Pop & Jazz Keyboards & Harmony (intermediate)

Description

Where this course will take you :

This Intermediate course is a follow-on to the Beginner level of Pop and Jazz Keyboards and Harmony. It leads to the next level of your jazz and pop keyboard studies, first of all through in-depth study of Seventh-Chords, where you’ll get comfortable at playing more harmonically-sophisticated styles of pop-standards.

Next, you’ll move closer to classic jazz piano-playing perhaps as a solo-player or accompanist. You’ll learn how to make chords sound richer by using Tensions, and then, how to arrange them over the keyboard to suit any jazz-standard melody.

Finally you’ll progress to the level where you could join other musicians in a modern-jazz combo, with your ability to play, at sight,  the most sophisticated jazzy chords and progressions, with maximum fluency and smoothness in both hands. 

You'll learn to :

• Extend your knowledge of all 7th chords and their use in chord progressions

• Play all 7th chords types smoothly in all inversions and in both hands 

• Add richness to all 7th chords by adding 9th, 11th and 13th Tensions

• Add "Altered" Tensions (b9, #9, b13) to Dominant 7th chords

• Use two-hand “Spread Voicings” for solo-versions of jazz-standards

• Understand II-V-I patterns and their importance in jazz-standards

• Study II-V-I exercises in both hands and all keys to greatly improve your overall chord memory and group-playing

As a possible student, you’d be likely to have completed some or all of the Beginner level of Pop and Jazz Keyboards and Harmony or have achieved that level through other study. The Intermediate course moves on by concentrating on how increasingly complex chords and harmony are used in pop and Jazz composition and performance. As it progresses, the focus moves further from Pop and nearer to Jazz, something that should match your interests.

Content and Overview in more detail:

The course has 6 lessons and 1.45 hours of video. In the first two lessons, it moves on from basic triad and seventh chords, covered at Beginner Level, to more complex seventh chords.  The aim is to understand theoretically how each chord works within a progression, and to play progressions fluently by using suitable chord-inversions.   

In the next two lessons, the concept of chord-tensions is explained, that is, using 9th, 11th and 13th notes, and which ones suit which chords.  Here, the emphasis is not so much on using chord-inversions, but “Spread-Voicings”, that is, arranging chord-notes over wide areas of the keyboard so as to create, for example, a solo-piano arrangement of a jazz-standard, or a chord accompaniment for a singer.     

In the final two-lessons, the emphasis returns to playing different inversions of seventh chords, including tensions, so that II-V-I patterns containing these can be played as fluently as possible in either hand.  Also, within a narrow area of the keyboard as possible, so as to give ample space to a bass-player’s accompaniment in a typical small-group setting.  

The final lesson shows several drills or exercises directly aimed at giving you practice in playing  in both hands II-V-I chords in every key and inversion. and also every possible type of seventh chord, including  standard tensions, on every note of the keyboard,  giving you  a great foundation for your basic jazz-piano technique. 

Along the way, there's full explanation of the chord and harmony theory involved, backed up by text,  fingering-charts and, of course, lots of filmed playing at the keyboard, including pop and jazz chord progressions and standards.. The only thing there isn't is notated music: everything is shown by visual demonstration, letter-names and numbers.

What You Will Learn!

• • Play Major, Minor, and Dominant 7th chords commonly found in pop and jazz styles, understanding their construction and how they relate to a particular key.
• • Play 7th chords in inversions, and to play seventh-chord progressions with maximum fluency.
• • Add Tensions to Major, Minor and Minor 7th flat 5 chords, understanding which are appropriate for each chord type, how they function, and how to play them within chords.
• • Add natural Tensions (e.g. 9, 11 and 13) to Dominant 7th chords, understanding which are appropriate for each chord type, how they function, and how to play them within chords.
• • Add altered Tensions (e.g. b9, and b13) to Dominant 7th chords, understanding which are appropriate for each chord type, how they function, and how to play them within chords.
• • Arrange 6th and 7th chords, including Tensions, using Spread-Voicings techniques, over the keyboard,
• • Play Closed and Open position inversions of 7th chords, including Tensions and excluding root notes.
• • Understand how II-V-I patterns work, and how inversions of 7th chords and inversions work together in II-V-I patterns.
• • Study and practice II-V-I patterns in various drills and exercises, to improve fluency of playing them in both hands and in all keys.

Who Should Attend!

• As this course is intended as a follow-on course to the Beginner-level one, you’d be likely to have completed some or all of that course or similar, but want to get to a higher level.
• As it progresses, the focus moves further from Pop and nearer to Jazz, and this is something that should match your interests.
• The course may also be well-suited to experienced musicians for whom pop and jazz keyboards is a secondary interest. For example classical musicians wishing to explore other styles; singers; composers, song-writers and singer-songwriters.
• An interest in knowing how music works is important, beyond just playing tunes “for fun”, as it contains explanations and theory-content!
• There is no study of notated, pop or jazz pieces, which may not suit everybody, as the course tends more to playing-by-ear and improvisation (as in the real pop and jazz world), basing this in a knowledge of how chords, scales and harmony work.

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