this excerpt from the public television program the piano guy
is brought to you by namm the international music Products Association
and by Sharp Electronics Corporation
In this segment I want to show you how to play a really fun tune called
Jailhouse Rock
it's going to stretch out a little bit from the way we normally do things with
playing all these chords because in this particular tune
i think it is more appropriate to not get into all of that and instead
play the way we have always heard it on the recording
so let's dig right in now obviously this was a big Elvis tune right
and it's played in a kind of early rock n roll style all the time
in the recording rather than hearing all these
heavy chords because there was some strumming guitar going on. the big thing in this
arrangement
was really the bass line in addition to the melody because Elvis was singing it
so it's kinda hard to imitate that on a piano, so why even try doing that
let's just try to imitate the feel of the whole thing and we can do it
by imitating a bass sound with the piano so what we are going to do in this tune
which really is a blues tune
there's a C7 and an F7 and a G7
so all three of
the blues chords are in there in the key of C
but again it doesn't follow the form perfectly because it stretches out those
first four measures of C
into an extra four measures so you get this stretch
at the beginning and then it kind of turns into a blues tune once you hear
the bass line kick in
I think it'll make sense why do this for a few seconds now
the melody by itself - you really need to interpret this one because you have to
imagine someone singing it, it is going to sound kind of silly just playing it by itself
but it goes like this:
however you want to do that. I would
probably use a lot of what we call the slide, where you ...
are trying to make this kind of funky and bluesy
you know something like that so feel free to do that. then obviously rhythmically
is certainly don't want to... this is a perfect example
of how not to interpret a lead sheet exactly as written
because if I read that exactly as written, it would sound like this
Boy that is really swinging, huhhh...
so you have to feel free to interpret this the way you can imagine
what it would sound like on the record or the way you heard it
or the way you want to sing it for that for that matter now let's get to the
other side of the coin in this case instead of playing all these implied chords
which would be a C7 and all this
All I'm going to do instead is just the bass line and what
they did in the recording
you heard this it was a kind of pick up
or a syncopated into the downbeat it would go
1, 2, 3
and all I am doing is playing the root of the chord
because the first 8 measures are just C chords.
so I'm just - I'm sliding from the C # down to the C
and doing it in this tempo. It's 1, 2, 1,2,3
right do you hear the way it kinda kicks over that way
so you keep doing that through the first eight measures and then when you get to
the point where it says
jailbird sing let's rock thats when it really starts gonna kick into
the Blues sound
I should have mentioned that its I've got the advantage of playing on a
digital piano
so I've got my left hand set. I've got this piano split the left hand set on a
really good sounding kind of picked bass sound
so what we need to do to really imitate that bass line again is do this part for
the first eight measures
then when it gets ready this is what I want to give away when it gets
ready to move into that section where it moves to the F, you go like this
I'll blindly give that away again.
start on the G and go Ba-tuh
you can imagine a n upright bass player plucking across two
strings they go ...
that's what you're imitating
and then you gotta walk right up
so I'm gonna go from here
excuse me,
here comes, once you get to that
and it is really cooking temo wise what you want to do is this I think this is an easy one to give
away it's a good start
all I'm doing is spelling out the F chord
1,3,5
go back to the C
So all you're doing is that same pattern
so that's really the pattern and that's a real standard old rock bass
line is this
it is a good bluesy lick to get under hand
so
I'm gonna put that part together along with a my best attempt at playing the
melody line
moderately interesting and bluesy like ... We'll put them together
in this case we're going to completely leave the chords out and just focus on
the bass line and the melody line
here's what it would sound like
those are fun things to do and when you can really be focusing on just
that single part and really making it groove hard thats a ton fun to play
like that on a piano so
take advantage of what I've shown you hopefully get up go to your
piano if you have one
and sit down and try to get some of this under hand and have fun with the tune
Jailhouse Rock. this excerpt from the public television program
piano guy has been brought to you by NAMM the International Products Association.
recreational music-making is a key initiative
of NAMM. to learn more visit your local NAMM music retailer or go to www.namm.org
and by Sharp Electronics Corporation
dedicated to improving people's lives through the use of technology and a
commitment to innovation
quality value design and the environment