[Music]
hey guys and welcome back to another
lesson today we're gonna take a look at
this little fusion piece you heard me
play at the beginning just a little
piece I arranged and recorded for the
purpose of this lesson and I'm going to
take you through it kind of and break
down the different parts so I can show
you a few of the tricks that I used to
render it and I hope you actually take
something from this just by you know the
best way to learn something is really to
copy someone so I hope you end up
copying some of the stuff I show you and
incorporate it into your own play so
let's get started let's look at the
first part of the piece which goes like
this
[Music]
now before I even begin I'd like to
point out that I was actually playing
not just a piano sound but they layered
piano sound with the piece this is quite
common forgetting like this it's a very
distinctive kind of fusion jazz sound
and the way you do it is you take a
piano sound and you add a pad to it so I
don't know if you can hear it but
there's a pad in the background see it's
playing while I'm holding down the key
and you usually also add an electric
piano and the electric pianos people
tend to use or these sort of modern sort
of FM based
pianos like this so once you layer them
all you get something like
[Music]
and that really fills up the sound so
that's something you should start doing
if you want to get this very distinctive
fusion sound now let's go back to the
piece itself and basically what I was
playing was a a C - an F C - an F to a G
which is really a 1 to a 4-1 to a 4 to 5
in the key of C major but I chose very
distinct voicings for you know for my
playing for example for the C I chose
this so what do I have here so have this
very open voicing for the C major and
just to see how it comes about just
started from a C major chord and then
take this C let's say up here sorry
that's the up here and this e down here
and here you have this open poison
and I also added this cluster which is
really the seven so you could say I'm
playing a C major seven but I prefer to
think of it as simply a C major but with
this additional cluster tone and these
clusters actually play a very prominent
role in getting a kind of a modern
sounding thick harmonic vocabulary so
usually the clusters that tend up to
creep up the most are the ones that are
a semitone apart so either a B and C
that is the root and the seventh or say
an E and an F in the key of C which is
the third and fourth for example if I
were to play I could play like a
different inversion which would maybe be
this
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this is also C major but the moment I
add this cluster up here
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it really gets this extra bit of tension
that I've personally find to be very
nice
now the same goes for this kind of F
major chord C this is really just a
really simple F major triad and you can
see this by taking this a down here so
really this is a very basic if major
trial but I've also added this G here
you can think of this as this F sus -
sorry an F major trial with it with an
ad - but again I prefer to think of it
just sort of the way I approach things
is an F major chord but with an
additional kind of cluster note
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let's look at this G chord here so I'm
playing a G in the right hand but I'm
also hitting V see here and my bass is
not a G it's really an F these are two
interesting things to think about so why
am i adding this C here and again this
is a cluster thing so if I took the C up
an octave here I would get this again
this very nice cluster e sound but I'm
just playing it down here you could also
think of this as sort of this is really
a C major seven sus 2 but honestly I
prefer to still think of this as a G
just with a cluster note
now as for the left hand
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you see I'm hitting this F bass note why
am I doing this well I want to create
tension a lot of the time what you're
trying to do is really maintain a
certain amount of tension and the
listeners ear and so the f is actually
can be thought of as like as if I'm
playing a G dominant seven because the G
Tom and Sam would have this F note in it
but the way I prefer to think about this
is I'm anticipating the next chord which
is going to be a C
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so I know that my next base is gonna be
a R and E so I'm really playing a note
that is as close to it as possible I
could have also done like maybe a a G
but I prefer this very smooth motion
motion for my base which was
so I'm really still playing I'm not
moving with my base a lot I'm just
playing E to an F and then I'm staying
on the edge this greatest tension at
immediately resolves when I play the
next repetition of this phrase now
you'll notice that the next repetition
really is played an octave lower and
this is kind of you thinking like an
arranger and not I mean whenever you
play an instrument you should always
think a little bit like an arranger for
example if you play the first part up
here maybe to add tension you can play
it an octave lower so this really
thickens up the sound and adds the
additional oomph that you need to push
the piece forward one more thing that
you would think of as maybe an arranger
remember when I played
I also played the slow trill up there
and again you have to think a little bit
like an arranger because what you're
doing is there's like a little glow of
space I'm playing and then I'm not
playing anything
[Music]
so I'm filling up the space just a
little bit just like a little dash of
color in the painting with this little
drill up here it's not really a drill
really wouldn't when I think about it
because you have to be like this but
still there is no deep theoretical
concept behind it just sort of a
composition sort of thing now this
phrase repeats again
so there's not nothing really that much
interesting here this is basically a G
resolving to a c5 resolving to one and
then the next part of the song really or
the second part of this piece sounds
like this
so there's a lot of to digest here so
let's break it down really a
step-by-step let's start with this now
this is again a very simple progression
in the sense that I really have an F
going to a G go to an E minor
now the first thing I do here is I open
up these voicings so I do this sort of
thing and this this is really just an F
just take this F up here which is just
an F trialed within the second inversion
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now next thing you can do is you can
double the base then you can play in
fifths in the left hand that sometimes
helps thicken the sound
[Music]
and then I do an additional trick again
I add these clusters here you see I hit
two notes with my thumb
so I'm playing this f c/f g GD g eh eh
eh-eh-eh be
[Music]
and that in itself already sounds pretty
good and I can also double things in the
right hand so most of the harmonic brunt
you can say or at least some of it falls
on the left hand and I can place parsley
in the right hand for example here when
I'm playing this a minor chord which is
you can really think of it as an a minor
9 but I prefer to think of it as an a
minor 7 see this is my seven here with a
cluster the next part
this is an F going to a C over base of e
going to a D minor 7 now the trick here
is these hammer ons that you know guitar
players do do all of the time
and that can really liven up a
progression instead of just doing your
doing so the idea is that pretty much
you can do this hammer on technique on
any note and it in the chord that you're
playing I could have also done maybe
stuff like that that sounds a little bit
worse usually when I do a hammer on it's
for the middle note so this is like a
classic kind of keyboards version of the
hammer on you have a triad and you're
doing this sort of motion
you're hitting the note below the note
you're playing and resolving to the note
you wanna play now again you can do this
for all three chords
what could you just maybe for the first
one and this is the last one and just
play the middle one straight another
interesting thing to note here is the
particular voicing of the F chord this
is really you can think of it and I
actually prefer to think of this as well
as this is an F major 9 but it's really
as if major 9 sus 2
these kind of sus two major seven or sus
two major nine
Gords had a really nice kind of color to
them
so I recommend that you you know just
play around with them here's a c-major 9
sus 2
[Music]
you can even do this with on minor
chords it's I think it sounds a little
bit not as well defined I'd say
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so interesting to play around with and
again I'm using this trick in my left
hand I'm playing a double bass that I'm
adding the fifth and I'm also doing this
cluster trick with my thumb the next
part is a repetition but with a
variation
[Music]
so this is interesting
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what I'm really playing here from a
basic diatonic point of view is an F II
a minor but the particular voicing I
choose
has really chromatic motion of sus2
cords
sister cords are really great for again
adding tension to your playing that make
it sound sound too simplistic you know
if you were just to play try it try it
sound very boring but sus two chords
sometimes sus 4 chords really add an
additional color really interesting
color to your playing and again
chromatic the sort of chromatic
reharmonization
is something you can always try for
example let's say you want to play mary
had a little lamb
I mean just off the top of my head doing
something like this with such two chords
makes it sound you know just completely
different but of course at the same time
the same let's try maybe a chromatic
motion
well you know of course you have to
experiment and over time you'll kind of
learn what sounds good what doesn't but
really just trying these chromatic
motions can often pay off big so I'm
gonna recommend that you experiment with
this
[Music]
now looking at the next part of the
salami
this is kind of the same as the motion
the f2g do a minor motion we had at the
beginning but now I'm playing this F to
an e or an e dominant seven to an a
minor a minor nine or you know one of
these variations a minor 11 now this
part is also the same as the previous
one but the last chord is substituted
for this and this is voicing by stacked
fifths and have a video talking about
this I'm kind of playing the the outline
of D flat major in the left hand and an
a-flat major in the right hand and these
two chords are a perfect fifth apart
and the reason I chose this is again
this is sort of anticipation because the
this is going to resolve to a c-major so
you see this this chord is less about
the functional role of whatever you're
playing it's more about just just really
getting ready to resolve to this C major
is going to come in a moment this is a C
major really on over a base of E
[Music]
now again we're thinking we're putting
on our arranger hat what we're doing
here is I've gone a little bit too low
and I don't want to keep playing on this
register and I know that the finale is
also coming up so I'm gonna go up here
but maintain my very strong base notes
down here so this really cuts through
the mix
[Music]
so again in this case keeping the strong
very deep bass notes in the left hand
maintains the power of the playing and
this high register in the right hand
cuts through and sort of regrets to the
listeners attention and you know these
register tricks are often as important
as all of these fancy voicings and
whatnot they can really really make a
song or you're playing shine through
it's not always about having the most
complicated chord voicings and
progressions so let's look at the final
part of the song
[Music]
now what I was going for here and this
also happens in the base that's playing
at the track is a really smooth motion
in the base in the left hand
you see it's really
going and really really small either
semitones or tones so it's a C going to
an F going to this is a the dominant
nine
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this is an F over the base of G a minor
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F major seven sus do
a flat major nine
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this is again an F for a base of F sorry
over a base of G
and see and I'm not really playing a
c-major here I personally prefer to
finish again with a little bit of
harmonic ambiguity the CSIs do
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now the way you can understand this I'll
just say a few words is this is this
progression is made of two parts
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as the first part and
it's the second part and the final
resolution for the first part is really
just fourths see going to an F and then
transposed up a D going to a G
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and finally the last part
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I was going to play something like maybe
an a-minor I mean you you could've
really I could have really done this in
many many different ways I could have
played this I want to play sort of an
a-minor
- an F sorry so a minor - an F to a D
minor to a G to C but I ended up -
replacing the D minor
with this a-flat major nine this is kind
of like a little bit like a tritone
substitution but really honestly for me
it's just a chord just like a passing
chord it's a chord that's a semitone
above the target chord which I wanna
reach which is the G which I choose to
play as an F and the right hand and the
G bass in the left hand
[Music]
so I hope you've kind of followed me
through this journey going over the
piece and if there was a particular part
that sort of piqued your interest I
highly recommend that you pause the
video you know go back to the particular
point in time pause the video and copy
it just really honestly as simple as
that just copy my plane it's not
cheating it's perfectly fine players
have been doing this for you know since
the beginning of time and that's really
the way you learn to do stuff so don't
feel bad about it you have my perfect
you know full approval and I also hope
that the sort of commentary or narration
I had following the piece helped you
understand kind of how my brain worked
in choosing some of these voicings and
you know jumping around registers and so
on and that's pretty much it I hope
you've learned something interesting and
I'll see you next time