Jazz Piano School

This tip that I will teach you in literally one minute has the power to drastically change your solo piano sound instantly. Don't believe me? Well there is only one thing I have left to say...try it. It isn't for everyone because you might be well beyond this, but if you're playing LH root position chords with RH single note melody lines...then you absolutely need to watch this. Even if you think you're an intermediate or advanced player, try to do this with some tunes. If you can't...it might be a good time to working on your fundamentals so you can integrate this into your playing. This step will allow you to add many more advanced concepts into your playing with ease. If you're interested in learning more about my solo piano system and how it can help you quickly and easily change your solo piano performance go to the link below to get my free 3 part video workshop. It's very in depth and will give you a lot of amazing education you can work on today. https://jazzpianoschool.com/solopianoworkshop

Daily Jazz Piano Practice: A 4 Step System

here is way more to improvising over the blues then just using the traditional blues scale. When I learned these other two blues scales, and combined them with the traditional blues scale, my playing changed forever. In this lesson, I'll teach you each blues scale, demonstrate how to use them, and then combine them so you can hear what the improvisation potential is when using these three blues improv tools. If you're looking to learn more about improvisation and want to learn my 5 most important improvisation steps to building a solid improv foundation and layering on advanced improv methods...vist the link below to watch my free masterclass. https://jazzpianoschool.com/improvmasterclass

A fellow musician who is learning how to play jazz piano mentioned that all the voicings he uses sound to thin. I asked him what voicings he was using. He said he was using a lot of drop 2's and rootless voicings in the high register of the piano. BOOM. There is the issue. The number 1 issue in fact that students have when comping jazz on piano. Most videos, blogs, even teachers, teach about rootless voicings, or upper structure voicings that are all up high. Most students should actually begin they're comping journey down low with these 2 voicings! Enjoy! If you're interested in receiving a free notated pdf of my 22 most favorite jazz piano voicings go to the link below. https://materials.jazzpianoschool.com/our-top-22-voicings

Learning how to improvise can be extremely overwhelming. Most of the time you'll get very vague advice. In this lesson, I'll teach you the 2 most important fundamental steps to learning improv. These 2 steps will help you build a rock solid foundation and allow you to layer on more advanced concepts with ease. If you're interested in checking out my free improvisation masterclass with even more in-depth education go to the link below. https://jazzpianoschool.com/improvmasterclass

WP & YT Summary: Most jazz piano students have no control over their left hand while improvising. This can drastically take away from your improvisation sound. Most students also don't even know HOW to fix this or what to do. In this video I'll show you 4 very easy patterns and methods your LH can use while you improvise to ensure you sound like a pro. Have you been trying to learn jazz piano with youtube videos, dvds, teachers but feel like you're still constantly guessing, can't play any tunes without copying what someone else has played, and don't know how to connect all the tid bits you've learned? I went through the same thing but thankfully stumbled upon a learning system I created based on proven language learning blocks. The JPS System brings you through 4 main categories of learning, Theory, Technique, Improvisation and Repertoire. I'll show you exactly how to utilize our popular system so you can finally achieve jazz piano freedom: https://jazzpianoschool.com/lookinside

Red Garland was one of the greatest jazz pianists to ever live. This transcription analysis covers the tune, "A Foggy Day", and is off the album, "A Garland of Red". This analysis is taken from directly inside my brand new Improvisation Mastery Specialty course which is now available for purchase at a discount by going to the link below. Click the link below for more info. https://jazzpianoschool.com/improv

In this free lesson I'm going to walk you through how to improvise over the tune Like Someone In Love. This is taken directly from a live lesson that I gave to all the JPS members during the Tune of The Month Series that we do. If you're interested in learning more about improvisation, go check out my new specialty course that's being released called, Improvisation Mastery. Click the link below for more info. https://jazzpianoschool.com/improv

Summary: In part 3 of the 2023 planning series I'll be covering a full spectrum plan to crush all the jazz piano voicings you could possibly need in 2023. Voicings are necessary for all parts of jazz. Solo piano, improvisation, comping and so much more. When you have a solid plan to improve your voicings you will be making progress across the board which is fantastic. This will translate to everything you do. Don't forget to grab the planning book below as I refer to the steps inside when teaching this lesson. https://jazzpianoschool.com/2023planningbook

We're on to part 2 of our 2023 planning sessions. In this live stream lesson, I'll be covering the full solo piano blueprint and plan you need to make serious progress in 2023. If playing jazz solo piano is your goal, then you'll definitely want to take detailed notes on this episode. Don't forget to go to the link below to get our free planning guide because I'm referring directly to the steps in this free guide for solo piano. https://jazzpianoschool.com/2023planningbook

Jazz Piano Plan For 2023, Part 1

Sus chords can be mysterious but with the 3 different types of sus chords I'm going to show you today, you'll know exactly where, when and how to use them. The first sus chord will be more of a general, space sound you can use over the majority of dominant chords in tunes. The second one will be more for ballads to pull at the heart strings. And the third will be more for a dirty, gritty, soulful sound like in the blues. Enjoy!

So if improvisation is spontaneous...how do we practice the art of spontaneity? There are a couple key points that make improvisation sound good. No matter how many fancy tools you throw on top like the blues scale, pentatonics, half whole, scale, lydian augemented scale, the foundation still applies. In this podcast I'll show you the BEST improvisation exercise you can use through out your entire career no matter HOW good you get. I still use it to this day.

The 3 jazz piano licks included in this lesson are important for a couple reasons. One, they contain both scalar motion and arpeggiated thirds. Most jazz piano improvisation contains both of these movements very frequently. Two, they contain chromatic motion. Chromatic motion is extremely important in bebop to slide into chord tones or move around them to create tension. Third, these three licks emphasize the thirds of each chord in this two-five-one progression. By emphasizing the thirds, of chords, you will reflect the harmony of progressions and create beautiful solos. Most importantly, in this lesson, I go further than just showing you the licks, I teach you how to analyze them and extract improvisation lego building blocks to use on your own. This will allow you to spontaneously create improvisation freely rather than waiting for a specific meausre or phrase in a tune and regurgitating a memorized lick. You'll be able to build solos your self based upon what you want to play. Just like building legos! Enjoy! To learn more about our secret Black Friday 2022 offer go to... https://jazzpianoschool.com/blackfriday2022

These 5 improvisation strategies are continuations off the last tutorial on comping through a 3-6-2-5. Enjoy! To learn more about our secret Black Friday 2022 offer go to... https://jazzpianoschool.com/blackfriday2022

Progressions in jazz can get extremely boring. Especially if you're playing them the same every time. A common one that you'll see in so many tunes is a 3-6-2-5. If you're bored of playing a 3-6-2-5 the same or need some new ideas, I got exactly what you need. In this podcast I'll show you 5 easy ways to play a 3-6-2-5 that will sound COMPLETELY different and extremely hip at the same time. Here we go!

The metronome can either be your best friend or your worst enemy! Practicing with the metronome is an essential way to develop your own internal sense of time. In this podcast lesson, Sterling will show you some tips and tricks to use the metronome in creative ways to test your sense of time and make room for improvement while making friends with the metronome!

Jazz doesn't always have to be hard. I swear. Sometimes one specific skill set can be broken down into 3 easy steps. I recently taught my special Accelerator Program students this easy 3 step process to thicken and fatten up their arrangements and they absolutely loved it! This process can be used over any tune and will serve you for the rest of your jazz piano career. It's well worth your time to learn. Enjoy!

When learning new tunes, it can often be tricky to know which notes to play over chords that are unfamiliar. By finding the home key and practicing improvising over chord progressions, you can be ready to play over chords to any tune. Follow along as Sterling shows you how to do it in this podcast lesson.

There are usually a handful of things in life that REALLY help you make some serious progress. This goes for almost everything in life. Golf, painting, riding a bike...literally anything. If you find the right drill or exercise you can unlock A LOT of doors. In improvisation, that one drill is this. And by this I mean the exercise that I give you in this podcast. Practice this a lot and I guarantee you'll drastically improve fast. Enjoy!

It can be easy to get stuck using the same tired licks or sets of voicings. Here is a new way you can approach comping and improvising by incorporating the intervals of tenths and sixths. Sterling Cozza will show you in this lesson how to practice these intervals to seamlessly integrate them into your playing!

Action creates reaction. If motivation and inspiration naturally found us, there would be millions of Monet's, da Vinci's and Oscar Peterson's in the world. Unfortunately, to spark creativity we need to do things that ignite it! In this podcast I'll show you 5 amazing ways to bring more creativity and exploration to your improvisation. Jazz Piano School's new small group Accelerator program is now open. Get exclusive teaching from Brenden, his staff, guest masterclass', private lessons, weekly playing assignments and more. go to... https://jazzpianoschool.com/smallgroup

There are just some things in jazz that are completely random and do not have a deep theory concept attached to them... but they sound freakin' great! And you want to know them. That's exactly what this episode will teach you in regards to comping. I'll show you 3 misc. comping textures that will instantly make your comping sound better. Check it out! Jazz Piano School's new small group Accelerator program is now open. Get exclusive teaching from Brenden, his staff, guest masterclass', private lessons, weekly playing assignments and more. Go to: https://jazzpianoschool.com/smallgroup

"Mercy, Mercy, Mercy" is a jazz standard written by pianist Joe Zawinul and made famous by Cannonball Adderly's Quintet. In this tutorial, you will learn how to play the tune using authentic gospel voicings which have a variety of applications. Enjoy! Have you been trying to learn jazz piano with youtube videos, dvds, teachers but feel like you're still constantly guessing, can't play any tunes without copying what someone else has played, and don't know how to connect all the tid bits you've learned? I went through the same thing but thankfully stumbled upon a learning system I created based on proven language learning blocks. The JPS System brings you through 4 main categories of learning, Theory, Technique, Improvisation and Repertoire. I'll show you exactly how to utilize our popular system so you can finally achieve jazz piano freedom: https://jazzpianoschool.com/lookinside

Learning jazz takes you on MANY different paths. Trust me. I know from experience. It's like using a GPS, sometimes maps will take you 50 miles out of your way, where as if you had taken a diffferent route, it would have taken you 5 miles. This is happens all the time in jazz. In this episode when you follow MY drop 2 path, you'll not only learn your drop 2 voicings faster, you'll understand them better, learn multiple variations, and where and how to use them. Now if that doesn't sound good, I don't know what does. Enjoy! Jazz Piano School's new small group Accelerator program is now open. Get exclusive teaching from Brenden, his staff, guest masterclass', private lessons, weekly playing assignments and more. go to... https://jazzpianoschool.com/smallgroup

The word itself can be cause a lot of resistance among students. This happened to me for years. Just hearing the word...MODE...cause me to freeze up and not want to learn jazz piano. But in this podcast I'll give you a COMPLETELY different spin on how to use modes. I'll actually compose music and atmospheres on the spot with different modes. I even tell little stories that I hear as I'm compsing the music. Check it out! You'll never think of modes again. I promise. Jazz Piano School's new small group Accelerator program is now open. Get exclusive teaching from Brenden, his staff, guest masterclass', private lessons, weekly playing assignments and more. go to... https://jazzpianoschool.com/smallgroup

This podcast lesson is based on the education I taught for my brand new Accelerator program. It breaks down the piano into 3 different registers when playing solo piano and will tell you exactly what to do and play in each of them. This information is a MUST have for anyone looking to excel solo piano performance. Jazz Piano School's new small group Accelerator program is now open. Get exclusive teaching from Brenden, his staff, guest masterclass', private lessons, weekly playing assignments and more. go to... https://jazzpianoschool.com/smallgroup

This podcast lesson will show you how you can use to improve your improvisation over any tune in any key using this one simple exercise. By practicing improvising over 3-6-2-5 chord progressions in this manner, you will improve how quickly and fluently you can come up with lines over standard jazz chord changes. You'll be playing great lines in no time! Have you been trying to learn jazz piano with youtube videos, dvds, teachers but feel like you're still constantly guessing, can't play any tunes without copying what someone else has played, and don't know how to connect all the tid bits you've learned? I went through the same thing but thankfully stumbled upon a learning system I created based on proven language learning blocks. The JPS System brings you through 4 main categories of learning, Theory, Technique, Improvisation and Repertoire. I'll show you exactly how to utilize our popular system so you can finally achieve jazz piano freedom: https://jazzpianoschool.com/lookinside

The #1 Solo Piano Mistake Happening Right Now

No matter how much you know, making simple improvisation sound great continues to be the name of the game. If you blow 8th notes for days, it's not music. It's an exercise. Making music is about development, texture, musicality and more. Learn all about making simple improvisation sound great in this podcast. Jazz Piano School's new small group Accelerator program is now open. Get exclusive teaching from Brenden, his staff, guest masterclass', private lessons, weekly playing assignments and more. Go to: https://jazzpianoschool.com/smallgroup

If you want to sound like Bill Evans, you have treat the “classical” end of the spectrum with equal respect and time as the jazz process. When you do this, You can learn to play from the same basic framework as Bill yet sound completely individual.

The last live stream I did went so well that I had to turn it into a podcast. These 3 solo piano steps are an absolute must practice in order to play solo piano well. I also talk about the critical 2 categories you should group tunes into in order to confidently know how to approach all tunes. Enjoy!

When it comes to jazz piano, there is a myriad of techniques, voicings, and approaches which one can study. This doesn't mean that not everyone can play jazz piano! In this podcast, we've boiled it down to 3 functional techniques which you can use to play jazz piano. Follow along to find out what they are!

Bud Powell was one of the kings of bebop at the piano. In this podcast you'll learn 3 easy take aways for improvisation that Bud uses that you can implement TODAY to drastically elevate the sound of your improv. This will conclude my LONG series on bebop and bebop approaches. If you haven't checked out the previous episodes I highly recommend you go back to listen to the series in it's entirety. Enjoy!

What does it mean when people talk about "finding your own voice," and how are you supposed to do it? Here is one idea for you which Sterling will teach in this week's podcast. In this lesson, he'll show you how to add a daily warmup to your practice routine to explore your own creativity through "drone improvisation." By playing whatever comes to mind over a single note drone, you can explore infinite possibilities and develop your own sound!

Bud Powell was a bebop genius and in this podcast I analyze a part of his solo and explain the simple elements he's using over and over and over again. After learning these elements, I guarantee you'll have a much better understanding of how to play bebop, and will be able to play it yourself with a lot more ease.

There comes a time for exercises and a time to transform exercises into music. But what is the process? How do we go from bebop approach note improvisation exercises to USING bebop approaches in an actual musical solo? Find out in this episode!

Learning you bebop approaches is one thing...connecting them through 2-5-1's is the next step. That's exactly what I'll be showing you in this episode as well as how to spontaneously improvise with them as well.

If you feel like your LH has been fighting you while improvising or just want to improve your LH approach, this video is for you! Follow along with these 3 easy steps to improve your left hand comping.

In this podcast lesson we will explore various 5-note combinations of pentatonic voicings as seen in the classic modal jazz tune "So What." There are many variations on how to use these chords, and by the end of this lesson you will have several new ways of playing them which will give a fresh sound to your comping in minor keys!

Major 7th chords are the resolution to a 2-5-1 and with that comes new bebop lines and approaches. Learn how to utilize the major 7th in your improvisation and how to start picturing your bebop line from start to finish through a 2-5-1. Enjoy!

In this podcast episode I'll dive into bebop approach notes and bebop lines you can play over dominant 7th chords. Dominant 7th chords tend to give students problems for some reason. With this episode you'll learn all the bebop movements you and need and how to connect them so you can create some killer improv over dominant 7th chords in tunes.

We've talked about learning tunes here in previous podcast lessons, but here we're going to focus on how to master playing the melody of any standard tune in 5 easy steps. By the end of this lesson, you will know the melody of a standard and not only be able to perform it convincingly, but also interpret it in an authentic and original way!

Learning bebop can feel completely overwhelming. There are so many approaches over so many chords and then connecting them is a whole other ball game. To help you out, I'm going to show you the most POPULAR bebop approaches I use on a daily basis and at all my gigs. Today I'll cover minor 7th chords and specifically what I play over each chord tone. Enjoy!

The blues is a fundamental element of jazz piano. What would happen if you played a blues every day as part of your jazz piano practice routine in 2022? By playing a blues-a-day, you can challenge yourself to learn melodies, voicings, and improvise in different keys. This will expand your musicality, and make you ready for just about anything!

Playing original compositions can be quite the journey compared to playing regular jazz standards. In this episode I explore 3 weird and very modern chords I had to play and solo over on a recent gig I played. Here's what they are!

We finally wrap up this series by talking about taking action. How do we take action in 2022 to make progress in jazz piano? I'll talk about what practice exercises to use, how to follow the systems, and so much more.

We go a little further into our planning in this one. We're looking at the plan for our goals today. What is the plan to accomplish our goals? What are the systems? In today's podcast episode I'll show you how to plan to accomplish different jazz piano goals like solo piano, improvisation, and more.

A little planning and thoughtful strategizing can go a long way. Can you imagine if coaches never prepared for games with their team? The games would be a mess. The same holds true for your 2022 year. Knowing HOW to plan, prepare, and set goals is a whole other thing though. That's exactly what I'll teach you in today's podcast. Enjoy!

When I think about the things that hurt my progress the most through out my jazz piano pursuit there are 4 things that come to mind. And I dont mean, me sitting on the couch with my hand on my chin wondering. I mean like BAM! These 4 things DIRECTLY come to my mind because they're so blatantly obvious now that I can see them and know of them. In episode 2 of my new mini series I'm going to explain what these 4 things are. They're STILL, to this day, very heavily rearing their ugly head and the more you can be aware of them...the better off you'll be so you don't go through what I did for 15 years. Enjoy!