio All right, so let's bring the ensemble in let's check it out here we go.

Dr. Bob Lawrence  23:59  
Nice right, you know I mentioned all the temples today will be 110 and 110. I mentioned it earlier as a comfy comfy temple. And in reality, it's kind of a snappy tempo. So, again, I'm playing at 110 Really, for the sake of time in the podcast here today. But I would as I always encourage you to do start at slower tempos, right, literally 60 7080 slower tempos to really digest the fingerings and to get used to the hand shifting with in each of these patterns, okay. All right. So now let's look at letter B pattern to arpeggio motion again. Same entry points, the root, the third, the fifth, the seventh and the seventh, exploring the entire sound from the root all the way to the 13th of the sound. And again in tensional fingerings intentional hand shifts built into each of the fingerings. Now, the arpeggiated pattern has a little bit more of a shape to it, we're just not using a four note arpeggio, as you can see, and so it gets a little bit more involved. So let's bring the ensemble in same process, same format, same approach, same intentional hand shifting, built into each of the fingerings. So let's check it out, see what we think here we go.

Dr. Bob Lawrence  27:02  
As I'm playing each of these patterns today. Regardless of the entry point, I want my articulation I want the the presentation of the melodic line to feel and sound the same regardless of my entry point. Regardless of whether I'm entering the sound from the root, the third, the fifth, and the seventh, good fingerings good fingerings allow me to move allow me to shift my hand in such a way that I am capable of retaining the proper jazz articulation for each one of these melodic lines, regardless of the entry point. Okay, so now let's look at letter C. Okay, one thing I want to point out, that's not a typo. It's not a misprint, I am actually starting each of these patterns. Or I should say, that route entry, the very first pattern, very first line on E flat, I am starting with my thumb, that is not a typo, we need to get used to that I know the the golden rule in music is, especially with classical background and classical training, that you've been taught to avoid that thumb on a black note starting, you know, when you play your scales, starting any scale, like a D flat, E flat, G flat, A flat B flat scales to never start with your thumb, I get it. Right, I was taught the same thing. It's not always the case, especially when playing jazz. So here in letter C, you'll see that I start with the thumb on my E flat. Check it out. I'm starting with the thumb on the B flat on the fifth entry, I'm starting with the thumb on the D flat which is the seventh entry. Okay, again, the the objective here is to get the hand shifting and moving. So let's bring our sample in and let's listen to pattern. See. Okay, here we go. Check it out.

Dr. Bob Lawrence  30:39  
Okay, now we're on to letter D. And we have our eighth note triplets, the melodic line gets a little longer, it fills up the entire measure. Now from count one all the way through count four, we're dealing with eighth note triplets, right on counts, one, two, and three. Again, pay careful attention to the fingerings. Some of these patterns have more than one hand shift. So be aware of that. And once again, if you do modify the fingerings in any way, do not modify them in a way that removes the hand shifts. Okay, that's the objective of what we're trying to accomplish here today. So let's bring the ensemble in, we're going to play this melodic idea again from the root from the third from the fifth from the seventh of the sound, so that we explore the entire sound from the root through the 13th. So here we go. Let's have some fun and check it out here we go.

Dr. Bob Lawrence  33:12  
eighth note triplets can be tricky, but with the right fingerings they become very, very fun and very, very manageable. So if, if you're struggling with the eighth note triplet right now, just be patient, slow that tempo down. Take it in a nice relaxed, comfortable tempo. Get the fingerings under Get the fingerings under your fingers. get cut, but I'm saying get comfortable, right muscle memory, right we want muscle memory then begin increasing the tempo. Alright, so letter E, we're back to eighth note movement are going to cross over the bar line for entire measure. First measure into measure to Okay and again, utilizing the same format with a Root Entry third, fifth and seventh. All right, pay careful attention to our fingerings multiple hand shifts going going on in each of these patterns. So let's check it out.

Dr. Bob Lawrence  35:45  
All right, so that concludes our arpeggio workout, right, we have five patterns using all arpeggio motion, ascending from the root, the third, the fifth and the seventh of the sound, so that we're covering the entire sound from the root to the 13th. Each pattern again, has an intentional hand shift or hand shifts built in to the fingerings. So now we're on to our scale movement. So grab lead sheet seven. lead sheet seven has five melodic ideas laid out for us letter A, B, C, D, and E, using primarily scale motion now, but following the same approach with four entry points from the root from the third from the fifth and the seventh, covering the entire sound from the root to the 13th. And of course, each melodic line has fingerings with intentional handshapes built in, so letter A is pretty straightforward, right? Simple scale motion, ascending scale motion from the root to the seventh, then from the third to the ninth, from the fifth to the 11th, and then from the seventh to the 13th. So let's bring the ensemble in. And let's check it out E flat dominant sound here we go.

Dr. Bob Lawrence  38:42  
All right, on to letter B. Again, primarily scale motion, but notice the very first, the very first beat of each measure starts with it leap, right, an interval leap of a fifth. And you'll notice again, I'm starting with my thumb on the E flat with the Root Entry, my thumb on the B flat fifth entry and my thumb on the D flat the seventh entry. Again, not a typo, it's intentional. So study the fingerings. Pay attention to the hand shifts. We want each melodic line regardless of the entry point to sound the same be articulated and presented in the same way. So here we go. Let's bring the outside Berlin. Let's check it out.

Dr. Bob Lawrence  41:05  
So if we had to deal with the eighth note triplet using arpeggio motion, of course, we're going to have to deal with the eighth note triplet using scale motion. And so check out Letter C, we have eighth note triplets on each beat of the measure, count one count to count three, count four, we end on count one of measure two, so our melodic line is gradually getting longer. Again, our fingerings have intentional hand shifts built in our entry points remain the same from the root to the third to the fifth to the seventh, so that we explore the entire sound. This is so important when you're practicing scales and arpeggios, practicing from various entry points and making sure that you're covering the entire sound. This actively engages your ears and this is very much ear training exercise as well. Okay. So make sure that when you're practicing scales and arpeggios outside of these patterns with your own routines that you are utilizing that you approach it in the same way. Okay. And the other thing that you've heard me mention, if you've been a frequent listener, my entry point, my destination points are never the same. I'm never playing a scale or an arpeggio from the root to the root, or from the third to the third, always a different entry point, always a different exit point. destination point, this is training my ears to listen for very specific sounds and regions of sound. Alright, so enough said let's bring the ensemble and let's listen to letter C and these eighth note triplets here we go.

Dr. Bob Lawrence  44:23  
All right, on to letter D. We are back to eighth notes again. The melodic line continues to get a little longer. Right so now we play the entire measure, measure one and through count one of measure two. Again pay attention to the fingerings we're going to use the same entry points. You might want to mark where those hand shifts are taking place. I've should have mentioned that earlier. It's a great idea on all of these patterns to go on and maybe take a pencil colored pencil or highlighter and mark where The hand shifts are taking place. Okay, so do a little investigative work and it will pay off big time for you. So here we go letter D, let's bring the ensemble Lin and let's check it out here we go.

Dr. Bob Lawrence  46:45  
All right, we are down to our very last exercise or pattern for today letter E for our E flat dominant sound, scale motion from the root from the third from the fifth and the seventh covering the entire sound again from the root to the 13th. You know I keep pounding that home because I really want to drive that in every sound that we play, every sound major dominant minor, half diminished and diminished, has a range from the root to the 13th the entire sound and we always want to practice in a way that we're exploring the entire sound okay, from the root to the 13th. All right, so we have our intentional hand shifts built into our fingerings for our very last scale pattern which extends even further now into measure two. So let's bring the ensemble in and let's listen to our E flat dominant sound letter E here we go.

Dr. Bob Lawrence  49:21  
Wow, wow, well, we've done it again. As always right we've unpacked an enormous amount of information one very short one very fast hour. I always feel like I'm running a marathon to try to get through everything. Even though I played the improvisation exercises they using the dominant sound only. Be sure to practice these exercises for the major minor have to manage the Dominie sounds as well. Right? They are all laid out for you in your lead sheets Pat podcast packet right with the fingerings included I remember, you can make some modifications to the fingerings to best suit your hand. Just be sure that whatever fingerings you choose that you're not intentionally removing the intentional hand shifts, right. That's the whole objective of these exercises to help develop hand in finger mobility, moving the hand across the keyboard, all right. Also make sure that you're playing through each of these patterns using various entry points, like I modeled today from the root from the third from the fifth and the seventh, then remember that the articulation for each musical phrase, which within the sound, regardless of the entry point, should sound the same, and the fingering should allow you to accomplish this goal. Wow, you have a ton to tackle this week. So it's back to business as usual, right. So practice, and use your practice time wisely. Next week, of course, we're going to jump into the jazz improvisation exercises for the E flat, altered dominant sounds. Once again, I want to encourage you, all you jazz panel skills members, I want to encourage you to use those podcast packets, your illustrations, your lead sheets, play alongs to guide you as you study and practice these skills. Right. These are educational tools that will help you gain a mastery of these skills conceptually, physically, and of course musically. And as always, please, please be very patient. Developing mature professional jazz piano skills takes time and begin structuring your improvisation development. After the plane demonstrations I modeled for you today in this podcast episode and I guarantee it you will begin to see feel and hear your progress. Well I hope you have found this jazz panel skills podcast lesson exploring jazz improvisation exercises for the primary E flat sounds to be insightful and of course to be very beneficial. Don't forget if you are a jazz panel skills ensemble member I will see you online Thursday evening at the jazz piano skills masterclass. That will be 8 pm Central time to discuss this podcast episode lesson, exploring the jazz improvisation exercises for the E flat sounds in greater detail. And of course to answer any questions that you may have about the fingerings or that you may have about the study of jazz in general, you can always reach me by phone at 972-380-8050 my extension here at the Dallas School of Music is 211 if you prefer email Dr. Lawrence at jazz piano skills.com That's drlawrence@jazzpianoskills.com. Or you can use the nifty little SpeakPipe widget that is found throughout the jazz piano skills website. Well, there is my cue. That's it for now. And until next week, enjoy the jazz improvisation exercises for the E flat sounds. And most of all, have fun as you discover, learn and play jazz piano!