Tag: II-V-I

Piano day (1h 30m)

  • Jazz voicings
    • ii7 — V7 — Imaj7 — VImaj7 — ii⌀ — Vb9 — i in all keys, 3 times
      • LH playing the block chord
      • LH playing 2-octave arpeggio
      • LH playing root + 1st inversion
  • Improvistaion
    • Lydian pentatonic in all keys (over maj7 chord)
    • Minor blues + major blues + Lydian pentatonic over ii — V — I in all keys (avoiding the roots)

Bass day (1h 30m)

  • Walking bass / chord tones
    • Major ii — V7 — I in all keys with 5-1-3-7 permutation
  • Reading
    • The Beatles — All My Loving, Got To Get You Into My Life, I Wanna Hold Your Hand

Next time: seems like I’m a little bit stuck with my bass routine (while piano is thriving) — think about adding some new topics!

Piano day (2h)

  • Jazz voicings
    • Dominant to major (2 versions)
    • Dominant to minor (2 versions)
    • II — V — I — IV’s in all major and parallel minor keys
  • Comping
    • All By Myself (Irving Berlin)
      • Voice leading / minimum movement
      • Some improv in passing chord scales (when I was able to find it quick enough)
  • Improvisation
    • Cool stuff: nine tone scales in C & F (WOW that was huge)
    • Minor blues scale in C through Ab (comping with minor and dominant shell voicings in LH)
    • Combining nine tone and C + F minor blues over I — IV progression. Crazy

Observations

Synthetic scales are absolutely awesome. They may sound harsh at first (especially if you play them over a wrong chord type, e. g. nine tone over minor, whereas it apparently works better over augmented), but they are such a great material that helps you enrich your vocabulary and break out of the stuff you’ve been using for ages! Just like Todd Johnson says in his masterclasses, scales and patterns are the “templates of digesting the new harmonies”. Exactly that.  The more ways to alter your scales you’re comfortable with, the less time you spend lost in the dark when improvising.

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