Complete Blues Keyboard Method: Beginning Blues Keyboard (CD) Review

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(More customer reviews)This is one of the best beginning blues instruction books I've found. It teaches a bit of blues theory and provides the basic framework for the blues, but Tricia also provides the beginner with a few blues tunes to play. You can find books with advanced blues songs (from established performers) and you can find books with blues "riffs"....but you won't find many bookes for beginners that have good sounding, playable, blues tunes. Ms. Woods delivers on all fronts.

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Product Description:
Anyone with basic keyboard skills (equivalent to Alfred's Basic Piano, Lesson Book 2) can dig right in and begin learning blues right away. Learn what it takes to create the distinctive sound of the blues, including basic chords and scales, blues melodies, improvisation, turnarounds and intros. Other topics include the 12-bar blues form, walking bass and playing in a band.Full of fun blues tunes to play, Beginning Blues Keyboard provides a step-by-step enjoyable way to learn the blues. 96 pages.

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Blues Piano: Hal Leonard Keyboard Style Series (Keyboard Instruction) Review

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(More customer reviews)I got this book along with a number of other blues books, and this one has been my favorite.It doesn't contain as much material as the multivolume Alfred series, but I find the organization, presentation, and *especially* the examples to be superior in Mark's work.The way the examples build section by section and chapter by chapter is exquisite.They are musically interesting yet very focused on the point at hand--I always enjoyed playing through the examples, but was never confused by unnecessary complications.

The companion CD is the best I've seen in any music instruction book, ever.Most examples have the left and right hand parts on the left and right channels, so you can mute one speaker or the other for "hands seperate" practicing.I personally don't use this much, as I prefer to work it out with the metronome, but I'm glad it's there and you may appreciate it.On tracks that have a backing band, the band is on one side and the keyboard on the other so you can play along to just the band.Finally, the "complete" examples at the end of the book feature a "slow" and "fast" version on the CD.One nitpick: I wish he'd included (in the text) the metronome settings he used, making it easier to practice/jam without the CD.

I've got several of the Hal Leonard books in this series, and they're not all by Mark Harrison.His books are definitely a cut above.All in all, if you have any interest in the subject whatsoever, you can't go wrong with this book.

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Product Description:
Ever wanted to play the blues, but weren't sure where to start? Blues Piano will teach you the basic skills you need. From comping to soloing, you'll learn the theory, the tools, and even the tricks that the pros use. And, you get seven complete tunes to jam on. Listen to the CD, then start playing along! Covers: scales and chords; left-hand patterns; walking bass; endings and turnarounds; right-hand techniques; how to solo with blues scales; crossover licks; and more.

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Blues & Jazz Complete Review

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(More customer reviews)Dr. Konowitz presents a thorough, pedagogically sound introduction to blues and jazz. The book is spiral bound, so it lays flat on your music stand. A variety of blues and jazz techniques are meticulously illustrated. New chords are introduced with a nice full page guide to the keyboard fingering. It is a bit cookie cutter, but having the fingering written out below and above the staffs is a plus. My only complaint is that the "band" seems to be a cheesy concoction of General MIDI instruments played through an inadequate sound engine. The CD sound quality is irritating. One word of extra advice: You will not need the CD for the companion book, Chords Complete, because it only contains incidental backing rhythm tracks for the chord exercises. I have four books authored byKonowitz. The sound quality of the CDs are uniformly cheesy except for the Listen and Learn Blues Book published in 2002.

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Product Description:
Save lots of time searching for ways to play Blues and Jazz.All you need to know to begin playing these great styles is carefully organized here by master teacher and performer Bert Konowitz.Learn to play blues scales, chord voicing, progressions, left-hand accompaniments and improv techniques.Unlock the basics of Latin, Rock, Bebop, Pop Ballads and Fusion styles. Start playing Blues and Jazz now!

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David Bennett Cohen Teaches Blues Piano (Listen & Learn) Review

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(More customer reviews)I bought this book based on the good feedback that was left here and I am absolutely thrilled with it.I am at an "intermediate" level of piano playing and found the instructions and exercizes extremely well done.He breaks it down into steps that you can actually follow, and you will learn to improvise too.I was able to play something that sounded really good in a short time.Now I have a piano teacher who works with me with this book, she thinks it's great too.The CD makes all the difference.I always wated to play blues and boogie woogie piano, and this is the book I've been looking for!I have book two as well and it looks good too but I haven't gotten there yet.

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Product Description:
This easy play-along follow-up to Blues Piano, Volume 1 is the learning blues pianistÕs ticket to the next level! David Cohen helps develop the powerful grooves beloved by blues and rock nÕ roll players alike. His unique step-by-step teaching method is modular, building logically on each preceding section. Once the basics are mastered, adding walking basses, boogie woogie lines, New Orleans-style rhumba rhythms, 9th chords, "the Fats Domino shuffle" and other variations become second nature. LEVEL 3

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Bebop Jazz Piano: Hal Leonard Keyboard Style Series Review

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(More customer reviews)I have a few of the other books in this series and find them all great! John Valerio is a wonderful composer and teacher and has a very similar style to Mark Harrison (another composer in this series). This book includes important information about chords, voicings, harmony, chord progressions, scales, tonality, melodic figures and patters, comping, characteristic tunes, styles of Bud Powell and Theolonious Monk...anything that is used in any type of bebop jazz. It goes through the history and evolution of Bebop. The book moves quickly but provides the information that is important. It comes with a very handy CD which allows to hear what it's supposed to sound like. I highly recommend this book and have found that using it with some of the other books in the series is beyond helpful!

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Product Description:
In this book in the Hal Leonard Keyboard Style Series, author John Valerio provides essential, detailed information for bebop and jazz pianists on the following topics: chords and voicings, harmony and chord progressions, scales and tonality, common melodic figures and patterns, comping, characteristic tunes, the styles of Bud Powell and Thelonious Monk, and much more. The accompanying CD features many of the examples in the book performed either solo or with a full band. Also included are combo performances of five of the tunes featured at the end of the book.

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Improvising Blues Piano Review

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(More customer reviews)This is a great book! I'm a beginning/intermediate piano player, I went through the first two Alfred's All-in-One Adult piano books and really enjoyed them (and recommend them!). But I found myself at a fork in the road: I was happy to continue memorizing "pieces", and practicing "technique", but I found myself wanting to know more about improvising. I play drums in a blues band, and I've had some music theory for keyboard percussion, so I'm not a total musical-novice. I tried out some other books (Mark Harrison's "Blues Piano: Hal Leonard Keyboard Style Series", but it's still a little over my head, perhaps in a year or so it'll be good for me. Also "David Bennett Cohen Teaches Blues Piano: A Hands-On Course in Traditional Blues Piano", but it really didn't light my fire either, and if I recall correctly, didn't have finger markings which I still find helpful.)This book pulls it all together for me: some blues music theory, some blues history, clearly-marked "assignments", a CD included, (a spiral binding that lays flat on the stand!) ... I'm hooked!

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Product Description:
The basic principles of blues piano explained for the intermediate-level pianist in an easy-to-grasp fashion.

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Progressive Rock Keyboard: Hal Leonard Keyboard Style Series Review

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(More customer reviews)I don't why anyone has'nt written a review for this book yet. Its perfect, and the accompanying CD is so helpful to help learn the rhythms of progressive rock keyboard. I would greatly recommend this book if you are sick of playing yankee doodle or any other book with boring sheet music. Contained in the book is an adequate description of the genre and presents perfect examples that you can learn. I found this book very satisfying and not too hard. I also have the rock keyboard and find that one great as well. So do buy these books.

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Product Description:
From the classic sounds of the '70s to modern progressive stylings, this book/CD provides you with the theory and technique to play and compose in a multitude of prog rock styles. You'll learn how soloing techniques, form, rhythmic and metrical devices, harmony, and counterpoint all come together to make this style of rock the unique and exciting genre it is. Also included is an introduction to classic and contemporary keyboard instruments and sounds, and how they can be used in different combinations to produce authentic-sounding keyboard parts. The accompanying CD features many of the examples covered in the book, as well as six complete progressive rock songs recorded by a real band.

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How To Play Boogie Woogie Piano (Music Sales America) Review

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(More customer reviews)I have been playing piano for ten years and I finally decided it was time to move away from classical music and try something new. I looked into several Boogie Woogie books and ended up buying this one about a week ago.

This book has a wonderful collection of songs which are fun to play and sound like professional pieces. The book orders the songs from easy to the more difficult to help build on your skills.

The music is not hard at all. Most of the time the same bass pattern is kept in the left hand while the right hand plays the melody. There are no tricky fingerings or even rhythms. The pieces are all in either C, F, or G (from one flat to one sharp) and use familiar notes and chords. The difficulty of this book is a 6 on a scale from 1 to 10 - 10 being the hardest.

This book is perfect for beginners - beginning piano players, maybe not - but if you've never tried Boogie Woogie before and are looking for something new, this book is for you.

Anyone who has taken a year or more of piano lessons should have no problem with this book.

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Product Description:
A collection of 14 boogie woogie solos for piano, with tips on playing technique. They include such favorites as Barrel House Boogie, Tommy DorseyÂ's Boogie Woogie, and Bad Penny Blues.

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Jazz-Blues Piano: The Complete Guide with CD! Hal Leonard Keyboard Style Series Review

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(More customer reviews)I've been playing jazz piano for about two years now, and have had great success with The Jazz Piano Book (as one might imagine). The next book that has served me well is Post-Bop Jazz Piano - The Complete Guide with CD!: Hal Leonard Keyboard Style Series, which is from the same series as the Jazz Blues Piano book under review. So, when I began looking for a book to help me sound bluesy, something noticeably lacking from my skill set, I gravitated toward this book for that reason and because my piano instructor didn't have this book (although he had many others in the same series). I have to say, that overnight, this became my favorite book to work from. There are a lot of reasons for that. First is that this book contains a good dose of easy-to-digest jazz music theory and explanation. The student can choose to skip over this and concentrate on playing the exercises, but I chose to read everything carefully and to try and understand and apply it, and I found it very useful. I was also quite pleasantly surprised when I found myself playing a ii-V-I progression (the backbone of jazz music) in a fashion I had never been shown before (with a moving bass note changing the mode of the chord). I was fascinated, and it made it easy for me to work on doing it in all twelve keys (which is normally drudgery), and to quickly press on in the book. As I played through the exercises, read through the material, then reached the exercises that are on the CD, I kept working on the suggested chords. Because I'm not a raw beginner, the first twenty pages went very quickly, and all of a sudden I found myself at about twenty pages in on exercise 9practicing a straight up blues lick. That's right: two hours and I was playing blues. Very, very exciting. Like all piano books, including a number I have reviewed, this still requires practice and stick-to-itive-ness, but this book provides some small rewards on every page, which I find quite motivational and desirable. I can easily picture myself working through this entire book in a relatively short period of time. Beginning piano students will still need to work on some of this material with an instructor, but anybody with a good technical foundation in piano and at least a small amount of jazz knowledge should be able to work through most of this by themselves, thanks to the useful and well executed CD. Although there are many options and levels available, if you want to sound jazzy or bluesy, without a lot of fuss and without spending a lot of money or time, I really think this book is the best and simplest place to start.

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Product Description:
This comprehensive book/CD pack will teach you the basic skills needed to play jazz-blues piano. From comping to soloing, you'll learn the theory, the tools, and the tricks used by the pros. The accompanying CD features many of the examples in the book performed either solo, or with a full band, including a full chapter of complete songs. Topics covered include: scales and chords * harmony and voicings * progressions and comping * melodies and soloing * characteristic stylings.

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Beginning Blues Piano (Music Sales America) Review

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(More customer reviews)Amazon, to balance two bogus reviews from:

A Reviewer: Chris (Dorset,england) -
B Reviewer: Joshua Carter (Lafayette, CO USA)

Obviously someone wrote two fake reviews under two different names:

Compare:
Chris: bought this book about 3 weeks ago, and I've been having a load of fun with it. I needed something that would be reasonably easy to play,

Joshua; bought this book about 2 weeks ago, and I've been having a bunch of fun with it. I wanted something that would be reasonably easy to play, but still be interesting.

then compare:
Chris; About half the songs are in C, the other half in pretty easy keys, so you don't get tangled up in reading the music

Joshua; About half the songs are in C, the other half in pretty easy keys, so I don't get tangled up in reading the music.

then compare:

Chris; You can tell he loves this music, loves its roots, and he wants you to love it, too.

Joshua; you can tell he loves this music, loves its roots, and he wants you to love it, too.

The only original sentence is a plug for his other book:

Joshua; I just bought Eric Kriss' other book, "Barrelhouse and Boogie Piano," ....

If someone can't put enough time into creating simple reviews to make them different, they won't put much time into writing their book.

My experience is , I purchased several similar books, including those by David Bennett CohenandMark Harrison..
both of those were far better books.

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Product Description:
Expert blues piano teacher and player, Eric Kriss presents a step-by-step format of the major styles and techniques essential for mastering the blues. He explains chord structure, tonality, bass lines, slides, and syncopation.

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Barrelhouse and Boogie Piano (Music Sales America) Review

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(More customer reviews)The transcriptions of some of the greatest barrelhouse and blues pianists such as Jelly Roll Morton, Meade Lux Lewis, Memphis Slim, along with their history are in this music book.
There is also a tantalizing CD of samples of the pieces in the book as played by the great blues pianists. This gives essential information as to how the syncopation and rubato sounds in the hands of the masters. The only problem is that as the snippet gets going, you really want to hear the entire piece and whammo! It's only a few seconds per piece, 12 minutes in all. Why oh why couldn't they put at least a few complete works on the CD?
Other than that quibble, this is a great book for blues piano, though greats such as Roosevelt Sykes are to be found in a companion volume, not in this one.
A must for blues lovers who play keyboard.

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Product Description:
An important instruction guide to the blues-style piano by the author of Six Blues Roots Pianists. Complete with music transcriptions and excerpts from the original recordings of 22 piano greats.

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