LearnJazzPiano.com archives: Otis Spann's "This Is The Blues" transcription
7 -- 06/14/2004, 20:37:00 -- #4926
~
I finally finished this transcription (it took me almost 40 hours work to do it!)

The left hand bass is still available in the "Walking Bass" room (along with a short text file containing a few observations).

I've uploaded the midi file of the full transcription (both hands) to both the "Transcriptions" room and the "Blues" room.

*

This was originally step-entered into Cakewalk's Scorewriter notation program. Consequently it's devoid of dynamics - it was designed to be printed out and read, hence the "piano-roll" sound on playback.

If you would like to convert the file to standard notation, simply save the midi file to disk and then open it up in any decent notation software. It'll be fairly accurate (but probably not as pretty as I laid it out in Scorewriter).

*

This project was a commission. I never would have gone to all this work if I hadn't been getting paid for it.  Nonetheless, I found that there were a few of Otis' tricks worth stealing in there - maybe you will too.

For those of you who are unaware of Otis Spann, he was Muddy Waters' brother-in-law and long time pianist.

*

And what about the piece itself? I won't say that Otis used every trick in the book, but darn near!

Hopefully this will prove interesting and useful to some of you.


7

james3 -- 06/15/2004, 01:20:53 -- #4929
incredible work.....I love Otis Spann!  Thanks I'll take a heavy look at this

James

Gordon -- 06/15/2004, 04:19:50 -- #4930
Thanks for that 7 - brill - Can't wait to play around with some of those bass lines !

Gordon

Copyright © 2005 by Scot Ranney. All rights reserved.
Click Here for more information about performances and clinics. Click Here to sign up for Scot's music announcements.