My Music Journey

 Determined to set a piano goal over the Xmas break and that is to be able to play all previously learned Standards with fluency, fluidity, rhythmically using iReal Pro as accompaniment. Additionally to develop and apply some improvisation to the tunes. This may be a bit of a challenge, given it took some time to retrieve All Of Me from its forgotten state. So, here are the songs: Autumn Leaves, All of Me, Fly Me to the Mood, Take the A Train, Honeysuckle Rose, Blue in Green, In A Sentimental Mood, Summertime, All the Things You Are, In a Mellow Tone. Starting with Autumn Leaves. An analysis of Autumn Leaves should help with understanding Minor 521 progressions discussed with Lauren at my last lesson. This is a good model for analysis.  https://www.learnjazzstandards.com/blog/learning-jazz/jazz-theory/navigate-autumn-leaves/ This Jens Larson, whilst guitar focused, is another good discussion focusing on improvisation.  https://jenslarsen.nl/simple-and-easy-approach-to-a-minor-2-5-1/

 Just finished my last music lesson for 2022 with Lauren and she reminded me about keeping up with the blog. Great idea, so here we are back again. Todays lesson we covered:  1.Consolidating playing with iReal backing track, All of Me, A Train, Circle of 5’s. 2. Developing Rhythmic Freedom. I had found a video  https://youtu.be/6joyfjupMGk  which offers a heal toe method to developer a sound sense of rhythm. We discussed. Laurens preference is heal only. But do what what ever works… heal, toe, sway, count. 3. Discussed Jimins video, which Lauren had sent to me, on LH Styles .   https://youtu.be/6XWqDg4l7u0    She covers 10 styles. Stride, Boogie, Choro, (latin Jazz) Latin, Walking Base Appregios, 4 Beats, Bud Powell Style, (pedal point) Red Garland Style, McCoy Tyler Style. Review this video regularly, it has examples of  several songs I am working on. 4. We further reviewed Rhythmic Variations . See this web site and work thru to options.    https://jazz-library.com/articles/comping/