These Foolish Things, Harmonic 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, January and there will never be another you history. February, back home again in Indiana over now, we're in March, and about to discover, learn and play one of my favorite ballads of all time, the 1935 gem these foolish things. Whenever you have a great melody, paired with awesome chord changes, supporting beautiful lyrics, you have a musical masterpiece. And that is exactly what we have with the tune these foolish things. Timeless melody, harmony, and lyrics. This is gonna be a great month. Today we start with a harmonic analysis of these foolish things. Take a look at the form chord changes, harmonic function common progressions, and of course voicings, which we will follow up with a melodic analysis next week, which will involve learning the melody of these foolish things by ear of course, plus fingerings and various treatments, we then enjoy the grand finale, week three focusing on improvisation development, using various zones, patterns, motifs, and of course, tension. As always, our three week exploration is a process a systematic approach to discovering, learning and playing a tune. As all of you know, who have been faithful jazz panel skills listeners, we are taking all of those essential jazz piano skills that we have studied over the past four plus years, and now applying them to tunes all of our chord work, voicing study, scales, arpeggios, improvisational approaches, and so much more right that we have taken a look at look at over the past four plus years. All of that is now being put into action. All of our grunt work as I like to say that we've done better that's necessary for developing our musicianship and is necessary for legitimately learning how to play tunes is going to finally pay off. Right, I love it. Now, if you haven't been a faithful listener for the past four plus years, no worries, I have stressed this since the beginning of the year, that the tune study we are doing. And the process we have implemented will actually help you sift through and prioritize the last four years of podcast episodes, so that you can begin maximizing your jazz piano skills immediately. So as mentioned last month, it makes no difference. Whether you are a jazz panel skills veteran, or a jazz panel skills, rookie, you are in the right place the right time to begin a jazz panel journey that will profoundly impact your understanding of music and of course, your jazz piano playing. I'm thrilled and I hope you are too because having established a systematic approach to tune study means that we now have an assembly line that we can use over and over each and every month with every new tune that we tackle. This means our learning process will only get faster. Now that's exciting. Right? It's liberating. So today we begin our harmonic analysis of these foolish things. Today, you're going to discover that beautiful classic standard from 1935. These foolish things you're going to learn the form core changes harmonic function for these foolish things. And you're going to play these foolish things using my suggested voicings plus common harmonic progressions for ear training development. So as I always like to say Regardless of where you are in your jazz journey, a beginner an intermediate player, an advanced player, or even if you're a seasoned and experienced professional, you're gonna find this jazz panel skills podcast lesson exploring these foolish things. Very beneficial. But before we get started, I want to as I always do welcome first time listeners to jazz piano skills. If you are a new listener to jazz panel skills, jazz panel skills podcast, then welcome I want to invite you to become a jazz piano skills member. Your membership will grant you access to the premium content for this podcast episode, and for every weekly podcast episode. Now premium content helps you thoroughly and correctly discover learn and play the jazz standard we are currently exploring. And as the old saying goes so much more. For example, as a jazz panel skills member, you can access the past the current and future educational weekly podcast packets. These are the illustrations, the lead sheets, the play alongs the backing tracks if you will, that I designed and develop to help you get the most out of each weekly jazz panel skills podcast episode. You also 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, there are video demonstrations of the jazz panel skills and all 12 keys and so much more. You also as a jazz panel skills member have a reserved seat and my online weekly masterclass, which is held every Thursday evening. And if you can't attend no problem master classes are recorded. And you can watch and rewatch the class whenever and as often as you wish. You can also access an online interactive Fakebook containing must know jazz standards with excellent chord changes chord scale relationships, harmonic function analysis, listening suggestions and historical insights. As a jazz panel skills member, you also have access to the online private jazz piano skills community, which hosts a variety of engaging forms a great place to hang out with old jazz friends and meet some new ones as well. And finally, as a jazz panel skills member you have unlimited, private, personal and professional educational support whenever and as often as you need it. I'll hold these amazing privileges are waiting to help you discover learn to play jazz panels. So when you have a moment, 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 privileges that I just mentioned. Of course, if you have any questions once you get to the site, you have some questions, please do not hesitate to contact me. I'm always happy to spend some time with you and answer any questions that you may have. All right on to the question of the week. This week's question comes from Henrietta Rix, living in Oklahoma City. And Henrietta asks Dr. Lawrence, in many of your podcast episodes and courses, you stress the importance of understanding that jazz is the study of shapes and sounds. I have found this to be very beneficial when it comes to the development of my improvisation skills. I know there are various shapes for each musical sound, but I find myself always working off of the same shape. For any given sound. Is this normal? And how can I begin to break this habit? And begin incorporating a variety of shapes for each sound? Wow, fantastic. Question, Henrietta. And, yes, it's normal to adopt a single shape for each musical sound when beginning to learn how to improvise. So no, no worries. Great news. Your normal. Okay. First of all, really, in all seriousness, congratulations, you're improvising. This is a huge step in your jazz development and you should be thrilled. You know, the fact that you have at least a single shape under your fingers that you associate with each of the major dominant minor half diminished and diminished chords. It's huge. It's very huge. After all, you have to be Again, with one shape, right, you got to have one, you have to have comfort with at least one shape that you associate with the sound so that you can practice creativity. And you will remain partial to that initial shape for quite some time. Again, this is normal, the best way to begin to slowly incorporate additional shapes for any given sound

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is to begin by isolating that sound when practicing. In other words, if, if I want to begin using additional shapes, for a C minor sound, then I should isolate the C minor sound. So I can begin to intentionally practice the various shapes of that sound. Now, as you know, or may not know, there are 16 shapes 16 For note shapes, for any given sound. And I know that you know this, but I'm going to say it anyway. You cannot practice all of those shapes in a single practice session. Honestly, any attempt to do so will be 100%. counter productive. It's just too much information to try to ascertain process and play simultaneously in a single practice session. And this is precisely why I always preach that you should have one practice objective for each practice session. Let me say that again, you should always have one practice objective for each practice session. So what I like to do to start my day is to pick a sound, major dominant minor, half diminished, diminished, then pick a chord to use for that sound. And then select a shape. Again, right, very clean, very tidy. Sound chord shape Henryetta just be sure to pick a shape that is not your go to shape for that sound and chord right. So once I have determined my sound, my chord, my shape, I use an application like a real pro or band in the box. To create a play along track a backing track that isolates the chord because I want to explore the sound the chord the shape in time. I'll establish a nice comfy groove, nice comfy tempo, and then begin to practice creativity. See, in order to practice creativity, you have to limit your options. Again, to practice creativity, you have to limit your options. One sound, one chord, one shape. That's it. Remember, creativity does not come from abundance. It comes from limitations. One sound, one chord, one shape. Heck, I even like to place more limitations upon myself by limiting the formation of my melodic ideas to using only the four notes of my shape, no scale tones no approach tones no tension tones. Limitation is the key to spawning musical creativity. Henrietta if you begin to do intentional isolation practice with self imposed limitations, you will begin to slowly associate new shapes, new melodic ideas with each of the chords you are focusing on when practicing your improvisation vocabulary will begin to grow. Now I hope this helps and if you have any additional questions or further clarification is needed. Please do not hesitate to reach out to me. I'm happy to spend some time with you always. And answer any additional questions that you may have and help you in any way that I can. Great question. Henryetta Okay, so let's discover learn to play jazz piano let's discover, learn and play these foolish things. Okay, quick review. As always, here is my outline for learning any tune the genre makes no difference, right? Doesn't matter whether it's jazz, rock, pop, country folk, r&b, no difference. Here's how I go about learning to tune first. Listen, I listen to various artists, vocalist, instrumentalist, and yes, of course pianist. Number two, I always determine the form of the tune that I'm listening to is a B, A, B, A, B, some unique form, right? Every tune has a form. Number three, I learned the chords, the voicings common harmonic progressions like 2511451625 and so on. Number Number four, I learned melody. Number five, I explore various treatments and improvisation. That's it. That's my outline. I listen, determine form, learn chord voicings, learn melody, explore treatments, improvisation. That's it, nothing more, nothing less. So this week's harmonic analysis will have us listening. Determining form learning chord changes, harmonic function and voicings for these foolish things. Next week, we will focus on melodic analysis and in two weeks, improvisation. As always, we are keeping things very structured, very organized. And like, like I like to say clean and tidy with our discover, learn and play approach. Whether it's a scale study or tune study, right? It makes no difference. Our conceptual understanding of all that we do musically must be structured and simple so that it can be replicated, right over and over. I've said it many times throughout the past four years. If your understanding of music, or any musical skill is not structured, and simple conceptually, then it's 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. Therefore, we keep our tuned study, structured, simple, and replicatable.

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So the educational agenda for today is as follows. Number one, we are going to begin our harmonic analysis, part one, our harmonic analysis to discover, learn and play these foolish things. Number two, we are going to listen to a definitive recording of these foolish things. Number three, we will discuss the form of these foolish things. Number four, we will discover learn and play the chord changes for these foolish things. Number five, we will discover learn and play the harmonic function of these foolish things. And number six, we will discover learn and play my suggested voicings for these foolish things. So if you are a jazz panel skills member, which is take a few minutes right now hit that pause button. I want you to download and print your podcast packets, the illustrations, the lead sheets and the play alongs. Your membership as I mentioned earlier grants you access to premium content for every weekly podcast episode, which of course includes all of the educational podcast packets have mentioned that every week you should have these podcast packets in your hands when listening to this episode to get the most out of it. And of course you should have these podcast packets sitting on your piano when practicing. Okay, 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 lead sheet packet. Let's go through them quickly lead sheet number one diagrams the form of these foolish things. lead sheet number two identifies unique chord changes the chords that are found within these foolish things. lead sheet three gives you the core changes just classic lead sheet with chord changes for these foolish things. lead sheet four provides you the harmonic function analysis for these foolish things. And lead sheet five highlights five calm And progressions that we will use for ear training purposes these progressions are found in standard after Standard after standard. In fact, they were found in there will never be another you that we studied in January. They are found in Indiana that we studied in February. Wow, we have a winner and then lead sheet six, I almost forgot lead sheet six, gives you my suggested voicings for these frivolous things. Okay, so, yes, we have a ton to do today. A ton to get through. So let's get busy. What is the first thing that we should do? Always when studying and learning a tune? I hope you're all saying listen to it. Because without question, listening to various renditions of the tune is not only the first, but I believe the most important step. I can't even imagine attempting to learn a tune before spending time becoming familiar with it. Alright, absorbing it. I like listening to different artists perform the tune and typically, as I have mentioned in the past, I turned a vocalist first. Because vocalist typically remain true to the original melody. Right? Especially vocalists like Sinatra, Nat King Cole, Nancy Wilson, right. And heck, if I really want if I really want a really straight version of the melody. I've mentioned before that I'll check out people like Andy Williams, Doris Day, Perry Como Sammy Davis, Jr. to mention a few. Right. I'll turn my attention the instrumentalists next, like horn players. Some of my favorite being Chet Baker, cannonball. atherley. Clark, Terry Coleman Hawkins, Lester Young. Right. And then last, but certainly not least, I check out pianist, as many pianist as possible. The bottom line is I listen. And that's what we're going to do right now. Before going any further. But I gotta be honest with you, selecting the recording to listen to, for this town, these foolish things so very difficult, because there are so many to choose from. And I'm talking about just the vocal renditions, right? So many to choose from. You have got to check out Nat King Cole singing these foolish things. Simply amazing. And there, of course, is Sarah Vaughn, l Fitzgerald, Carmen McRae and the list goes on. So do your homework. Do your search. Find various vocalist singing these foolish things? Right. But considering that these foolish things, is one of my all time favorite ballots, I thought it best that I choose one of my all time favorite vocalist, singing that vocalist is the one and only Johnny Hartman. So grab your coffee or favorite beverage get comfy. Sit back. Enjoy this masterpiece composition and masterpiece performance doesn't get any better than this. Enjoy

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Johnny Hartman's recording of "These Foolish Things"

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I have heard this recording a million times. And can I honestly say every time I am moved musically and emotionally, what a voice a voice from heaven. I encourage you to spend time checking out the abundance of vocal renditions, some that I mentioned just a few minutes ago. This was a beautiful standard. No doubt about it. And of course, every rendition will help you absorb the harmony, the melody and the lyrics of this must know too. So now that we know how this tune goes, let's explore those lead sheets. So grab the cheap one. Let's like let's take a look at the form of these foolish things, which is a standard

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