Tag: cool exercises

Piano day (1h 30m)

(Back to practice after a 3-day travel.)

  • Improvisation
    • Minor blues scale in all keys (over m7 chords in 7-3-5 shells)
    • Major blue scale in all keys over dominant chords in shells
    • Alternating between major and minor blues (sounded like crap)
    • Major Bebop scale in all keys around the cycle of 4ths (tried over major and dominant)
  • Left hand
    • 2-octave stride patterns
      • Progression from “Just One of Those Things” (without right hand)
      • Harmonising C minor with 2-octave jumps (root → 1st inversion with added m6, i. e. 3-6-1)

Next time: harmonise a tune from the Real Book, play to the walking bass & drums track, do some voicings, search for & add technical exercises

Piano day (2h)

  • Improvisation
    • Studies in D Dorian
      • ii — v — i in shells in LH
      • Improvisation with “blanket scale” (D Dorian)
      • Try all chord scales for each degree (Aeolian, Dorian, Phrygian and Hm4 for minor), i. e. E Aeol, E Dor, E Phryg and E Hm4 for E-,  A Aeol, A Dor, A Phryg and A Hm4 for A-, etc.
      • Try keeping same modal color over the whole progression (only Aeol / only Phryg / only Dor)
      • Try mixing with blanket scale (sounded weird but definitely playable)
      • Mix Hm4 with minor blues (only a few notes’ difference)
  • Jazz voicings
    • m7 → 7
    • 7 → maj7
    • 7 → m7
    • Fourthy modal voicings (D Dorian, G Dorian)

Observations

Mixing chord scales with key scale is definitely a wonderful framework for improvisation. I learned it from Rich Brown, as he was combining Aeolian and Phrygian over a minor chord to produce cool chromaticisms. It’s not always guaranteed to get great results, but it definitely helps a lot in terms of expanding your vocabulary. For example, I would’ve never thought of combing minor and harmonic minor mode 4 over a minor chord unless I forced myself to try it (which I did), and it actually sounded AWESOME! So yeah, Hm4 over Dorian ii chord — try it, folks.

Bass day (1h 30m)

  • Chord tones (Phil Mann) — 40m
    • All triads in all inversions around the cycle (70bpm)
    • All 7th chords in all inversions around the cycle (60bpm)
  • Break
  • Functional harmony excercises (derived from Phil Mann course of the same name)
    • Superimposing G & E pentatonic scales (minor and major) over static Cmaj7 chord to explore extensions (9ths, 11ths, 13ths)
    • 6ths excercise over 12-bar blues progression:
      • play a root
      • try to play 6th above in tempo
      • if can’t, play below (it’s easier because of the pattern that looks like 5th shape but mirrored bottom to top)
      • figure out the note and immediately play it above (all in time)
    • Same with 9th

Observations

Invented a new excercise for familiarising with extensions — I always felt like I was not fluent enough in that area (like, naming m6 / M6, 11 / #11 on cue) and therefore kept avoiding using them in improvisation and — especially — walking bass lines. Though there’s a cool hack: major or minor 6th above is tricky, but below — it’s an easy pattern that looks just like 5th (or tritone) above, but sort of “mirrored”. So, although notes first shapes second, I can actually benefit from patternistic approach here and used it as a fallback when I can’t quckly recall the note name is some less-than-common key. Like, I’m playing over Eb, and I want major 6th, it’s— er— quickly playing pattern “6th below”, figuring out it’s C and nicely sliding to the high C. Boom! Same approach works for 9ths. 9th above is weird fingering, but 9th 8vb — well, it’s a second. So, just in case you were a little slow with extensions like me, here’s the helpful exercise.

Piano day (1h 20m)

  • Major ii — V — I, format 2 (Dan Haerle, skill 41 both pages) — without click, slowly several times (50m)
  • Shell voicings (7-3-5, 3-7-9) + inversions over walking bass line & drums for Autumn Leaves in Bb- (30m)

Observations

Shell voicings (chord inversions with some intervals removed or added) are probably the best thing I’ve learned during my jazz piano practice. They are fun to play (make you sound jazzy immediately) and at the same time they are an endless source of excercises! Like, you thing you’re cool playing all chords in 3-7-9 through the cycle? Then play ii — V — I based on each chord! Easy? Voice them as b6-3-b7, 7-3-5 and 3-7-11! Cool? How about playing chords instead of roots with the left hand and make your ii — V — I polychordal? Mastered that? Play the jazz standard now and feel like shit again! LOL. It’s so much fun and I can’t thank Mr. Haerle and Mr. Aebersold enough.

Piano day (1h 30m)

  • Harmonising the C major scale with modes & studying the MATH behind the modes
    • All major modes for the key of C harmonised with 7th chords (Ionian thru Locrian): LH plays 7th chord, RH plays intervals: 2nd, 3rd, 5th, 6th, 7th, octave and back
    • All major modes for the key of D
    • Same for E, F and G — and then I ran out of time :)

Observations

That’s such a cool exercise! Along the way I also found some cool maths that help recall the number of b’s or #’s for each key in each mode more quickly. For example, if you pick a major scale, take a flat 6 of it and run a scale from that b6 in reverse parallel to your major scale (starting on the same note), you will get all the references for your modes. E. g. for the key of D:

D E F# G A B (flat 6: Bb) C#

Bb scale running in reverse starting on D against the mode order (derived from C Major scale) starting on Ionian:

D (Ionian) — D

D (Dorian) — C: C major has no accidentals, so has D Dorian

D (Phrygian) — Bb: Bb major has bb, so has D Phryigan

D (Lydian) — A: A major has ###, so has D Lydian

D (Mixo) — G — G major has #, so has D Mixolydian

D (Aeol) — F — you got the idea

D (Locrian) — Eb

Of course it’s better to just use the mode formula, like, Dorian has b3 and b7 and therefore D Dorian is… er… Right, no accidentals at all, lol. But sometimes this way feels a bit quicker for me, but then again I’m just terrible at math!