Transcripts
1. Introduction: When I play the piano, I feel like I'm talking to my
best friend and I'm able to communicate different
feelings that I couldn't express with
the English language. Hi, I'm Alicia Fox, PNS producer and songwriter. And I've been playing
piano for 18 years, during which time I've
been able to tour internationally and record with some of my favorite
artists, such as MS. Sago, DJ to Chicago
kid in Tom Mish. I love playing piano because of the infinite
possibilities of sound. If you're excited to
learn how to compose original music and improvise
over your favorite songs. This class will give you
the fundamental skills you need to continue
that journey. In this class, we're
gonna be looking at the fundamentals
of composition and improvisation and learning how to create an effective
chord progression. And also how to turn that
into an accompaniment pattern that we could use for
improvising or when composing. And learn how you can develop a good practice
habit to make you a better composer and improviser. After this course,
you'll understand the fundamentals of
composition and improvising. And be able to write original
compositions as well as improvise over existing
chord structures. Let's get to it.
2. Getting Started: Welcome to the composition
and improvisation class. When I started piano, I was initially taking
classical lessons, but I got a bit discouraged by how rigid teaching instruction was and how there wasn't that much creative freedom
involved with the music. It seemed like I could just play the music right or wrong. And I was just playing
someone else's songs but didn't really understand
what I was playing. When I was 11, I transitioned
to a new teacher, Tyson Rogers, who introduced a new approach that
really resonated with me. In this approach,
he introduced me to improvisation and soloing, in which I could choose my
own notes to craft a melody. And I quickly connected to the freedom that this
approach allowed me to have. This approach introduced me to improvisation or
spontaneous composition, where you can choose
your own notes and create a solo on the spot. Improvisation and
music is similar to speaking a language in
which we can express ourselves through
different vocabulary and with statements that we learned from transcribing others and coming up with
our own phrases. I hope this class offers
a glimpse into some of the systems that
can be helpful for learning composition
and improvisation. Improvisation is a
constant journey and I hope to provide some of the fundamentals then
you can keep working on throughout your journey
while practicing this, it's important to be patient
with yourself and embrace the possibilities as there are no right or wrong ways to play. I look forward to seeing
what clicks and inspires you to create your own
improvisations and compositions. Let's get to it.
3. Creating Progressions: In this lesson,
we're going to look at different skills for creating an effective chord
progression that can convey the right emotion
to the audience. When we're picking courts
for a chord progression, we want to choose chords based
on what will resonate with the right emotional frequency
of the song or composition. We've already talked
about how to find good possibilities for
chords given the CTL scale. In this lesson, I'm
going to be explaining some of those
concepts to help you take a basic progression
and expand on it through substitutions
and with alterations, let's expand on the skill set we have by learning some
new ways to create substitutions or alterations to enhance our chord progressions. First, as a refresher, let's revisit the CTL scale, but this time let's do
it in a different key. For this example, I'd like to
look at the key of G major, which has one sharp, F sharp. To start by finding
the CTL scale, we'll start by creating
the seventh chords, starting on G major seventh, which is G, B, D, and F sharp. As we move up along the scale, will find the new chords that
are options in this key. So next we would have
a minor seventh, followed by B minor seventh, followed by C major seven, followed by D dominant seventh, followed by E minor seven. Finally, F sharp minor
seven flat five, and then back to G major seven. All of these chords are
in the key of G major. But sometimes it can be good to pull cords from other keys, related keys that are almost like a glimpse of another
world for a second. Before we return back home, I'm going to come up
with a short progression that has three chords in G major and pulls
one chord from G minor. I'm going to start
with G major seventh, the one of this key. Then I'm going to move
to a minor seven. Before moving to B minor seven. These are all in
the key of G major. And then I'm gonna go
to C minor seventh, which comes from G minor. As we can tell, this
chord is sort of symbolizes another world
almost or something opening up before we return
back home to G major. So once again, this
progression was G major seven, a minor, B minor,
and then C minor. Before we return
home to G-Major. Oftentimes when looking
at a chord progression, you can see that
there's multiple chords that will function
in the same way. It's important to remember
the concept of a root chord, which is always the
one in any given key. In this case, our route
would be G major. A typical progression in the
great American song book, in many popular songs in American history includes
what's called a 251. Which means that you start
on the second scale degree of this key before
moving to the fifth, and then finally
home to the one. In G major, a 251 would be a minor seven, D dominant seven. Before we finally resolve
to G major seven. Resolving or resolution
can be thought of as coming back home
to where we started. And it's important that there's many different resolutions
that will feel different ways. And so when composing
or improvising, it's important to pick chords based on what feeling
you want to convey. Starting with a minor seventh, I can go to D7, which
is a bit dissonant, but then resolves back
to G major seven. I could also do a minor
seven, C minor seven. And then resolving the
G major to C minor, once again, we pulled
from the G minor scale. So that is, it signifies almost another world for a second before we come back home. In this case, the C minor seventh and the D
dominant seventh. Even though they're
different chords, they serve the same function as resolving back
to our homebase. We started with a dummy, went to see before we resolved
back to where we started. A lot of times you
can create something very beautiful and
music by having a very dissonant sound that then resolves to
something beautiful. It's almost as if
you enjoy a shower more after you've had a
long run through the rain. And if we have something
that's very dissonant, when it finally resolved, It's a sweeter feeling. So we can play with this contrast when we're
coming up with chord progressions and
developing chords for our songs. Anytime you come up with a
chord progression you like, It's very important
to move it to all 12 keys so you can
understand how it works in different contexts
and have it available as an option when you're
composing in different keys. One great place to start is
taking a 251 progression. The minor seventh
off of the two, the dominant seventh
off of the five, and then resolving to
the one major seven. We can practice
this progression in every key to become more
fluid on the piano. Let's start by revisiting
the C major scale, in which C is the one. So D would be two. So we would start
with D minor seven, followed by G dominant seventh, and then resolving
to C major seven. If we were to move this
into a different key, the relationship between the
chords would stay the same, but the names of the notes would change along with the
corresponding key. Let's take an example and find
a 251 in a different key. This time, let's look
at the key of a major, which includes three sharps,
c-sharp, F-sharp, G-sharp. So if we're looking at
a 251 and this key, we first need to play the scale. And we'll notice that the second scale degree
would be B minor. So we'll start with
a B minor seventh. After this, we would go to
the fifth scale degree, which would be E. So we'd go
to an E dominant seventh. And then follow that by resolving back to
a major seventh. You can tell that the
chord progression has the same sound, even if it's in a different key. So we've got B minor. We're in the first example, we had D minor, G, and C Major seven. You can take this 251
progression into every key. And I think you'll
notice that it'll appear in many of
your favorite songs. Experiment with these
chord progressions by trying to come up with a chord progression that uses the CTL scale of a new key that you're
maybe less familiar with. And then maybe also
borrows a couple of different chords from
a different key. So you can experiment
with how that sounds. It's important to
play with techniques of tension and resolution. So you can create an
effective story plot with your chord progression. In the next lesson, we're
gonna be looking at some more advanced
accompaniment patterns and inversions to help take a simple chord
progression and really bring it to the next
level, time to level up.
4. Patterns and Inversions: Welcome back. In this lesson, we're gonna
be looking at how you can use inversions to create more advanced
accompaniment patterns. This is a technique that is
incredibly fun to use and is a great way to challenge a simple progression and really take it to
the next steps. For this example, I'd
like to jump right in, starting with the inversions
of an F major seven chord, which includes the
notes face F-A-C-E. So we'll start by playing the original root position F major seven chord
with our right hand. F-a-c-e. and moving up to
the next inversion of this, which would be ACEF. Then we'll move up the a, an octave higher to
the next inversion. See EFA. And then the
final inversion, EF, AAC. Get comfortable with all
these inversions across the piano as different
versions of the same chord. Because often you'll
want to move to the closest setting of a chord and not just the
root position chord. So let's move this F major
seven across the piano slowly. And we start to hear the
sounds of all of it. Moving across the keyboard. For this example, I'm going
to demonstrate moving from an F major seven
to a C Major seven, of which the notes
are C, E, G, and B. Let's now walk through
the same inversions for the C major seventh. So we'll start with CBGB, will move up to E, G, B, and C. We'll then move one
step further to G BCE. And then finally BCG. Before we're back
to where we started an octave higher with CBGB. So we're moving from
our basic progression, which is F major seven, down to C major seven. It's just a basic two
chord progression. But we're going to
expand it by creating a chordal melody with the
inversions of these two chords. It can sometimes be
helpful to write down the notes on paper so you
can see all your options. But for this example, we'll just keep it with
the chords on the piano. So what we're going
to essentially be doing is coming up with a melody using the notes of
these two chords and then playing it
with its inversions. For the F major seven, we can pick any of the notes
in the chord to use as our melody before resolving
to the C major seven, where we can pick
any of the notes of that chord to use as our melody. So to start, we have any
of the options from face, and then we go to any of
the options from CBGB. So I'll start with maybe
a melody like this. So I did see BCG. So I've got my basic melody. Now what I wanna do
is fill it in with using the melody as the
top note of the inversion. So since I started with E, C, a, C, I'll fill that
in with those chords, which would be, and now we'll go to the next
part which was BCG. So I'll fill in
with those chords. So altogether we would have, you can continue. So on like that. So we're basically only
shuffling the same four notes, but we're able to create a longer phrase that has a
melodic and CTO component. Let's demonstrate one more
example to help this sink in. I'll come up with another
melody using those notes. So this time I'll do e, f, c, a, b, g, e. See, so the next step is, I will find the inversions that have those
notes at the top. And it's helpful to see
this in writing sometimes. But what that would
be, would be, as you keep practicing
these inversions, you get to a point where you
can improvise with them. So you can hear a
melody on the spot. And if you're playing
with other instruments, you can help support
what they're playing by playing a
chordal melody behind them. So I'll now demonstrate
moving between a couple of different
chords from F major to C major and then occasionally F minor. F minor. Before returning home to see, it may be doing an arpeggio. To close out the song. To recap. In this exercise, we
looked at how to take one four-note chord and by
using all the inversions, create a chordal
melody that could then turn it into an effective
accompaniment pattern. Now, I'd like you to take
the same two chords, F major seven and C Major seven, and try coming up with
your own melody first, using the notes
from those chords. And then try filling in with the notes from the
corresponding inversions. In the next lesson,
we're going to introduce pentatonic
scale improvisation. That's gonna give us a lot
of different resources for soloing and coming up with melodies for our compositions
or improvisations. I'm excited for you to join me. See you there.
5. Pentatonic Improvisations: In this lesson, we're
going to look at the pentatonic scale and
how it can be used for improvisation and
creating effective melody that can work over
a chord progression or accompaniment pattern. The pentatonic scale is
derived from the major scale, which you should already
be familiar with. In this case, we're
going to start by looking at the C
pentatonic scale, which is a five note scale. The C pentatonic scale
includes the notes C, D, E, G, and a. Or in other words,
the first, second, third, fifth, and sixth
degrees of the C major scale. It can also be thought of as the C major scale
minus the F and the B, or the fourth and
seventh degree. The pentatonic scale is
an excellent scale for improvising or when choosing
notes for a great melody. To start, let's practice
the pentatonic scale, moving upwards with
our right hand, will start with
the fingerings of one-two-three than
crossing under 212, crossing under again to see one-two-three than
crossing under again to G. So we've got C, D, E, G, a, C, T. And coming back down, we'll start on C. This fingering
is a little bit tricky, so I'll go over it once more. We start with
one-two-three than 12, then 12312123, and then back
down to 1 213-212-1321. So any of the notes from the
pentatonic scale will sound great over a chord progression
in that corresponding key. So if we're coming up with a chord progression
in C major, e.g. F major, E minor, D minor. These are all chords that come
out of the C major scale. We can use this pentatonic
scale to improvise over it. I'll demonstrate
a short example. I can go on and on. But let's now take a
pattern with this scale. So we can start by practicing the pentatonic scale
in groupings of 34.5. For the groupings of three, we'll start with our thumb on C, and we'll go C, D, E, D E G, E G, a GAAC, a, C, D, and so on. So let's try that. And back down. We would have practicing in these patterns can help
us when we're improvising, because then we have
extra ways of moving. And we don't just move in the
scale and we end up being less likely to get stuck
or run out of ideas. These patterns can
also be used as a great vehicle for
soloing or when composing, or using as a fill to
play between chords. Now let's look at the
grouping of four nodes. So we'll start on C
and we'll move up. We're playing C, D E G, D, a, E G TAC, TAC. So let's try that again. And we can also go back down. So that would be now that we've got those
patterns of 3.4, I'll try inserting some into
the chord progression I was playing to use this
improvisational fills. A pattern of three. Now a pattern of four. Three again, four. So we can use those patterns
when we're soloing or as little fills to fill in the gaps between the
cords replaying. Now, I've practiced these a lot and have gotten them up by using a metronome to a faster tempo where I'm
able to play them fluidly. It's important to start
slowly and not beat yourself up if you have trouble
playing these at first. Now I'm going to demonstrate
those same phrases, but a little bit more slowly. All of these phrases are all coming out of this
pentatonic scale, which is a five note scale. For the next exercise, I like to practice it in
the patterns of five. So we'll start on C and we'll go up using all five fingers, C, D E G a D E G a C, E G, a, C, D, and so on. Now I will demonstrate
some patterns of five over the same progression. You may notice as you're using the pentatonic
scale to solo, that you can predict
how it's going to sound before you're playing. And this is one of
the essential parts of improvisation
when improvising, you want to get to a
place where you can almost predict how it's going to sound as you're playing and
see your hand can be thought of as an extension of your mind or a melody
that you would sing. Now, I'm going to play the same chord progression
and I'd like you to try improvising using the
notes of the pentatonic scale, C, D, E, G, and a. You can also try using
some of these patterns of 34.5 to create a spontaneous melody
with your improvisation. Remember, there's no
right or wrong Melody. And as long as you're playing the notes of the
pentatonic scale, you're off to a great
start. Here we go. Excellent job.
Another great way to practice improvising is you can record yourself playing the accompaniment patterns
or chord progressions, and then play over it by soloing using the
pentatonic scale. Anytime you're
learning a new song, you can find what
key the song is in. Take the major scale, and then find the pentatonic
scale by playing the first, second, third, fifth,
and sixth scale degree. You can also get
comfortable by playing these patterns of 34.5 that I've demonstrated in additional
keys to get more fluid with the pentatonic
scale in every key. So anytime you've
got a new song, you can find out
what key it's in, finding the major
scale of that key. And then play the first,
second, third, fifth, and sixth degree to find
the pentatonic scale. You can also move
through the patterns of 34.5 in the pentatonic scale in those corresponding
keys to get more familiar with it
across the piano. To recap, in this lesson, we looked at the
pentatonic scale, which is the first,
second, third, fifth, and sixth degrees
of the major scale. And how you can use
this as a vessel for improvising or coming up
with your own melodies. A lot of times when
coming up with melodies, a great place to start can be free styling or improvising, finding a melody you like, and refining it in
eventually making it secure. In the next lesson, we're gonna be looking
at a technique to come up with repeated
note phrases or runs, which can be excellent vehicles for improvisation or composing.
6. Repetitive Notes: In this lesson, we're gonna
be looking at how you can use repeated note phrases or runs to create textures for
composition or improvising. A repeated note phrase is a six or eight note
phrase that ins, near where it started
in octave higher, so becomes a fluid
phrase across the piano. That's great for improvising as a compositional tool
or as an ending. To jump in, I'd like
to start by creating a sixth note phrase
over any chord. For the first example, let's take the Court of
D minor seven, D, F, a, and C. We're going to come up with a
repeated note phrase that could work over
this chord and will end near where it starts
in octave higher. So it can repeat
across the octave. I'm going to come
up with six notes, and I'm going to play
them in triplets, meaning I'm playing three
notes for every quarter note. So it's important
to know that when composing your
repeated note phrase, whatever node I start on, I'm going to want to end
near an octave higher. The phrase can keep
running into itself. So we've got D minor. I'm going to start
my phrase on E, the ninth scale
tone of that key. So I'm going to start with E, F, G, and then cross under to ACG. All of which are
notes in C major, of which D minor is
part of the CTL scale. So, so far I've got E, F, G, a, C, G. And then this sets me
up to be next to the E, again in octave higher. So I can play the
same phrase repeating across the octave.
I'll demonstrate. So now I'm playing
the same phrase, but I'm moving it
across the octave. So it sounds like a
repeated pattern. I'll start it again. Since I've got a
six note phrase, it can also be broken down
into two groups of three, the e, f, g, and then the ACG. When we're playing any phrase, I always like to get the most
mileage out of the phrase. So I think of it in
different sections. In this case, we would think
of this as one-two-three, one-two-three, one-two-three, one-two-three, which is
the finger I'm doing. But we could also play 132, which would make it EGF. That's also a nice sound. We could also go down. So first I'll go
three-to-one going down, which would be GCA, GFP. If I wanted to create another
variation with this phrase, I could do 231 on the way down, which would be CGA, PFGE. So it sounds like a
much longer phrase, but it's essentially the
same six note pattern repeating across the octave. Anytime I come up with a phrase, I like, I tried to apply
it over every key. So then if I'm playing
a song in that key, I can use it as an ending. Let's say I'm playing a song in F minor and I'm
coming to an ending. I just played the same
phrase I wrote in D minor, but I transposed it to F minor. Now let's look at
another phrase. This time we're going
to do an 8-note phrase, meaning all the notes will
be 16th or eighth notes. For this next 8-note phrase, I'm going to create one
over the key of a minor. And I'm gonna remember
that I want to end near where I started
in octave higher. So the phrase can
naturally repeat. For this example, I'll
start on the note B. So I'll do BCG and
then do D, E, D. I've got. And then that puts me right
here back again at B. So I'll watch it repeat. Once again. We've got BCG a, D, EDA. If we wanted to, we could
split this grouping into two groups of four in
which we've got 12341234. And we could try playing it in other variations, maybe 3421, which would be and come up with other phrases
using the same notes. To wrap up this lesson. You can create a repeated note
phrase over any chord with six or eight notes in the
main step is that you want to end near where you
started in octave higher. So the phrase we'll
repeat across the octave. Anytime you come up
with a phrase you like, I'd encourage you to try
it in as many keys as possible so that then when
you're playing a new song, you already have tons of
freezes at your fingers that you can improvise with
or use in the arrangement. Now, I'd like you to
try coming up with your own six note phrase
over the key of C minor. And I'm excited to see
what you come up with. You can practice
this technique by coming up with your
own phrases over different chords and
start to use them as a compositional tool or
in your improvisations. In the next lesson, we're gonna be looking
at how we can use the blues scale to create a more guitar like
sound on the piano.
7. Blues Scale: Welcome back. In this lesson, we're
gonna look at how we can use the blues scale and blue notes to create a more guitar lick
sound on the piano. The blues is a black
American art form that originated in
the American South, is the foundation of almost every genre of
music we know now, from rock to country, to jazz, to RMB. We can use the blues
scale in many genres. And knowing how to use
it effectively makes us a better pianist and
musician overall, on a guitar, you can bend a string
in binned in-between notes to create a really
cool, bluesy texture. But on piano, once
we play a key, we have no option to
change the sound. Because of the
limitations of the piano, people have found ways to
create a more guitar like sound by using the blues
scale and blue nodes. I'm going to demonstrate some
of those concepts today. Before jumping into
the blues scale, I'd first like to look at a typical 12 bar
blues progression. In a typical 12-bar
blues progression, you'll start with C7 for 4 bar, followed by F7 for 2 bar, before returning back
to see for 2 bar. And then finishing with the
turnaround of g for 1 bar, f for 1 bar, and then see for an
additional 2 bar, there are many ways to
play a 12-bar blues, but I'll demonstrate a
basic progression now. That progression
demonstrated a 12-bar form that repeats and in
which case you can solo or improvise as mini courses or times through
the forum as you want. Now that we've looked at
the basic progression, Let's look at the
sea blues scale. The sea blues scale
is a six note scale, which includes the notes C, E flat, F, F sharp, G, B flat, and C. Once again, that's C, E-flat, F, F sharp, G, B flat, and C. The fingering I typically do for the sea blues scale is 123412. And then you cross
again if you're going up another octave, 123412. So let's now try that
across two octaves, starting on C, E-flat, F, F sharp, G, a, B-flat, C, D-flat, F sharp, G, B-flat, and back down. Before we get into blues
scale improvisation, I like to now explain
what a blue note is. In addition to the blues scale, we can use what are called
blue notes to create a bluesy or more guitar
like sound on the piano. A blue note is when you slide
from one key to the next. Let's demonstrate this with the F-sharp sliding up
to G and then down to F. So you're going to start with the same finger by playing
F sharp and sliding to G down to F. This almost sounds like
a guitar sliding between keys because even though we
don't hear the exact bend, it's almost implied
in the music. We can use this to create a more guitar lick
sound on the piano. So let's take a
simple phrase and I want you to try playing
it with blue notes. So I'm going to slide
from F sharp to G and then down to F
before playing E-flat. And see, now I would like
for you to try that. You can think of a blue note
as an inflection of sorts or a way to get more sound or
character out of the piano. Now I'm going to play a
phrase without blue notes, and then again with
blue notes and see if you recognize
the difference. That's without blue notes
and width blue notes. You can tell what
the blue notes. It has a little bit
more character, or it feels a bit less straight or rigid in the way it's played. Anytime we come up with a phrase using the blues
scale that we like, I tried to store it in my mind as an option for improvising. So that then the next
time when you're playing a song in that key, you can remember the phrases
or vocabulary that you came up with in order to effectively speak
when you're soloing. We can learn a lot from transcribing other blues
musicians and taking other instruments sounds
and trying to transmit it onto the piano and
seeing how it translates. In the same way we
demonstrated patterns of 34.5 with the pentatonic scale. We can also look at those
for the blue scale. I'm now going to run
through patterns of three on the blue scale. C, E flat, E-flat, F, F sharp, F, F sharp, G, F sharp G, B flat, G, B flat, C, and back down. We can practice these patterns and then use them
in our soloing. I'd now like to invite you
to try improvising using the sea blues scale while I play the accompaniment chords
from the 12 bar blues form. Remember, there's no right
or wrong phrases to play. But any of these notes will
work over these chords. And anytime you find
something you like, try to remember it
and store it in your mind as an option
for future solos. Alright, let's jump in 121234. Excellent. So although this may have
been your first time, you might have recognized
a couple of times when you played a
phrase that you liked. And it's really important to remember what you
liked about that in to save that
as something that then you can play
over other songs. So when you're improvising, you're not exactly coming up with everything from scratch, but you're using
pre-existing vocabulary to structure and form
a cohesive statement, it's important to
remember that improvising with the blues scale
is an ongoing journey. And it's important
to be patient with yourself and start
small when learning. Getting familiar with
the scale can take time, and it's important to remember
the phrases that you like. So you can keep
building in adding to your vocabulary
as an improviser. In our next lesson,
we're going to dive into some additional
improvisational concepts that can help take our
improvising to the next step.
8. Improvising Keys: In this lesson, we're
gonna be looking at some additional
improvisational concepts and how we can effectively
practice improvisation. A few of the concepts
we're gonna go over it will include enclosures, arpeggios, and
setting limited range on the piano when improvising. First, let's take a
look at enclosures. Enclosure is a technique that originated with bebop music in the 1940s through pioneers such as Charlie Parker
and Thelonious Monk. A basic example of
an enclosure is to approach a note from both
sides chromatically. E.g. if I know I want
it to land on b, I would approach it
by playing C and then B flat before landing on b, but still hitting be on the
downbeat or the strong beat. E.g. if I was to play a phrase with an enclosure,
I would then play. I'm essentially
enclosing the desire. Note that I like to
play from either side. Let's look at another example. If I were to play
a major triad, C, E, and G, and enclose
each note I would play. I'm approaching the c
chromatically with C-Sharp and B, then approaching the
E with F and E flat, then approaching the g with
a flat and F sharp to get. We can use enclosures to create a more chromatic sound while still keeping our
guide tones the same. In this example, I'll
explain how to use enclosures over a 251
in the key of C major. As you can tell it as
very chromatic sound. And we can get used to taking
a simple phrase and then expanding it by enclosing the guide tones
from either side. You can take a chorus on a
blues or any song in practice, putting in some enclosures and seeing where you'd like them
and where they don't work. A lot of improvisation
is trial and error. And in some situations, you might get lucky and discover something that you never
knew you could play. Next, we're gonna
look at how you can use arpeggios when soloing, starting with the D
minor seventh chord will use an arpeggio or the notes of the chord to create another texture for
when we're soloing. I'll start with a
D and demonstrate. In this example, I used this arpeggio to create a linear phrase that
moves across the piano. We can also use arpeggios
is escape routes and move to another range
when we're improvising. I'll demonstrate an
example of that. When practicing improvisation,
a good habit can be to set limitations in focus explicitly
on one concept at a time. A good place to start can be limiting yourself to
a certain range of the piano and seeing how
many options you can come up with with that
set of limitations. A lot of times the greatest
art is made with limitations. And you can discover
something really impressive by putting
boundaries on yourself. And then when you open
those boundaries back up, you have new ways of
expressing yourself. Now I'm going to demo all of
these concepts, enclosures, arpeggios, and limited
range over one progression. I'm going to use the
chord progression, a minor seven, E minor
seven, D minor seven. And since this is an a minor, I'll be using the a Blues scale. Now I'm going to use enclosures. Now I'm going to use arpeggios. Now I'm going to use limited
range and only one octave. And tonic scale. Normally use blue notes. So that was an example to
demonstrate how I was focusing on each improvisational
concepts one at a time. To strengthen that, instead of just practicing
everything all at once, it's important to set
these limitations so we can be very practical and precise when practicing a wide-open concept
like improvisation, which can be overwhelming at first because there's
so many possibilities. In the next lesson,
we're gonna be looking at how you can take
a simple pattern and use it as a tool for composition. Let's
start composing.
9. Patterns and Composing: Oftentimes when I'm
practicing a piano, what I'll be doing is taking a simple pattern or exercise in moving it in different ways and applying it across
different keys. A lot of times a
simple pattern or exercise can then turn into
a full-fledged composition. And there's a link that holds the composition together
because people can tell there's a pattern or something similar acting as a glue
to tie it together. To demonstrate this, I'm
going to use my songs, Central Park West from my album, city in the sky
to show how I use one concept or pattern and turned it into
a full composition. When I was writing
Central Park West, I was using one chord, which was a major chord
encircled by octaves like this. You can move this
chord up the scale. In this case, I was a D major, which has two sharps,
F-sharp and C-sharp. And I was practicing moving that one chord across
the piano like this. And so on. So I'm taking a simple
concept which is the same chord and moving it
in order to play a melody. I'll demonstrate
just the right hand. I'm moving across
the D major scale, taking the same shape and
using that to play a melody. So I've got, and so on. I could also expand on that
chord in play with arpeggios, which would sound like this. The point of this is a
lot of times you can take a simple pattern or motif and
turn it into a composition. I'll show another example from an original composition
in mind, city in the sky, in which I used a four-note
repeated pattern to create the illusion of a skyscraper
moving across in a city. In this song, I was working
with two four-note phrases. Moving between C
minor. In C major. I started with a C minor phrase in which I'm using a four-note
pattern and repeating it. And then moving to
the C major portion. So together it sounds like. So although the chords
are in different keys, there's a link that
ties it together, which is the four-note pattern
that's moving throughout. A lot of times, having a
pattern can also act as a limitation in that it forces you to think
in different ways. But there's always
a link that helps tie the composition together. I encourage you
to try exploring, playing with a pattern and then maybe using it in
your own composition, which you can score
using MuseScore. Anytime you come up with
a pattern that you like, it's important to apply it to as many keys in different songs
as possible so that you can get the maximum mileage out of the pattern and be able to apply it for other people's songs
or your own original works. For this class assignment, I'd like you to
take a pattern or a p denote phrase and use it as a vehicle
for composition, which you can then submit
via the project gallery. In the next lesson, we're gonna look
at how you can use arranging and
dynamics to help take your composition to
the next level by using the full range of sound
available on the piano.
10. Musical Arranging: In this lesson,
we're going to look at how we can use arranging and dynamics to bring out the
full range of the piano. The piano is an extraordinary instrument because
it's basically like having an entire
orchestra at your fingertips. The piano has a larger range
than any other instrument. We have insanely low lows that imitate the contra
bass of the orchestra. And very high highs, which are similar to
a piccolo or flute. When thinking about
composing on the piano, It's important to think
about the range in the arrangement
that we're playing in in order to get the
full spectrum of sounds. Many times, it can
be great to create contrast by playing low, as well as playing high. And thinking about how
you want to structure your composition to get the full technique
out of the piano. When playing the piano, it's important to think
strategically about range and also using dynamics. Dynamics on the piano refers to how loud or soft and
all the varying levels in between that we can use. Dynamics can be thought of like story plots in creative writing. And instead of keeping something stagnant or at the same level, we can use ebbs and flows to create a journey
for our listener. To demonstrate this, I'm going
to play one passage with no dynamics and then experiment with two
different dynamic options. I'll start out by playing a
phrase from an original song, Grand Canyon, with
varying dynamics. When practicing dynamics, you
can often think about arcs similar to a story plot in
drawing on your composition, how you want your
dynamics to rise so that there's gradual rises and falls, almost like a wave. Instead of sudden jagged motions which might throw
off the listener. I'll demonstrate
another example of dynamics over the same
chord progression, but having the dynamics rise and fall in different places. In the second example, I kept the second
two chords quieter. We're in the first example, those chords were louder. Now it's a matter of taste into which example I like more. But it's important to practice dynamics in practice writing in dynamics so that we can use the full range of sound
in volume on the piano. A good way to practice
dynamics is to take a simple phrase like a C
major scale in practice, increasing in volume and
decreasing in volume. A good example would be this. I'll start from the lowest C. So I'm gradually increasing in volume and then practicing
going back down. You can also do
exercises like this with just one node trying to get as many dynamics as possible while going
on a consistent arc. Can see how softly you can press while still
creating a sound. Dynamics are a very powerful tool and we
can use them when composing to create an arc in a story plot to
our composition. Dynamics can also affect
the feeling in mood of the piece and are
very important for conveying the right
emotion to the audience. In the next lesson,
we're going to look at compositional techniques
and sections. So you can help
effectively structure your composition and take
it to the next level.
11. Composer Techniques: In this lesson, we're gonna be looking at compositional
techniques in sections that can be used to create structure when composing. The type of sections that we're gonna be
looking at are most commonly associated
with pop songwriting and include the verse, the chorus, or hook, the bridge, the
intro, and the outro. These function by creating
momentum throughout the song to have familiar
sections come back, we'll also creating a
natural progression to give this song an arc and
a lifespan of its own. Typically, songs, we'll
start with an intro, which may be
instrumental or setup the key or the chord
progression in the song. They will then usually
move into averse, which will have a
melody and is usually more sparse instrumentation
than the chorus. Typically songs
will have 123 Vs, and the melody will be the same, but the lyrics may be different. The chorus or the
hook is meant to hook in the listener
by repeating the catchy as part of the song so that there's
something that's infectious and you have to sing along or dance to the bridge, which is often after the
second chorus or second verse, will function as a slightly
different section to provide another texture before returning back home
to the chorus. Oftentimes, bridges will
modulate into another key, sometimes a fifth away.
The original key. The bridge, is essential
for setting up the chorus again and helping it feel as
a cohesive song altogether. After the final chorus, there will sometimes
be an outro, which may be an instrumental
section or a repeated phrase the vocalist sings to continue
the song as it fades out. When working with
pop songwriting, you can take the same
chord progression and expand upon it by
using variations, using arpeggios or
inversions to create a new section with more
momentum for the chorus, bridge or outro, while still keeping the same core
chord progression. Many times the song can
have one chord progression, but its variations can lead to the chorus and hook and lead to natural developments through
the techniques we've gone over in this class,
including inversions, arpeggios, in different
methods of accompaniment, in traditional song structure
or songs of the 30s, 40s and 50s, such as Broadway classics or also known as great
American song book. They'll often use
the form A-A-B-A, in which the a can be thought
of as a chorus or verse, which is repeated twice. And then there's a bridge and then followed by
the same a again, so that the a is stuck
in the listener's mind. Now, I'm going to demonstrate
an original composition, then uses AABA form entitled We spent
the night on a star. When I wrote this song, I was aiming to make
it sound like a song from the 1930s or 1940s. And so I wanted to use
the traditional form from that time period to make
it sound authentic. You'll hear that the
a section repeats three times in which
there's different lyrics, but it's the same melody. They'll also be a short bridge. So you'll hear a BA, listen to the
repeating a sections. They have different lyrics, but it's the same melody. We walk back. This soft light blue bar gas. They'd God my heart and
I don't want to stop. The streets were close in there. The bell boys singing Goodnight came down
cloudy skies when we spend the night on a stone, we're finding out how to jump. Just know they will be so high. And at night, the tax is paid out as say,
it's twinkling lights, but we spent the night with that song. You could tell that the same
section was repeated three times and the only different
section was the bridge. This is helpful because when
we're learning songs from the great American song book or classic American
songs for the 1940s. If we learned the a section, we've already
essentially learned three-quarters of the song, meaning that we can
learn songs more quickly by focusing on one section
and how it will repeat. In this lesson, we looked at how we can use different
sections for pop songwriting and
also different forums to effectively structure
our composition. It's important to remember these concepts when songwriting, to give our songs the proper arc and make the most effective.
12. Final Thoughts: Alright, We've made
it to the end of the composition and
improvisation class. This class introduced a lot of systems which can help when composing original music or an improvising or
writing melodies. We started out by
looking at ways we can create chord progressions to create tension and resolution and pulling chords
from other keys. We also looked at pentatonic scale improvisation and how we can use this scale to create effective melodies.
And when soloing. We also looked at
repeated phrases and runs and how we can use one phrase to move across the piano to create
effective arrangements. Additionally, we looked at the blues scale and how
we can use blue notes to create a more guitar
lick sound on the piano when
improvising or composing. Since much of what we
covered is very conceptual, It's important to apply these concepts in as
many ways as possible so we can really get
them ingrained in our playing and not just
have them in our mind. Improvising and composing
is a constant journey. And this is merely an
introduction that aims to give you possibilities
to spark creativity. We looked at how you can take one pattern and develop
that into a composition. And also how we can
use song structure and dynamics to create
an effective song. All of these concepts in systems can be used
interchangeably. And it's important to
practice them with a refined vision so we
don't get overwhelmed. As a class assignment, you can take one pattern or repeated note phrase
and workshop it into a composition
so that there's a link moving
throughout your work. It's my hope that you'll be
able to use these concepts in your own improvisation
and composition. And join me in my next class where we look into
creating arrangements.