this excerpt from the public television program the piano guy
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I'd like you to meet my good friend and a great piano player
Bradley Sowash how are you I'm great today
well I am hoping you're going to be willing to be unselfish enough to
to throw out some of your good ideas as always you're such a good jazz educator
and a good piano player. it's very helpful I think for our viewers to
see what you do and what we want to talk about is the tune autumn leaves
you now it's really a standard it's kind of a jazz standard although i guess it
got really popular originally when Roger Williams recorded it
we were doing some research mid-fifties I think at some point and it
has the distinction of being the the longest-running number-one hit that was
an instrumental
ever so I think it might have some French roots too, I saw in
a lead sheet, fake book
I think that was the lyric and maybe and I guess Johnny Mercer wrote the lyrics
okay but anyway this tune is kinda fun because number one
there's some very identifiable chord changes, it follows going to two fives all the time or the
circle of fifths that we talk about
you can really do it in a couple of different versions you can do it more up like a jazz tune
or more slowly like a ballad.
Let's hear a couple of measures so that
we can be thinking about it.
Then we can start working through it.
Yeah, that is very identifiable yeah I hear that in cocktail clubs and
hot jazz settings and sometimes you hear it in grocery stores. maybe that's the best
way to approach this is by splitting it into two pieces and say let's try it first as
a slow ballad sound that kind of soft you know not soft maybe more
emotional, you know, and then we'll also try to give us give away some tips
that we can do to make it sound a little bit more swinging.
right and maybe I can see that those might even come together.
we can set it up
to perform this in a way that was a ballad first and then swinging in the
end it's a nice way to set up a tune. Maybe we will do it that way
If you're going to do it slow, let's talk about that one first.
at that point you kind of sticking to chords in the left hand and
more noodling in the right-hand. yeah I mean this song has those big
holes in it. If you check it out, nothing
space space space space space what we do with a space well we
tastefully fill it. or in some cases not so tasteful.
I know Roger William's huge hit he had the
Now the signature hook of that tune. He would make this huge run that would come down
yeah I think that was sort of a musical leaves falling off the tree.
clearly I think that was the the allegory there is that you are hearing
leaves coming down but let's give away just one trick
let's get our key together first. Gm
G minor which has the same Black Keys as in Bb
let's just play G minor scale. the other white keys except for Bb and Eb
It is important know that scale if you are going to do that runs because they are solidly within those 7 notes.
you can noodle your way down ...
Let's do the tune
and then we can do some kinda noodle down, I think he did some
thirds ... Let's give that away real slowly right in the middle so we make
sure we get on the camera there. you said minor thirds
so do the tune and play it down low here.
so I'm going to stay in those seven notes and start on the Eb and skip the next note. anything I asked if the next No
and then come down and do it again. So some of them are
minor thirds and some of them are major thirds.
I'm just sticking with the key. Let's say we are in C major. All the white keys.
So you are just following those notes that you gave way the
G minor scale and you are just playing them in thirds.
Do slowly one octave like that.
okay so really it is just a function of
I can't because I don't have good enough chops
You just need to sit there and get good at going ...
but you know it doesn't have to be that complicated any kind of a little scale
passage
if you can play this scale, which isn't hard to finger,
you can just noodle around
that's nice that works nicely for leaves falling
whatever, just play those notes well that sound nice so it happens during the
break of the melody
you know falling leaves, a nice run
Which means you do have to wear multiple personalities, that's tricky you
know you had to be the chord guy
the melody guy and the fill guy - bass player
you know the guitar player and the singer singing now you're the trumpet in between or something.
You have to think in segments like that
okay that brings up a point, people sometimes say that they want to play all really
complicated and big and sound full
what they do is just play too many notes and are trying to do too
much
and it's true that a really full performance has a lot going on
but it's in different roles sure here's the bass, here's the Harmony
here's the melody here are the fills. we are taking advantage of the fact that piano is one of
the only instruments we really have
access to the full orchestra
I think that we are after the sound of imitating a whole band
interesting that is the sound we are after. that's a good way to think
about that mentally
I gotta get a bass player in there you gotta get that stuff in the
middle the harmonic area and you get the melodic line up on top
right and everything in between the melody like this like
four different instruments being imitated you should think that way
that's a good mental approach to take on that.
actually play just a couple measures if you would kinda in tempo with that slower
feel
OK so you really are just taking advantage of the spaces to noodle a little bit and
get in there
It is all right in the scale, those 7 notes. The counterpoint to that would be all right
if we were doing this in a jazz trio are you were doing this yourself
trying to make it swing, which this tune does very well what do you do
differently other than just doing it a little faster
you need to tell us about
sometimes jazz tunes pick up a bit of vocabulary or tradition just by being passed around played by different
guys in there
starts to be a sort of a rendition that is the
definitive way to play it even though that's not the way the original went
okay this is an example of that. there are what we call kicks on this song
where the the chords instead of being in the normal position which is the beginning
of the measure
chord, chord, chord, chord
you hold back a little bit and play this little rhythm
I've heard that a million times. that is a fun way to do it. You hear all the jazz recordings
do that
you get that little kick in there
It is not always the exactly same rhythm.
exactly the same rhythm but you can just hold back on that chord
We changed the melody originally.
We started out swinging.
on that one, it's the fourth kick. it tends to be open like ...
you fill it anyway you want. my version of thinking through it
you hear a bass player walk one measure
then you go back to head. so who knows who first did it that
way but it seems like
you call that on a gig everybody knows how to do that.
that's just for the A section. the second section typically goes into a hard
swing with like a walk
and something
and so there aren't kicks in the second half okay so there aren't kicks in the 2nd half typically.
Let's talk briefly - where we could talk ourselves into a huge black hole here so
we'll try to
to keep it is on top of the water as possible
about the chord changes - the fact that this goes 2 5's or the circle of fifths
all the time
but your ear really follows the chord changes in this tune well
right. It is very logical.
in fact and that logic can inform the way you improvise if you play little
patterns
well let's look at the chords first. okay so here's the roots of the chords first.
So here are the roots of the chords.
the second chord is an F, 4 notes up
and the next chord is a B-flat 4 notes up
and the next chord is 4 notes up
so these are all the roots i am playing. okay this next one ... again you're
talking about the roots of the first four chords which starts on a Cm
Starts on a C minor. again all these chords stick to the keys. There is nothing
surprising about this chord.
The flavor of the chord may be different could be minors or majors, or 7ths
but the roots are all going from C, F, Bb to Eb
exactly so it's moving around the circle here. the next logical one would be a
Ab
but they cheat a little bit and play an A natural to keep us from getting out into outer
space
another fourth and then another fourth and then back home
So it moves right around the circle of fifths okay
and that's what they sometimes people heard about it. but people say that they don't know about the circle the circle of fifths
you spent a lot of time worrying about some other things but
in essence it is a roadmap in the case of a lot of
chord changes that chords have this tendency
to move in those intervals. it makes it easy to memorize
tunes when you realize that. right
It is just a pattern. okay so now putting that into practice with this
you were ... well I was going to say that because that's so patternistic, you can
play patterns
with your solo. I'll just take a C minor 7
Can we take one step backwards to make it clearer for the
viewers
let's just play the chord changes with nothing else. Just the root and a chord in your right hand.
so we will just follow
I'll do them all in root position
F, Bb, EbMaj 7.
Amin7b5
4 up to D,
Then 4 up to G.
those roots just kept going up by fourths. we could do it that way.
my left hand ...
It just moves up by fourths. yeah okay that's a good
visual I think. all right now you are talking about a little pattern well
it is nice to play sequences. you hear this all the time in Bach.
Bach is always doing this
and then in 5 more places
you can borrow from that and do a kind of sequence
just taking the same idea and moving it down, even a really simple idea
just taking patterns and moving them down. speaking of Bach
I had a gig a couple of years ago that where the song came into play
I was suppose to play all Baroque music ok they were in costume and in Renaissance clothes on and
eating turkey legs, and carrying swords and they wanted to
to hear a lot of Baroque music well
jazz guys run out pretty short
and so I just picked songs are paternalistic like this from the world of jazz
and played them in a baroque way so
instead of this I was...
That sounds strangely familiar
well I can show a simple way to to play a bass line on the
second half for this
you don't have to know how to walk to play a nice bass line
this is going to give us an idea for a great bass line to use
so
just playing roots on one
and any other chord tone on beat 3
so we are playing half notes
check it out
So play the root each time on beat one and any other chord tone on the other ones
That's good for
the viewers
so what we're talking about is walking a bass line
getting to a point where you have something interesting to play
It's on your way to a walk
in your left hand. A good stepping stone is to say
you need to play the root when the chord happens. when it on one or whatever
but to get from one to the other just take any note in between those two.
any chord tone - in any note in the chord
That is a nice way to start
that's a good stepping stone to walking where you fill it all in.
And that is more advanced and that has a lot more of this going on
that is a great step 1 to get
pushed off in that direction so that is helpful
Lets hear you play this tune
eyes open for a lot of what we talked about but
if you would like to go to a solo we would love to hear that as well, good
yeah, I like this tune.
I'm sorry can you try to play the beginning real
slow and then work into the jazz. that's a nice idea
I'll start down here low
You are playing a little melody in your left hand
well why not. I'll play it in both hands
Here's where I will set up the Jazz feel.
how lucky am I, I get to set up close and watch this all day long
this excerpt from the public television
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