Hi I'm Pro saxophonist Jamie Anderson, you're watching Get Your Sax Together
and in this video I'm going to teach you how to play Phil Woods' famous iconic
sax solo on the Billy Joel song "Just The Way You Are".
I've listened to a lot
of sax solos in my time but this Phil Woods solo on Billy Joel's just
the way you are is surely one of the most beautiful and melodic solos ever
played. I'm gonna teach you exactly how to play it, break it down, all the notes
and fingerings for alto, but if you go down into the description and click the
link you will find a free pdf with the whole solo written out for alto AND
tenor sax, and the chords. That's a wicked thing to go and get so go and print it
off and follow along as we learn the lesson. Now in the meantime, if you're enjoying
Get Your Sax Together you can really help me out by subscribing to the channel, click
that Bell icon, that way you'll be notified when I upload new stuff, go and
check out my Instagram feed, leave me a comment down below, and without further
ado, let's get on and learn just the way you are.
So straight on and let's learn
the notes for the solo, starting with the intro section. Now this is phrase 1 played slowly...
Now here's that phrase one intro section played faster...
Now phrase 2, which is the
end of the intro flowing into the beginning of the real solo, so here it is
played slowly...
Now here's that second phrase played at full speed...
phrase three, lovely melodic
phrase to begin his solo, nice and fluid. Here it is played slowly...
Now here's our third phrase played faster...
Okay, phrase 4 is a really long
phrase, so here it is a played slowly...
Now here's our fourth phrase played faster...
Now phrase five, which is a kind
of bluesy phrase that leads into the next chord. Here it is played slowly...
Now phrase five played faster...
Phrase six, another really long phrase, this is
gorgeous, and it's got the most famous and beautiful line in any sax solo I
think I know coming up in this bit. Phrase six, played slowly...
Now this lovely phrase six played faster...
And then the answering half to phrase six is phrase seven to round it off. This
is another wonderful phrase, here it is played slowly...
Now the final phrase, phrase 7, played faster...
So that's it, we've learned all
the notes. There's some tricky bits in there - the low B's are particularly
difficult to get on alto, you can hear them on the recording he's just kind of
popping them out you know, they don't have to be a full note really just a
little note. Some of the little tricky things in there as well, it goes
over the full range of the instrument. You've got all the notes now, practice it
slowly until you've got it and then when you finally got it all together it
should sound something like this when you string it all together...
Like I always say on Get Your Sax Together, you've learned the notes, but go
to the original recording, go and check out my transcription series if you need
to about copying phrasing and try and copy it exactly like Phil Woods plays it,
because it's so beautiful you can learn a lot from it. So remember, learn the phrasing!!
That's it for this week. Congratulations, you can now play Phil Woods' incredible
solo on Billy Joel's just the way you are. If you enjoy get your sax
together you can really help me out and build up my channel by subscribing,
click the bell to be notified when I upload new material, go and check out my
Instagram, leave me a comment, and don't forget to go and get the PDF in the
description that way you're going to learn a lot more because you can analyze
it in look at the notes and all that good stuff. So until next week happy
saxing and I'll see you later!