Tag: 12-bar blues

Piano day (2h)

  • Jazz voicings
    • Recap major 7th, minor 7th and dominant chords voice leading around the cycle (no pauses, at 86bpm)
    • Minor to dominant and back around the cycle
    • Same with dominant to major
    • II — V — I — IV in major & parallel minor
  • Harmonic minor
    • All scales with both hands
  • Improvisation + blues
    • 12-bar major blues in C & F
    • Minor blues scales separately: C, F, Bb, Eb, Ab, Db
    • Transitions
      • Dominant 7ths: 3-7-9 — 7-3-6 in LH, matching minor blues scale in RH (I know, but it sounds awesome!)
      • Minor 7ths: 3-5-7-9 — 7-9-3-5 in LH, matching minor blues scale in RH

Piano day (1h 40m)

  • Jazz voicings
    • Recap major 7th, minor 7th and dominant chords voice leading around the cycle (no pauses, at 86bpm)
    • Recap major to dominant and back around the cycle
  • Improvisation
    • 12-bar major blues in C & F (switching keys without pauses)
      • Shell voicings in LH, Mixo + Hm scales in RH
      • Blues scale in RH
    • Blues scales separately: C, F, Bb, Eb + trying out different fingerings

Piano day (2h 10m)

  • Voicing skills — 1h 20m
    • Quick recap II — V — I — IVs in major + relative minor
    • II — V — I — IV in major + relative minor with embellished chords (m9 — 13 — △9 — △ — m7b5 — 7b9 — m9) — did’t really get through all keys, but boy it was intense anyway
  • Improvisation
    • Minor 12-bar blues in C, F and Bb while using blues, Dorian & Hm scales in RH
  • Harmonic minor
    • Scales with two hands in all keys
    • Harmonising Hm1 in C

Piano day (1h 30m)

  • II — V — Is in major and parallel minor with no pauses in 3-7-9 / 3-7-5 around the circle of 5ths (skill 44 from “Jazz Piano Voicing Skills” book)
  • Recap blues progressions and corresponding scales (Lesson 11 from “Jazz Piano Improvisation for Keyboard Players”)
    • I — IV — V in C
    • 12-bar major blues in C
    • 12-bar minor blues in C-
    • C Blues scale + corresponding Mixo / Dorian / Harmonic Minor scales

Yeah, right hand’s getting better. No skateboarding this week.

Piano day (1h 40m)

  • Improvisation (Dan Haerle — Jazz Improvisation for Keyboard Players)
    • Lesson 11: Blues progressions
      • F blues scale over 3 classic progressions (I — IV — V, 12-bar major and minor), shell voicings with LH
      • F blues scale + passing Mixo, Dor & H. M. scales over same progressions
      • C blues scale + passing modal scales over same progression in C
      • All scales used in progressions separately with both hands in 2 octaves

Observations

Just as I expected: running the scale and then immediately using it is the best way to make this process NOT boring. Just running scales is cool, but it only helps internalise the fingerings and does not really make them just pop out when you need them in the middle of the chord progression.

Bass reading (30m)

Reading a random contrabass etude just because I had some time for it 😄