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Visit Scot's personal site for various bits of outdated information: http://www.scotranney.com

There are basically two steps to being good at anything.

Practice
Repeat step one

The trick is practicing right and concentrating on the details. Once you master the small things, the big picture comes into focus on it's own.

I've been composing and playing jazz piano professionally since 1989. Music has given me a lifetime of experiences and opportunities to enjoy life. I'm poor as dirt, but I enjoy my life!

My first jazz piano mentor was Marc Seales, the jazz piano professor at the University of Washington in Seattle, Washington. He's a good "real world" teacher in that he teaches you to teach yourself - the way it is in real life. He is also one of the top monster players in the world. His blues and gospel background comes out in his bop playing.

I highly recommend the UW jazz program. Look for Marc's recordings- he is a monster player with a blues and gospel background.

One of Marc's philosophies has been a reason why I've enjoyed any sort of success at all: take care of business first then there is time for play.

23 articles with 5 comments, latest comment 07/14/2021 by Scot Ranney.

More Articles in Scot's Studio

Total Beginner Jazz Piano Lesson: 2-5-1 chords

by Scot Ranney on 02/10/2017 - 1 comment 02/10/2017

Are you looking for a place to get started with jazz piano? The 2-5-1 chord progression might be the most used chord progression in jazz. Learning about 2-5-1's is one of the first steps any jazz musician takes. And you get two for one- 2-5-1 chords are used everywhere, and you learn about jazz theory at the same time. You should know how to basically read music and play the piano, just a little bit.

Jazz Piano and Audience Response

by Scot Ranney on 09/27/2014 - 0 comments

You're playing piano in a band and taking a solo. It occurs to you that you're really jamming, the rhythm section is swinging hard, and you have that super euphoric feeling of playing the way you always envision it. Then you finish your solo and you'd never know it from the audience response. The strange part is that the sax player had a huge response, and the bass solo that came after yours also got a huge response. Your solo was just as good. So what's going on?

Updating LJP and Cosmic Awareness

by Scot Ranney on 09/17/2014 - 0 comments

It took six months of work, including a couple months off, for the new LearnJazzPiano.com system to be ready for prime time. It wasn't until Scot moved to Hong Kong did he muster the motivation necessary to get into the project. The following is a brief rundown of what took place to change the old system to the new.

Jazz Piano Notebook Series

Scot Ranney's Jazz Piano Notebook, Volume 1 - jazz piano tricks of the trade

Volume 1 of this educational jazz piano book contains 15 jazz piano exercises, tricks, and other interesting jazz piano techniques, voicings, grooves, and ideas Scot Ranney enjoys playing.

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Scot Ranney's Jazz Piano Notebook, Volume 2 - jazz piano tricks of the trade you can use today

"Latinesque"

Volume 2 has 14 jazz piano exercises and tricks of the trade, and quite a bit of it is Calypso jazz piano related material, including some Monty Alexander and Michel Camilo style grooves. Jazz piano education is through the ears, but books like this can help.

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Tim Richards' Jazz Piano Notebook - jazz piano tricks of the trade

Volume 3 contains 12 jazz piano exercises and explorations by the acclaimed jazz piano educator, pianist, author, and recording artist Tim Richards.

Tim wrote the well known "Exploring Jazz Piano" and "Improvising Blues Piano" books and has several others to his name.

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Jeff Brent's Jazz Piano Notebook - jazz piano tricks of the trade

Volume 4 is by Jeff Brent, a jazz pianist, composer, teacher, and author of "Modalogy" and other acclaimed jazz theory and education books. In this book Jeff shares detailed analysis of transcriptions of live performances. He covers everything from the shape of the songs to the tricks and licks he uses in improvised lines to the ideas behind his lush chord voicings.

buy pdf version - buy coil binding version