LearnJazzPiano.com archives: New to Jazz piano

Musical_Illitera -- 06/02/2004, 10:24:19 -- #4735

Hi all, hope you all have patience with my problem. I started playing teh Piano about 3 years ago. I am not very literate in music but i have been able to get around this problem by listening to the piece i want to play very carefully and then getting the sheet music and shomehow muddle along to get the right notes and whatnot. I then decided to start learning jazz piano this year; I had no idea how hard it is!! I listen to pieces i feel i can play but when i ge the sheet music i just cannot play them. I get along fine with the melody but playing the bass AND the melody in jazz is simply impossible. I guess in short is it any point to go on seeing as i cannot read music AND play at the same time or can i muddle along with jazz also? Thank you very much if you have been able to read this and understand my problem. If there is any point you do not understand please let me know so i can clarify myself.

albetan -- 06/02/2004, 11:36:35 -- #4736

You need a solid basis for beginning the study of jazz. I invite you to "rooms" "Albetan's area" and go to "files list". Near my name please click e red "w" and you will find a list of lessons for beginners. Good luck.

smg -- 06/02/2004, 16:07:54 -- #4741

i cannot read music AND play at the same time This is up to you,but most of us over here say different..a lot of online sites that get you reading in no time...........

jordo -- 06/02/2004, 22:10:11 -- #4748

Maybe you need to change your approach to reading notes. Do you find you have to look at each note, identify it, and then locate it on the piano? It seems from your post like you have a decent ear which helps you along as you learn a piece.  Perhaps a more wholistic approach would help you.  When we read language, we don't pick out each letter in a word and then identify it.  We see the word as a whole, even groups of words as a whole.  A similar approach could be applied to reading music.  Try to look at patterns of notes and their intervallic relationships to one another.  ie:  Can you easily identify an intervallic 5th on a sheet of music and just as easily make a fifth on the keyboard? There are lots of different ways of learning to read music, its good to figure out what works best for you. Maybe you'd get more satisfaction just developing your ear playing.   Another thought: with your problem chording and playing melody at the same time, could it be that with your initial reading you're starting off too fast and just need to slow down, even to a painfully slow pace, to get both hands working together?  Then you could gradually increase your speed.

ubill -- 06/04/2004, 00:52:54 -- #4761

Hello, I have a question to ask here. The first time I went to albetan's room, the list of message started with what I believe was the very oldest message in the forum... talked about how to learn songs and then something about the meaning of the word "kinder" and so on... But the next time I entered Albetan's room, no matter what links I clicked, I can't seem to get back to display from the very oldest message first, which I wanted to follow until the current discussion.  The link "Display Old Messages" doesn't seem to display so far as that. So I am quite at a loss about what to do, as I think exactly what I wanted to know was at that first page itself. Could anyone guide me on this? I already tried the help and all but couldn't figure it out still. :*-( Sorry if this didn't really seem Jazz related here... but I hope to learn something and post here someday :-)

Musical_Illitera -- 06/04/2004, 08:27:36 -- #4767

Jardo thanks a lot. yo have managed to understand my problem, despite the meagre info i gave. I do read one note at a time and then try to find it on the piano. It is extremely cumbersome and i just gave up and started listening to the piece until i could hum the whole tune, note for note, and then try and reproduce that on the piano. i will however take you advice and try and look at whole cluster of notes instead of one note at a time. I however have one quick question...why does it sound like most jazz pianists play with the right hand only? is this because they have a Bass guiarist with them already?

albetan -- 06/04/2004, 08:28:50 -- #4768

First time you come to a page here in LJP, oldest message is first. Then when you open again same page there are not messages...  If you click on "display old messages" they appear newest first. In red letters click on "files list"... and appear lessons, exercises and articles. And welcome to Albetan's Area.

7 -- 06/04/2004, 11:47:36 -- #4773

Musical_Illitera, You ask "why does it sound like most jazz pianists play with the right hand only?" Do you mean soloing or comping or do you mean both soloing and comping? There are many pianists that drop the left hand when  soloing. Miles once suggested to Herbie that he do that. It's a brain power issue. While all pianists use both hands (usually) when comping it is quite possible that you are not hearing the pianist's left hand because: a) you haven't learned yet how to use your ear to pick specific parts out of an arrangement, or b) due to what I call "the muddle in the middle" the pianist's left hand is falling in the same range as the guitar and other rhythm instruments and is consequently covered up in the mix. 7

7 -- 06/04/2004, 11:51:59 -- #4774

To Ubill, There are a lot of messages in Albetan's Area. They won't all fit on one screen. Scroll down to the bottom of the messages and you'll see a red link that says "Next Message Screen". Keep doing that until you get back to the very first message. 7

ubill -- 06/05/2004, 09:11:38 -- #4776

To albetan and 7, Thanks for the reply. I already did that before posting my question above, i.e. clicked on "Display Old Messages" then on "Next Message Screen". It does as you (and the help file) says by displaying from the newest message first. However the problem I faced is that clicking on "Next Message Screen" can't bring me back to the *very very first messages* that is posted there... that is, on the second message screen, there is no "Next Message Screen" link that can bring me further back. Maybe u could try and see whether it happens to you as well... Anyway I got around this by registering a new account and then clicking on Albetan's room... once and only once can I see the first few messages in his room before they are lost to me forever... anyway, thru this way I managed to get the info that I had been looking for. Maybe there's some way to access the first messages at will, but I haven't found it.

albetan -- 06/05/2004, 13:22:17 -- #4777

Hi ubill: I'm glad seeing your efforts to read my old articles. Please click on  "my settings" upwards near search engine... in "maximum number of messages to display " put 100.  So you will have in one screen all old messages.

7 -- 06/05/2004, 14:49:59 -- #4779

Ubill, I had "max msgs" set at 40. This brought me up to RobM's #3160. The same message appeared after clicking "Next Message Screen" and there was the same exact message AND NOTHING ELSE. After changing "max msgs" to 999. I got to the first message, "Message 394 is private" and the first readable message was albetan's 1/31/2004 16:36:11 #411. I believe those must be the first messages in that area. This appears to be a bug. I will direct Scott to read this thread. It seems as if the "Next Message Screen" link is not working. 7

ubill -- 06/07/2004, 10:34:28 -- #4802

Hello albetan, Good to know that you're glad about that... actually, it is I who should be thankful to get the chance to learn from you and from all the people here. Greetings to 7, After reading your method, I promptly changed the "max msgs" to "9999" and it did as it should, I managed to get all the messages from the newest msg right up till the very first one, all on one screen. I think that is the setting that I am the most comfortable with (all in one screen.) As you mentioned too, I think there is a bug if you set the "max msgs" at a value less than the total number of messages, at some point you'll get stuck on the "Next Message Screen" link? Maybe Scot would know better about this. p.s. Scot - I am more familiar with those ikonboard and phpBB style forums, how did it come to be that learnjazzpiano took up this current style of BBS? (I visited here, a loooooong time ago before it was migrated to this current bbs system, but I can't remember already how *that* one was. Just recently got back on the Internet again..). Anyway I think this is a suitable BBS system for organizing this site's contents, just that a lil' bit not-so-intuitive, compared to phpBB, to use in the beginning. (Just my two cents... no biggie. Tryin' here to learn to make it work fine for me now... :))

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